To What Degree Are Croatian and Serbian the Same Language?: Evidence from a Translation Study

Abstract

This article reports on the results of an experimental translation study conducted in 2008 in which 16 adult native speakers of the Croatian variant of Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS) were asked to translate nine texts from the Serbian BCS variant into their native Croatian variant in order to test the extent to which Croatian and Serbian do or do not employ distinct linguistic devices. The results show, on the basis of a statistical comparison of the purely grammatical building blocks in the original texts and their translations, that the Croatian and Serbian variants of BCS have essentially identical linguistic systems across all levels of language structure. In particular, we find that the phonological and syntactic systems are essentially identical and that over 98% of derivational and inflectional morphology tokens are identical. Lexically, the open classes show a difference of less than 10% of tokens, whereas the closed grammatical classes show identity in over 95% of cases.

1 | 1 | 2021

“…The term however has been sidelined in this paper to prevent the emergence of unwarranted political associations. The Author of the present study acknowledges the scientific validity of the views stated in the Declaration on the Common Language (Deklaracija o zajedničkom jeziku) and supports the general claim that Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian, and Montenegrin should be viewed as national variants (each with equal rights) of the same standard South Slavic polycentric language (for more technical evidence in support of this claim see also Bailyn 2010). The text of the Declaration is available at the following link: https://jezicinacionalizmi.…”

Cross-cultural adaptation and reproducibility of the EPIC-Norfolk food frequency questionnaire in young people living in Croatia

“…The traditional food pattern in these countries is similar to the Mediterranean diet, with a distinct influence of western cuisine and food processing industry ( 29 ). Although the Croatian language is similar to the languages spoken in neighboring countries (Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro) ( 32 ), each language developed through time, and some terms in the Croatian language used in this FFQ could differ from terms in other similar languages in the region. However, most people are familiar with linguistic peculiarities of languages spoken in other countries in the region.…”

Does Language Foster Reconciliation? Evidence From the Former Yugoslavia

“…This difference allows the identity and communication effects of the language to be separated. Since these are all essentially the same language (Bailyn, 2010), the level of communication is held constant regardless of what the respondent calls it. However, someone who uses the term 'Serbo-Croatian', which was the name of the language during the Yugoslav-era and is associated with pan-Yugoslav unity (Greenberg, 2004), is likely expressing a greater sense of shared identity with the other groups.…”

“…In the short term, no amount of relabelling the local varieties of Serbo-Croatian as separate ‘languages’ can change the fact that they remain mutually intelligible with one another in the same way that British English is intelligible with American English. Linguists note that they are ‘essentially identical’ (Bailyn, 2010). In the long run, concerted efforts by language planners can reduce the mutual intelligibility between language varieties which were once near-identical, as occurred between Hindi and Urdu (King, 2001), but there is little evidence that this has yet occurred between the varieties of Serbo-Croatian.…”