The Cultural Codes of Pashto in Khushal Khan’s Poetry

Abstract

Khushal Khan Khattak is a prolific writer, poet, politician, and community leader of Pashtun nation. He, as a leader, understood the spirit and soul of the Pashtuns at that time. So, his poems have all the cultural codes of the Pashtun nation. For example: Challenge, honor, masculinity, hospitality, shame, modesty, honesty, unity and love.

A few hundred years ago, the cultural codes, which described in his poems, are almost still present in the Pashtun community. The main reason being the backwardness of the Pashtun nation and their society, is because the cultural codes change as society changes. The society of Pashtun nation does not chance until today. It has its old shape as two or three hundred year ago.

There are a lot of codes that we can find in both, also in the poems of Khushal Khan Khatak and in the space of Pashtun nation. There are not the most of the codes in Western societies nowadays, because these codes that are often considered in Islamic countries.