ORANSKIJ, Iosif Mihajlovič. Petrograd 24.4./3.5.1923 — Leningrad 16.5.1977. Russian Iranian Scholar. Son of official. In 1941-45 in the army, wounded. Graduated 1948 from Leningrad, student of Frejman. Kand. filol. nauk 1951, Docent 1953, Dr. 1967, Professor 1973. In 1948-51 taught at Leningrad University and 1951-55 at Tadzhik University (where the anti-Jewish politics of late Stalinism forced him to move), 1955-59 at Stalinabad (Dushanbe) Pedagogical Institute. From 1959 naučnyj sotrudnik at Oriental Institute, Leningrad, 1962 staršij n. sotr.

Oranskij was a many-sided scholar, whose work comprised the entire field of Iranian linguistics. In Tadzhikistan he discovered the until then unknown Indo-Aryan Parya language in the Hissar Valley.

Publications: At least 80 publications, i.al.

– Kand.diss. Grammatičeskie kategorii vida i kratnosti v glagol’noj sisteme afganskogo jazyka (pašto). Manuscript 1951 (cf. Uč. Zap. Tadž. Un. 2, 1954, 201-233).

– Dr.diss.: Indoiranskie dialekty Gissarskoj doliny (Indijskij dialekt par’ja, govory i argo tadžikojazyčnyh ètnografičeskih grupp). Materialy i issledonavija. 1-3. 273+ 316+514 p. Lg. 1967.

– Vvedenie v iranskuju filologiju. 490 p. M. 1960, 2nd ed. 389 p. M. 1988; Iranskie jazyki. 192 p. M. 1963 (also in French and Italian).

– “A folk-tale in the Indo-Aryan Parya dialect”, E & W 20, 1970, 169-178.

– Die neuiranischen Sprachen der Sovjetunion. 266 p. the Hague 1975; Iranskie jazyki v istoričeskom osveščenii. 238 p. M. 1979.

– Tadžikojazyčnye ètnografičeskie gruppy Gissarskoj doliny. Srednjaja Azija. Ètnolingvističeskoe issledovanie. 238 p. M. 1983.

Sources: Miliband 1977; I. M. Steblin-Kamenskij, HAA 1977:6, 238f. and Encyclop. Iranica 2005 (online); both English and Russian Wikipedia only briefly (Russian with photo).