Bosanski jezik?

[Cynthia Simmons]

I have been following the discussion of "bosanski jezik" with interest, and
we have been reminded of the problematic history of the languages of the
former Yugoslavia.  But I long ago abandoned the traditional
"Serbo-Croatian," even if it is linguistically more satisfying, and
attempted to reflect in the nomenclature the changing situation in (the now
ex-) Yugoslavia.  I think we should respect the old adage that "a language
is a dialect with an army."  I desribe what I speak as Croatian, but I refer
to the various linguistic entities (for there is a way to describe them as
such) as bosanski, hrvatski, i srpski jezici (in alphabetical order), and I
would call a language course, if I were to teach one again soon, something
like Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian Languages.  This may turn out to be a
transitional solution, but for the time being, I think Slavists need to
respect the political reality.
Cynthia Simmons

--On Mar 12 1998, Thu 16.54 -0500 "Wayles Browne" <ewb2 at cornell.edu> wrote:

> We have to distinguish "standard language" from other meanings of
> "language". I teach a course which is still called "Serbo-Croatian"
> in the Cornell course catalog. My information sheet for students
> explains the situation as follows:
> "What kind of language are we learning?
> The linguistic raw material is practically the same, but different
> standard languages were made by different groups of people in
> different places. Our book [David Norris, _Serbo-Croat, A Complete
> Course for Beginners_] begins with the standard form used in
> Croatia. The standard form in Bosnia is similar to that of Croatia
> except for some choices of words and differences in 'accent';
> I will give samples of it too. There are samples of the standard
> form used in Serbia later on in the book. The traditional alphabet
> in Serbia and Montenegro is C'IRILICA, Cyrillic (similar to Russian
> letters). Students will learn to read Cyrillic before the end of
> the first year."
>
> An interesting characteristic of Norris's book is that it was written
> and published in Britain. Therefore when the students see "flat" or
> "tram" or "speciality" or "return ticket" in the book, I can
> make the point that _u americ"kom standardnom jeziku_ these are
> "apartment" and "streetcar" and "specialty" and "round-trip
> ticket".
> For the purposes of classifying the Germanic languages, there
> is only one English language. From the point of view of users,
> standard British is slightly different from standard American;
> intercommunication is usually possible, but sometimes breaks down.
> From the point of view of teaching, no American would be able to teach
> standard British to foreigners without making occasional mistakes,
> and no Britisher would be able to teach standard American to
> foreigners without making mistakes.
> The situation is the same with Serbo-Croatian. There are reference
> books for standard Croatian, for standard Serbian, and recently also
> for standard Bosnian (Senahid Halilovic', _Pravopis bosanskoga jezika_,
> Sarajevo: Preporod 1996, now adopted as the standard for schools).
> No e.g. Zagreb person would be able to teach standard Serbian or
> standard Bosnian without occasional mistakes.
>
>>Hello,
>>
>>Recently, I've encountered the term "bosanski jezik" several times,
>>including a title of a small dictionary....How do slavicists see the
current
>>linguistic situation of the region?
>>
>
>>MIYAMOTO Ken, or Ken C. Miyamoto
>
>
>
> Wayles Browne, Assoc. Prof., Department of Linguistics
> Morrill Hall, Cornell University
> Ithaca, New York 14853, U.S.A.
> tel. 1-607-255-0712, home 1-607-273-3009
> fax 1-607-255-2044 (write FOR W. BROWNE)
> e-mail ewb2 at cornell.edu



Prof Cynthia Simmons
Slavic & Eastern Languages
Boston College / Lyons Hall 210
Chestnut Hill MA 02167-3804 (USA)
   tel: +1-617 / 552.3914     fax: +1-617 / 552.2286
   eMail: simmonsc at bc.edu