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Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrian, Serbian | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| blindsheep Triglot Senior Member Spain Joined 6156 days ago 503 posts - 507 votes  Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: German | Message 41 of 47 21 July 2007 at 6:37pm | IP Logged | ||
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Differences_between_standard_Se rbian,_Croatian_and_Bosnian
I think one could reasonably refer to Croatian and Serbian as two separate 'official' dialects... but are they separate languages? It seems quite obvious linguistically that they are not... therefore it's obviously someone's vested political interests that drives them to identify them as distinct languages... There seems for example, to be more diversity linguistically between for example, Ebonics and Standard English than between Serbian and Croatian... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_American_Vernacular_Eng lish I don't understand why people can't adopt the attitude that they are linguistically the same language, while accepting that they still obviously vary in some ways and people may be sensitive about its label... ie: call it Serbian in Serbia and Croatian in Croatia if you don't want to start a potential debate, anger people... etc... Although, seriously I'd hope we'd be making an effort to move away from nationalism... oh wait, I forgot to sew my Canadian flag on my backpack, speak my 'stereo typical Canadian expressions' that sound 'more comfortable' to me and take drip Canadian pride in using them... etc... Where are my special Canadian translations that have the word 'color' spelt 'correctly' with the 'u' in it... How dare I have to hear about people putting on their jumpers and trousers and erasing things with their rubbers... damn crazy wrong speaking British... its all far to foreign, strange, and evil for my intolerant self... oh... and lets get rid of all colloquial language in books... its not 'official English'... so obviously those people speaking like that just need a 'proper education' to speak their own language correctly... lets just fix the grammar so a poor uneducated person expresses themselves without slang and the grammar of an english literature university graduate.... It has really began to start bothering me when people say "Are you from the united states...?," I say "no, canada," and then they apologize for insulting me... Obviously the differences between a typical accent of my region and 'standard Hollywood accent' or whatever it is are almost indistinguishable... and if by chance I happened to be born in the United States, that certainly doesn't make me a lesser human being and something which other people are to be insulted with... I really don't think there is ANY point to taking offence to something like this... hate governments, the military, manipulation of the public, a lack of democracy, our treatment of the environment... things we at least have some control over that won't just breed intolerance towards other human beings... 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| zorglub Pentaglot Senior Member France Joined 6796 days ago 441 posts - 504 votes 1 sounds Speaks: French*, English, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: German, Arabic (Written), Turkish, Mandarin | Message 42 of 47 31 July 2007 at 7:31am | IP Logged | ||
WHAT ??? If you allow this evil idea to grow, then some will say they speak Swiss or Belgian or COngolais instead of French! No way ! Kust kidding of course 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Taiga Diglot Groupie Australia Joined 6106 days ago 81 posts - 85 votes 5 sounds Speaks: English, Spanish Studies: Russian, Serbo-Croatian | Message 43 of 47 22 August 2007 at 10:23pm | IP Logged | ||
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OK here's my 2 cents:
I've been hanging out with Bosnians and Serbs in Australia. Based on my experiences, the "inclusive" ones often use "Nashki" for "Serbo-Croatian-Bosnian-Montenegrin" language, "nash" for a male and "nasha" for a female. However, the "nationalistic" or the "Exclusive" ones would rather use their national terms like "Serbian", "Croatian" or "Bosnian". So it's just a matter of personal opinions. It's advisable to find out their opinions of the matter before you pick the terms. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| reineke Senior Member United States https://learnalangua Joined 6243 days ago 851 posts - 1008 votes Studies: German | Message 44 of 47 24 August 2007 at 1:12am | IP Logged | ||
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One reason for using this term would be to be tactful with guests, friends and usage also depends on the context and speaker's background. I don't think it's really necessary to worry too much about this subject. Edited by reineke on 24 August 2007 at 1:24am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| winters Trilingual Heptaglot Senior Member Italy Joined 6840 days ago 199 posts - 218 votes Speaks: Croatian*, Serbian*, Russian*, English, Italian, Latin, Ancient Greek Studies: Greek, French, Hungarian | Message 45 of 47 24 August 2007 at 11:31am | IP Logged | ||
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This debate seems never to end, does it?
As someone who was brought up on the edges of cultures, has had both Serbian and Croatian as their native tongues, and has spent some time in - or at least visited - pretty much the entire area of where the so-called "Serbo-Croat" is spoken, let me repeat it once more: Culturally, you can consider them different languages, because each has got a culture 'attached' to it and in that specific context, that specific 'form' of the language can be viewed as its own 'unity', a language connected to the culture. Linguistically, they are all variations of one language, to various degrees, though mutually intelligible. If you neglect the issue of culture, you can consider them to be one language in several official forms. Taiga, I have lived in the former Yugoslavia for over a decade and half, in various places, and I have never heard anyone to seriously use the term naški (other than in jokes or a couple of expressions), let alone in any bit more formal situation. Like it or not, naming the language Croatian/Serbian instead of words such as "naški" has absolutely nothing to do with "openess" of a person, so it would probably be better not to draw such conclusions, based on chats with diaspora for which it is logical that they would tend to be more nationalistic (believe it or not, the "greatest Croats" in terms of velikohrvatstvo I have ever met were members of diaspora), which would be laughable had the national issue not provoked a lot of mess quite recently. Personally I tend to view the issue from the "cultural" approach and thus use distinctive terms for each, and view each as separated one, despite their mutual intelligibility. Also, keep in mind that the languages are "basically the same" only on one very 'basic conversational' level (and often not on that one too). I have not met a single Croatian child, brought up in Croatia with strictly Croatian as their native tongue, who was able to write a school composition in what is referred to as "Standard Serbian language" - a lot of them thought that "it was basically the same language", but when I corrected their works and started to explain to them how many lexical items are different, how many subtle grammatical things are involved... They gave it up and admitted it wasn't as easy as they thought it would be. And they were native speakers of what you call "Serbo-Croat", remember. Even if we understand each other's language, we feel the differences, especially people like me who were schooled both in "Serbian" and "Croatian". Understanding a language is one thing, active comptence is another thing; and I know very little people who actually speak both properly. Most of them just likes to think they speak B/C/S, but if you tested them, they would have an awful lot of mistakes both in grammar and vocabulary, which only proves how they are not confident with it unless they were in situations to use it often, or grew up with it, or moved to their respective countries. True, with some reading, usage, studying the differences and "getting used to the language" through exposure, they can quickly pick BCS in different standard form than their native one - but, if they do not do it, they do not actually speak it, despite what they like to think. They just understand, as if they would understand any other Slavic language, only this time to exceptional degree, followed by possibility of communicating freely with its speakers whilst each speaks their own language. I realise that for foreigners it is easier to "group" the languages under "Serbo-Croat" and teach them that way, but from what I have seen in such textbooks... Sorry, no good impressions so far. The impression I got was usually that it was either Serbian they taught masqued as "Serbo-Croat", either funny mixture of BCS which presented to me and my friends materials to frown at. Choose one form and learn it properly, that would be my advice. You are going to end up understanding other forms as well anyway. ;-)
Has it ever occured to you that maybe they are viewed as distinct for cultural reasons? (Croatia and Serbia, believe me my friend I lived in both, are two different worlds, no matter what anyone tries to convince you into... and it goes beyond religion and script - it creeps literally into everyday life culture, culture and art throughout history, etc... They are two very, very different countries culturally) For historical reasons? "Serbo-Croat" was an artificial political creature (you certainly know if you studied a history of languages that it was somebody's political interest to bring them together in the first place?), and a way to 'unite' languages, not to mention how much in that "uniting" certain languages' (*coughs*) specific forms were violated for the benefit of making one language out of them all. --- To speak entirely honestly with you all, I despise this need for oversimplification of things in spite of the context, cultural context, because to say that they are the same language is precisely that - oversimplification. Blatant oversimplification done without regards to any history (of the countries as well as languages), any culture, any art, any literature, anything... To be linguistically objective is one thing (I admitted myself that in current standard forms they can, indeed, be viewed as variants of one language), but to willfully ignore these things, and draw conclusions that, oh, we all there must be nationalists to insist on the name of Croatian or Serbian language, because, oh, to you it sounds and seems all the same, without questioning that maybe, just maybe, we have reasons beyond nationalism to insists on those forms, and that maybe, just maybe, as native speakers and people who grew up on the territory of former Yugoslavia, we have better chances of "being right"? And even if we were not right, those are our languages, and we have the right to name them whatever the hell we please without being accused of nationalism. So good if you study our languages, I am flattered by that, but please do not go around after having finished your average course claiming "it's all the same language" (or even better, without having finished it and speaking out of prejudices!), "it should be named X", 'cause guess what? That is up to us, and such statements go beyond your "field", unless you have academic comptence in our languages. Most of the people who oversimplificate things haven't got an idea of how deeply wrong they are in many of the things they claim, and people like me usually don't bother to argue with them. Not that I am referring to anyone on this forum, but summing up my general non-online experiences with foreigners for many of whom I got an impression that they are allowing themselves too much in their desire to "inform us" of how is the language we speak called and how is it the same as X. One foreigner, who can barely use the language correctly in basic situations, is certainly not going to tell me what is my language, how should it be called, etc. That is what makes people angry, not the fact that you have got a different opinion, nor the fact that they are nationalists. (And I apologise if the general tone of this message seems to be confrontative - it was not my intention, I just do not know how to word it differently.) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Taiga Diglot Groupie Australia Joined 6106 days ago 81 posts - 85 votes 5 sounds Speaks: English, Spanish Studies: Russian, Serbo-Croatian | Message 46 of 47 24 August 2007 at 5:07pm | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks for the info, Winters.
I just spoke based on my experiences with the diaspora from former-Yugoslavia in the city I live in. As the city is predominantly "Anglo-Celtic", the community is quite small compared to other major cities , but big enough to have a "Jugo night ". So when the Bosnians, Croats and Serbs get together, they use "nashki" and "Nash" a lot but when everyone in the group belong to the same ethnicity, then they use their respective term ( Hrvatski, Srpski, Bosanski). That's what I've observed here anyway. How does it work up there in Europe? I've met Balkanci who have the same perspectives as yours and the ones who keep insisting the "languages" are just "Dialects" and they are "one people" I reckon there's no right or wrong answer in this matter. It's just a matter of how you look at it. So I'll just be listening and leave you to your perspectives. Talking about the BIggest Croats are the ones in overseas, LMAO LMAO I can perfectly understand what you meant. I don't know about USA or Canada, but in here I've met the most nationalistic Croats. You might have heard the clash between Serbian and Croatian audiences during Melbourne open tennis match not long ago, which is a perfect example. Ironically, a lot of them actually have lost in touch with the current culture in their parents' homeland and I can communicate with their grandparents better than they do. Edited by Taiga on 24 August 2007 at 5:22pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| reineke Senior Member United States https://learnalangua Joined 6243 days ago 851 posts - 1008 votes Studies: German | Message 47 of 47 24 August 2007 at 6:04pm | IP Logged | ||
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Winters, was that "from heart?" :)
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