Language situation in Bosnia&Herzegovina.

[Wayles Browne]

>Dear SEELANGers.
>        Can anyone tell me about the language situation in Bosnia? Is
>Bosnian a
>language?
Yes.
On the basis of language "raw material" which we can call Serbo-Croatian (since
we don't have a better name), more than one standard language has been formed.
In Croatia there is standard Croatian (no other name is acceptable to its
users).
In Serbia there is standard Serbian (most of its users call it this).
In Bosnia-Hercegovina there is standard Bosnian (it used to be a de-facto
standard,
but now it's a de jure standard too, since an official spelling book has been
published and adopted: Senahid Halilovic, Pravopis bosanskoga jezika, Sarajevo:
Preporod 1996).
The differences between the standard languages are not great, and mutual
intelligibility
is almost complete. Some users laugh at the idea of translating from one to
another, and make fun of the small differences, but to others these
are extremely important for their symbolic value.

>When Bosnians say "bosanski", is it refering to their own
>language?

Yes. Many Bosnians I know are no longer happy with the term
"Serbo-Croatian" because it carries the names of other peoples and other
countries, and say "Bosnian" (bosanski jezik), bosanski being the adjective
from Bosna. Some say bos^njac^ki jezik, this being the adjective from Bos^njak
(one of several terms for an inhabitant of Bosnia, and often suggesting
specifically a Moslem Bosnian as distinguished from other inhabitants).

When linguists count languages, they have to be careful. If we are interested
in historical linguistics, we can say "The Serbo-Croatian reflex of the Common
Slavic back nasal vowel is u." and we don't need to think of the differences
between the present-day standard languages. But when we want to teach our
students how to write and speak, it's not really possible to teach them Serbian
usage, Croatian usage, and Bosnian usage all at the same time, so we should
concentrate on one of the standard languages, and perhaps mention the
differences later on.


>Thank you in advance.
>
>
>Sincerely
>
>Syeng-Mann Yoo
>
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Wayles Browne, Assoc. Prof. of Linguistics
Department of Linguistics
Morrill Hall 321, Cornell University
Ithaca, New York 14853, U.S.A.

tel. 607-255-0712 (o), 607-273-3009 (h)
fax 607-255-2044 (write FOR W. BROWNE)
e-mail ewb2 at cornell.edu