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the bottom of the page (above the grass), are the letters of the Iranian alphabet, which enable users to search through the database of pre-existing words.
The site is imbued with the rainbow colours of the gay rights movement, as these are also particularly resonant in the
Iranian context. Each word in the glossary is linked to a ‘share’ button facilitating its distribution on social networks. This
will encour-age site users to take the discussion and debate
surrounding the issues raised by their visit to the glossary back
to their own social spaces, in turn promoting an atmosphere of openness when it comes to gay issues.
Each new word to be added to the glossary is submitted
alongside a meaning, a context of use, an example sentence,
synonyms, a pronunciation guide and an indication of whether the word has a positive or negative connotation. The word is
moderated before being added to the site. In addition to asking
LGBT Iranians to contribute to the glossary, we also approached reputable linguists who agreed to participate on the grounds that their identity would be kept anonymous. They have
contributed a number of Middle and Old Persian words that
are no longer in use and are facing extinction. We opted to use Pinglish (where Persian words are spelled out using the Latin
alphabet) for the pronunciation guide, as none of our respondents were familiar with reading standardised phonetics.