Laz people

Laz, Lazi
(ლაზი, ლაზეფე)
Statue of a Laz man and woman in Arhavi (Ark'abi), Turkey
Regions with significant populations
 Turkey103,900 (Ethnologue, 2019)[1]
 Georgia1,000 (2007)[1]
 Germany1,000 (2007)[1]
 Russia160 (2010)[2]
Languages
Laz, Georgian, Turkish
Religion
In Turkey: majority Sunni Islam[3]
In Georgia: majority Georgian Orthodox[4]
Related ethnic groups
Georgians (especially Mingrelians), Pontic Greeks

The Laz people, or Lazi (Laz: ლაზი Lazi; Georgian: ლაზი, lazi; or ჭანი, ch'ani; Turkish: Laz), are a Kartvelian ethnic group native to the South Caucasus, who mainly live in Black Sea coastal regions of Turkey and Georgia. They traditionally speak the Laz language (which is a member of the Kartvelian language family) but have experienced a rapid language shift to Turkish.

Of the 103,900 ethnic Laz in Turkey, only around 20,000 speak Laz and the language is classified as threatened (6b) in Turkey and shifting (7) in Georgia on the Expanded Graded Intergenerational Disruption Scale.[1]

  1. ^ a b c d "Laz". Ethnologue. Retrieved 4 July 2022.
  2. ^ Национальный состав населения [2010 Census: Ethnic composition of the population] (in Russian). Russian Federal State Statistics Service. Archived from the original (PDF) on 6 September 2018. Retrieved 31 January 2015.
  3. ^ Roger Rosen, Jeffrey Jay Foxx, The Georgian Republic, Passport Books (September 1991)
  4. ^ "ЛАЗЫ СССР И ГРУЗИИ: ПЕРИПЕТИИ ИСТОРИЧЕСКИХ СУДЕБ - Кавказ: новости, история,традиции". www.kavkazoved.info.