From: dmatic@athena.mit.edu (Davor Matic)
Subject: Re: Serbian language
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 17:13:53 GMT

>>>It is true that Croats generally use "ije" and "je" (ijekavica),
>>>whereas Serbs use "e" (ekavica) but that is not a difference in
>>>the language, but a difference in dialect. I speak English as
>>>fluently as Serbian/Croatian but have a very hard time understanding
>>>somebody from south London (Cockney accent), the languages are
>>>undoubtably the same, though. The same applies to the Australian
>>>dialect.
>>
>>I am not talking about the same phenomenon.  There is plenty of
>>difference in vocabulry for someone who learns Serbian only not to be
>>able to understand Croatian.  Another difference is that I'm talking
>>about two literary languages.  Cockney is not literary English.  It's
>>a slang.  Croatian is not a slang of Serbian.  Croatian is a separate
>>literary language.  And it is really insulting that one would even
>>consider Croatian a slang of Serbian by comparing it like this.  That
>>is exactly why the languages should have a different name.  Because
>>they are different, and both are literary, used by intelectuals in
>>Serbian or Croatia.
>>
>
>I never meant to say that Croatian is "a slang of Serbian". I apologize
>if it sounded that way. The point I was trying to make is that the
>dialect used "ijekavica" or "ekavica" is not the sole determinant
>of the language in question. Neither is the alphabet. Serbian, for
>example is equally "Serbian" if it is written in the Roman aplhabet.

I know you didn't mean to say that Croatian is a Slang of Serbian, but
to someone who doesn't know anything on this subject, it seams that
way when you compare the differences between Croatian and Serbian to
English and Cockney.  Thanks for the appology.

>I like to think that I speak the Serbian language, but on the other
>hand, I use the "ijekavica" dialect being from Bosnia, even though
>most of the vocabulary is "Serbian". My question then is this
>"Serbian" or "Croatian"? Or is it "S-C" or "C-S". A lot of people
>say that "Serbo-Cr." or "Cro.-Ser." don't exist...
>

OK.  Serbo-Croatian is a Serbian construct.  All the way up and through
high-school in Croatia I was tought "Croatian or Serbian" not
Serbo-Croatian in school.  One could write in either Serbian literary
form or Croatian literary form.  But you couldn't mix them.  You
couldn't spell milk as "mlijeko" and "mleko" in the same essay.
If you did so, my teachers would surely give you a pretty bad grade.

>We also must make the distinction between the literary and spoken
>languages. The differences in the latter are smaller I think, and
>increase as one goes further to the east or west.
>

Well, there is my strongest point.  Serbo-Croatian has two completely
different literary forms, that are not completely interchangable, and
that is ridiculous.  It's either one language with one literary form,
or two different languages.

>Wheteher Serbian and Croatian are "the same" or "different" is, I
>belive, and academic argument. They are not "the same" as in
>"identical" surely, the biggest difference being the vocabulary,
>but to say that they are "different" is also not completely true.
>English and French are two different languages.
>We have to respect our differences, but we shouldn't exaggerate
>them either.
>

I'm not trying to exaggerate.  I'm just defending the right of
Croatian people to their authentic language.  Why should we call our
language Serbo-Croatian if we don't use Serbian literary form at all?
Why should you teach a foreigner Serbo-Croatian (which will be
actually Serbian) if she wants to wisit Croatia?  It won't be usefull
to her at all, and she'll be quite confused.  And the languages will
grow even further appart now since Croatia is independant, the old
banned Croatian vocabulary was restored, and Croats don't have
Serbisms shoved down their throats any more.  

For someone from B&H who speaks a mix of Croatian and Serbian, I guess
the situation is quite confusing.  You can either choose to speak
Croatian or Serbian, or you can call your language Serbo-Croatian
since it is a mix of the two.  But the language spoken in Croatia is
not a mix, it is Croatian.


>>   Regards,
>>   --- Davor
>
>Regards,
>G.B.


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