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Serbo-Croat Grammar

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Josquin
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Germany
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 Message 9 of 20
02 November 2012 at 11:39pm | IP Logged 
No, I'm learning on my own with textbooks - like most of the people here.
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Bbcatcher 08
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 Message 10 of 20
02 November 2012 at 11:47pm | IP Logged 
Oh ok. Luckily, I can practice with a native speaker, so hopefully that will expedite
things, right?
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Merv
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 Message 11 of 20
03 November 2012 at 2:55pm | IP Logged 
The problem is your questions are ill defined. The best way to address grammar is using an Assimil system and
native speakers. Read lots of sentences, observe the patterns of conjugation, declension, and syntax, learning
vocabulary as you go.

I would not just pick up a grammar book and start memorizing case endings.

And by the way, there are 7 noun cases.
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Josquin
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 Message 12 of 20
03 November 2012 at 4:27pm | IP Logged 
Merv wrote:
And by the way, there are 7 noun cases.

Sorry, I forgot about the vocative.
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Марк
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 Message 13 of 20
03 November 2012 at 4:43pm | IP Logged 
Bbcatcher 08 wrote:
Hello,

Currently, I am interested in picking up some Serbo-Croat (Bosnian to be exact), and was
wondering how difficult is is to get the grammar down?I have friends who are from over
there, and have been teaching me for a while, however I would like to take it to the next
level.

Thanks all

It depends on the languages you already know. For me it doesn't seem to be very
difficult, for example, but it will be different for you.
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Medulin
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 Message 14 of 20
03 November 2012 at 7:03pm | IP Logged 
There are 5 cases, effectively, since two are the same, and vocative is not used...
so NOMINATIVE+4 other forms...

As for tenses, many tenses are not used at all, for example AORIST and IMPERFEKT are never used, not even in newsapapers (unlike Spanish, French, Italian, German). We use PERFEKT exclusively.

All tenses you need:
PREZENT, PERFEKT, FUTUR 1, FUTUR2, KONDICIONAL
Much less than Spanish or Portuguese.

I don't even know how to construct other tenses (which appear only in old literature). We learned it in 6th grade, but it was long ago ;)

For example, if you stop people on the street and ask them: What is the IMPERFECT of the verb ići (to go)...less than 1% of population will know it, it is iđah (iba in Spanish, ia in Portuguese) and it sounds 17th century language.

Unlike French, Spanish, Italian (and even German) there has never been obligatory usage of literal tenses in writing, narration. It would be really strange to see AORIST or IMPERFEKT in newspapers or modern literature (on the other hand, Prataeritum is a must in German writing, and so is Passato Remoto in Italian). We have virtually buried all those obsolete tenses.. We learn them in the 6th grade, and we forget them in the 7th grade.

Edited by Medulin on 03 November 2012 at 7:06pm

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Merv
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 Message 15 of 20
03 November 2012 at 8:02pm | IP Logged 
Medulin wrote:
There are 5 cases, effectively, since two are the same, and vocative is not used...
so NOMINATIVE+4 other forms...

As for tenses, many tenses are not used at all, for example AORIST and IMPERFEKT are never used, not even in
newsapapers (unlike Spanish, French, Italian, German). We use PERFEKT exclusively.

All tenses you need:
PREZENT, PERFEKT, FUTUR 1, FUTUR2, KONDICIONAL
Much less than Spanish or Portuguese.

I don't even know how to construct other tenses (which appear only in old literature). We learned it in 6th grade,
but it was long ago ;)

For example, if you stop people on the street and ask them: What is the IMPERFECT of the verb ići (to go)...less
than 1% of population will know it, it is iđah (iba in Spanish, ia in Portuguese) and it sounds 17th century
language.

Unlike French, Spanish, Italian (and even German) there has never been obligatory usage of literal tenses in
writing, narration. It would be really strange to see AORIST or IMPERFEKT in newspapers or modern literature (on
the other hand, Prataeritum is a must in German writing, and so is Passato Remoto in Italian). We have virtually
buried all those obsolete tenses.. We learn them in the 6th grade, and we forget them in the 7th grade.


Well, it's not true that the vocative is not used. You might see it extensively in poetry and legend for any range of
nouns, and certainly there are proper names that involve the use of the vocative.

hej, bubreže: hey, kidney
hej, zvezdo: hey, star
hej, panju: hey, stump
hej, meseče: hey, moon
Ko ste, viteže?: Who are you, knight?
O Bože: Oh God
O Sine (Božiji): Oh Son (of God)
Kako si, Anice?: How are you, Anica?
Gde si, Milane?: Where are you, Milan?

The nominatives for the above are bubreg, zvezda, panj, mesec, vitez, Bog, Sin, Anica, and Milan. You would be
wrong to use them in place of the vocative.

It is also not true that the aorist and imperfect are never used. They are used by highly educated people, and also
extensively used in Bosnia-Herzegovina and parts of Montenegro and Serbia. They may not be used in Croatia,
but as the OP is interested in learning the Bosnian variant (certainly the most archaic and complex), he should be
aware that old tenses are still in use, that the 4 pitch accents are emphasized, and that the post-accentual vowel
lengthening is also a consideration.

I can't tell you how many times I've seen Bosnians (Serbs, Croats, and Muslims) writing things on the internet like
"Ja mišljah da je on...." instead of "ja sam mislila da je on..." And of course, the first is imperfect and quite correct
and the second is perfect and also OK.

Edited by Merv on 03 November 2012 at 8:13pm

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Bbcatcher 08
Diglot
Senior Member
United States
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Speaks: English*, Latin
Studies: Russian, Mandarin, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Serbo-Croatian, Hungarian

 
 Message 16 of 20
05 November 2012 at 1:01pm | IP Logged 
Thank you all for the explanations. I got through the first dialogue in the book I have.
The words seem to not stick as well as the Dutch and the Esperanto. But maybe this is
because it was 100% new, with no background in the language.


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