Bosanski jezik?

[Robert Beard]

Wayles and I apparently belong to an older tradition of educators,
to which searching for and teaching the truth is held fundamental.
As Wayles demonstrates, that may be done with great sensitivity and
civility. I hope the new tradition, that holds respect for the wishes of
others, even for those of the nationalists who brought us the recent wars
in former Yugoslavia, in the same light as we hold truth, achieves even
greater success than we have managed.  But knowing as I do the reason
for our respect of truth, I worry.

--Bob


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Robert Beard, Director, Linguistics & Russian Studies Programs
Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA 17837
rbeard at bucknell.edu
Office:  717-524-1336  |  Home: 717-524-9260  |  Fax: 717-514-3760
Dictionaries:  http://www.bucknell.edu/~rbeard/diction.html
Russia:        http://www.bucknell.edu/departments/russian/
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-----Original Message-----
From: Cynthia Simmons <simmonsc at bc.edu>
To: SEELANGS at CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU <SEELANGS at CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Date: Sunday, March 15, 1998 10:01 PM
Subject: Re: Bosanski jezik?


>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
>