A real Serbian-vs-Croatian query

[Loren A. Billings]

I've been following the West Balkan/Yogoslav/Serbo-Croatian discussion with
some interest.  I, for one, tend to think that there should be a name that
linguists (i.e., people interested in languiage facts, but not necessarily
about who's right, started the war, sided with the Nazis, etc.) can use
without alienating one group and providing tacit approval either.  Fortunately
for me, I don't work primariy in "SC" and need not refer to it much.  I do
have one query which I'm hoping people would reply to:

The "SC" literary norm, I'm told, is _ni za s^ta_ 'for nothing', while the
colloquial is _za nis^ta_ 'for nothing' [NB:  _s^_ = _s_ with a hac^ek on top].

My source for this is Wayles Browne, whose experience has primarily been in
Croatia, I gather.  His colleague, Draga Zec, whose own backgrownd I don't
know, confirms the existence of the latter, but says it is extremely
substandard.  Recently I spoke with my colleague here at Florida State Univ.,
Herman James, who seems to recall that his "Serbian friends" say the latter
without such a stigma.  Can anyone cast some light on this particular problem?
I'm actually about to send something off on this and would like an accurate
description of the facts.

Incidentally, as linguistics becomes more accurate in its descriptions of
the world's languages, inevitably it must start describing sub-languages (or
"dialects" if you will).  Recent work by C^avar and Wilder refers to
"Croatian" (presumably because the first author is a Croat).  Other work,
by Stephen Anderson, quotes both Browne and C^avar & Wilder and has to spend
a paragraph or so explaining what he means and why.  I think this is
inevitable.

By the way, is _Bosnian_ written in Cyrillic or in Latin script?  Might it
have been written in some Turkish script in the past?  I try to catch
glimpses of shop windows--such as there are--over TV reporter's shoulders and
it seems that the signs are in Latinate (Croatian) script.  Is this
consistent?

Thos who wish to respond to me (even anonymously) may do so.  I will post a
summary.  Best,  --Loren Billings (billings at mailer.fsu.edu)