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South Slavic
Geographic distribution	Eastern Europe
Linguistic classification	Indo-European Balto-Slavic Slavic South Slavic
Subdivisions	Eastern South Slavic Central South Slavic Western South Slavic
Language codes

South Slavic languages comprise one of the three groups of Slavic languages (besides West and East Slavic). There are around 30 million speakers of these languages, mainly in the Balkans. The South Slavic languages are further subdivided into Eastern and Western groups.

German, Hungarian and Romanian generally form a belt which geographically separate speakers of South Slavic languages from their counterpart West and East Slavic language users.

Classification

Slavic languages belong to Balto-Slavic family, which originates from Centum-Satem isogloss of the Indo-European languages family.

South Slavic languages form a dialectal continuum stretching from today's southern Austria to southeast Bulgaria. On the level of dialectology or linguistic typology, several major dialects can be distinguished, but their borders are blurred due to strong contact and frequent migrations in the past. On the other hand, cultural establishment and national liberation from occupying Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian Empires, followed by formation of nation-states in 19th and 20th century, caused development of standard national languages. These processes have (almost) ended just at the end of 20th century, with the breakup of Yugoslavia (with only the Montenegrin national and linguistic issue left to be resolved). Most of those languages selected one dialect as the basis; as a result, some dialects got deprecated and marginalized, while others flourished. Further, the national and ethnic borders do not coincide with dialectal boundaries in most cases.

Thus, two distinct classifications of South Slavic languages can be drawn; one from a genetic linguistic point of view, and the other from a sociolinguistic or political point of view. The two classifications seldom map 1:1. For example, Croats speak three main and two exclaval dialects in four countries, while their standard language is based on Štokavian Ijekavian.

Note: Due to different political statuses of languages/dialects and different historical contexts, the classifications are necessarily arbitrary to some extent.

Genetic linguistic classification

• South Slavic languages
  • Eastern
    • Bulgarian language
    • Macedonian language
    • Old Church Slavonic (old language used in traditional liturgy and religious texts)
  • Transitional East-west
    • Torlakian
  • Western south Slavic languages :
    • Serbo-Croatian language (see article for names and definitions)
      • Štokavian
        • Štokavian-ekavian serbian dialect
          • šumadijsko-vojvođanski (ekavian sub-dialect) in Serbia
          • smederevsko-vršački (ekavian sub-dialect) in Serbia
          • kosovsko-resavski (ekavian sub-dialect) in Serbia and Kosovo
          • prizrensko-južnomoravski (ekavian sub-dialect) in Serbia and Kosovo
          • srvljiško-zaplanjski (ekavian sub-dialect) in Serbia
          • timočko-lužnički (ekavian sub-dialect) in Serbia
          • hercegovački in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, and Montenegro
        • Štokavian-ijekavijan Croatian dialect
          • Ijekavian sub-dialect in Croatia (Bosnia and Herzegovina)
          • Ikavian sub-dialect in Croatia and (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia)
          • Gradiščan Croatian dialect (in Austria, and Hungary)
          • Molise Croatian dialect (in Italy)
          • Carasova Croatian dialect (in Romania)
          • Bunjevac Croatian dialect (in Serbia)
      • Chakavian Croatian dialect
        • Burgenland Croatian (in Austria, and Hungary)
        • buzetski sub-dialect in Croatia
        • jugozapadni istarski sub-dialect in Croatia
        • sjevernočakavski sub-dialect in Croatia
        • južnočakavski sub-dialect in Croatia
        • lastovski sub-dialect in Croatia
      • Torlakian serbian dialect in Serbia, Bulgaria and Macedonia.
      • Kajkavian Croatian dialect
        • zagorsko-međimurski in Croatia sub-dialect
        • križevačko-podravski sub-dialect in Croatia
        • turopoljsko-posavski sub-dialect in Croatia
        • prigorski sub-dialect in Croatia
        • donjosutlanski sub-dialect in Croatia
        • goranski sub-dialect in Croatia
    • Slovene language

Sociolinguistic classification

South Slavic languages

• Eastern
  • Bulgarian language
  • Slavic language (Greece)
  • Macedonian language
• Western
  • Serbian standard language (standard Štokavian-ekavian)
    • Istočno-hercegovački sub-dialect (standard Serb Bosnia and Herzegovina)
    • Torlakian dialect (non-standard)
  • Bosnian language (east Bosnian dialect - standard)
  • Montenegrin language (montenegrin dialect - standard)
  • Croatian standard language (standard Štokavian-ijekavian)
    • Chakavian Croatian dialect (non-standard)
    • Kajkavian Croatian dialect (non-standard)
    • Molise Croatian dialect
    • Burgenland Croatian dialect
    • Bunjevac Croatian dialect
    • Carasova Croatian dialect
    • Bunjevac (dialect-language) = (Bunjevac Croatian dialect of Serbia)
  • Slovene language

Eastern group of South Slavic languages

Bulgarian dialects

Macedonian dialects

see also:Dialects of Macedonian language

Transitional South Slavic languages

Torlakian dialect

There also exists another dialect, called torlački or torlak, which is spoken in southern and eastern Serbia, northern Republic of Macedonia and western Bulgaria, and often considered transitional between Central and Eastern group of South Slavic languages.

It is even thought to fit into the so-called Balkan sprachbund, an area of linguistic convergence among languages due to long-term contact rather than being related.

Central or Eastern Western group of South Slavic languages

History

Each of these primary and secondary dialectical units breaks down into subdialects and accents by region. In the past (and now in mountains and islands), it was not uncommon for individual villages to have some of their own words and phrases. However, throughout the twentieth century the various dialects have been strongly influenced by the Štokavian standards through mass media and public education, and much of the "local color" has been lost chiefly in towns.

With the breakup of Yugoslavia, nationalism has also caused many, especially in Croatia, to modify their speech, or even attempt to change dialects entirely. The various wars have also caused mass migrations, and changed the ethnic makeup of some areas, especially in Bosnia and Herzegovina, but also in central Croatia and in Serbia (especially in Vojvodina). In some areas it is unclear whether location or ethnicity is now the dominant factor in the dialect of the speaker.

Because of these forces, the speech patterns of some communities and regions are in a state of flux, and it is difficult to determine which dialects will die out entirely. Further research over the next few decades will be necessary to determine the changes made in the dialectical distribution of the language.

Dialect to language name mapping

The table below shows the relationship between the dialects of Central South Slavic diasystem and the names their native speakers might call them.

Štokavian dialects and languages

Rusian-štokavian, Bulgarian-štokavian, Macedonian-štokavian, Ukrainan-štokavian. Belarus-štokavian, Croatian-štokavian, Bosnian-štokavian, Poland-štokavian, Serb-štokavian, Montenegrian-štokavian.

Molise Croatian

The Molise Croatian (or Molise Slavic) dialect is spoken in three villages of the Italian region of Molise, by the descendants of South Slavs who migrated there from the eastern Adriatic coast in the 15th century. Because these people have migrated away from the rest of their kinsmen so long ago, their diaspora language is rather distinct from the standard language, and rather influenced by Italian.

Dialects and official languages

The Croatian and Serbian standard language:

• Serbian language is a system of two dialects: Štokavian and Torlakian.
• Bosnian language is dialects: Štokavian East Bosnian dialects.
• Montenegrian language is dialects: Štokavian Montenegrian dialects (Zetski).
• Croatian language is a system of three dialects: Čakavian, Štokavian and Kajkavian.

Čakavian dialects and languages

Čakavian dialects

Chakavian (Čakavian) is spoken in the western, central, and southern parts of Croatia, mainly in Istria, Kvarner Gulf, Dalmatia, and also in Croatian inlands (Gacka, Pokupje etc.). The Čakavian renders yat mostly as i or also as e (rarely as ye), or even mixed Ekavian-Ikavian. Many dialects of Čakavian have a lot of loan words from Venetian, Italian, Greek and other Mediterranean languages.

Example: Ča je, je, tako je vavik bilo, ča će bit, će bit, a nekako će već bit!

Burgenland Croatian

This dialect is spoken primarily in the federal state of Burgenland in Austria, but also in nearby areas in Vienna, Slovakia, and Hungary by descendants of Croats who migrated there in the 16th century. This dialect or possibly family of dialects is quite different from standard Croatian. It has been heavily influenced by German and also Hungarian. In addition, it has some properties from all three of the major dialectical groups in Croatia, as the migrants did not all come from the same areas of Croatia. The "micro-literary" standard is based on a Čakavian dialect, and, like all Čakavian dialects, is characterized by very conservative grammatical structures: it preserves, prominently, case endings lost in the Štokavian base of standard Serbo-Croatian.

At most 100,000 people speak Burgenland Croatian and almost all are bilingual in German. Its future is uncertain, but there is some movement to preserve it. It has official status in six districts of Burgenland, and is used in some schools in Burgenland and neighboring western parts of Hungary.

Western group of South Slavic languages

Kaykavian dialects

Kaykavian is mostly spoken in northern and northwest Croatia including 1/3 of country near the Hungarian and Slovenian borders: chiefly in and around towns Zagreb, Varaždin, Čakovec, Koprivnica, Petrinja, Delnice, etc. It renders jat mostly as e (rarely as diphthong ie); note that this pronouncing cannot be equated to that of the ekavian-shtokavian dialects, as many kaykavian dialects distinguish a closed e nearly ae (from yat) and an open e (from original e).

It almost lacks several palatals (ć, lj, nj, dž) found in Shtokavian dialect, and has some loanwords from the nearby Slovene dialects, as well as from German chiefly in towns.

Example: Kak je, tak je; tak je navek bilo, kak bu tak bu, a bu vre nekak kak bu!

Slovene language

Grammar

Eastern-Western division

In the broadest terms, the Eastern dialects of South Slavic (ie. Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects) most differ from the Western dialects in the following ways :

• The Eastern dialects have almost completely lost their noun declensions, and have become entirely analytic. ;

• The Eastern dialects have developed definite article suffixes in similar fashion to the other languages in the Balkan Sprachbund.

• The Eastern dialects have completely lost the infinitive. Thus, the first person singular is considered the main part of a verb. Sentences that in other languages would require an infinitive are constructed through a clause – eg. Bulgarian - искам да ходя (iskam da hodya) - "I want to go" (lit. "I want that I go").

Aside from these three main areas, there are several smaller, but still significant differences:

• The Western dialects have three genders in both the singular and plural (and Slovenian even has dual, see below), while the Eastern dialects only have them in the singular, eg. Serbian - on (he), ona (she), ono (it), oni (they, masc), one (they, fem), ona (they, neut); in Bulgarian, te (they) covers the whole plural.

• Standard literary Bulgarian has lost the Slavic "on-/ov-"based pronouns, such as on, ona, ono, oni (he, she, it, they), and ovaj, ovde (this, here) and has replaced them with "to-/t-"based pronouns, such as toy, tya, to, te, and tozi, tuk (it only retains onzi - "that" and its derivatives); Western Bulgarian dialects and Macedonian do retain some "ov-/on-" pronouns, and sometimes use them interchangeably. (Interestingly, Serbian also uses some "t-" pronouns, such as taj, which is almost a primitive "the".)

• All dialects of the Serbo-Croatian diasystem contain the concept of "any" - eg. Serbian neko "someone"; niko "no one"; iko "anyone". All others lack the last, and make do with some- or no- constructions instead.

Division within Western dialects

• While Serbian, Bosnian and Croatian Shtokavian dialects have basically the same grammar, its usage is very diverse. While all three languages are highly inflected, the further east one goes, the more likely it is that analytic forms are used - if not spoken, at least in the written language. A very basic example is :
  • Croatian - hoću ići - "I want - to go"
  • Serbian - hoću da idem - "I want - that - I go"

• Slovenian has a fully-inflected dual number (which means that it has nine personal pronouns in the third person) for both nouns and verbs, eg. –
  • nouns: volk (wolf) → volkova (two wolves) → volkovi (some wolves)
  • verbs: hodim (I walk) → hodiva (the two of us walk) → hodimo (we walk)

Division within Eastern dialects

• In Macedonian, the perfect tense is largely based on the verb "to have", as in other Balkan languages like Greek and Albanian (like in English), as opposed to the verb "to be", which is used as the auxiliary in all other Slavic languages (see also here) - eg.
  • Macedonian - imam videno - I have seen (imam - "to have")
  • Bulgarian - vidyal sum - I have seen (sum - "to be")

Writing

The languages to the West of Serbian use the Roman alphabet, while those to the East and South use Cyrillic. Serbian itself constitutionally uses the Cyrillic script, though commonly, it is the Roman alphabet which is in greater use. For example, most newspapers are written in Cyrillic, while most magazines - in Roman script; books written by Serbian authors are written in Cyrillic, while books translated from foreign authors are usually in Roman script; on television, any writing as part of a television programme is usually in Cyrillic, while adverts are usually in Western script.

The division is traditionally partly based on religion – Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria and Macedonia, which use Cyrillic, are Orthodox countries, while Croatia and Slovenia, which use Roman script, are Catholic; the Bosnian language, used by the Muslim Bosniaks, also uses the Roman script.

The Glagolitic alphabet was also used in the Middle Ages, most notably in Bulgaria and Croatia, but gradually disappeared.

Notes

1. Torlakian can be treated as the part of East South Slavic languages. Speakers can be ethnic Serbs, Bulgarians and Macedonians, mostly depending on their country of origin, although there is a Torlak-speaking Bulgarian minority in Serbia (the Western Outlands) and a corresponding Serbian one in the north of the Republic of Macedonia). Most of Torlakian now belong to Serbian diasystem.
2. ^ *
3. Note that some remnants of cases do still exist in Bulgarian, such as:
   • the numerical plural in the masculine and the incomplete definite article suffix are actually remnants of the old genitive, hence why they are invariably identical to each other:
     • stol - "chair" (sing.) → stolove - "chairs" (plur.) → dva stola - "two chairs" (numerical plural/old genitive)
     • stol - "chair" (indefinite) → "stolat - "the chair" (definite, subject) → pod stola - "under the chair" (definite, object/old genitive)
   • the vocative -
     • for family members - eg. майка → майко (maika → maiko - "mother")
     • for masculine names - eg. Перър → Петре (Petar -> Petre);
   • set phrases, such as nosht ("nght") → noshtem ("during the night"); sbogom ("farewell" - lit. "s + bog + ending" - "with god")
4. In Macedonian, these are especially well-developed, also taking on a role similar to demonstrative pronouns:
   • Bulgarian : stol - "chair" → stolat - "the chair"
   • Macedonian : stol - chair → stolot - "the chair" → stolov - "this chair here" → stolon - "that chair there"
     • note that Macedonian also has separate demonstratives - eg. ovoj stol - "this chair"; onoj stol - "that chair".
5. In Bulgarian, more complex constructions such as "koyto i da bilo" ("whoever it may be" ≈ "anyone") can be used if the distinction is absolutely necessary.
6. This distinction is true for the whole Slavic world: the Orthodox Russia, Ukraine and Belarus also use Cyrillic, as does Rusyn (Eastern Orthodox/Eastern Catholic), while the Catholic Poland, Czech Republic and Slovakia use Roman script, as does Sorbian. Romania and Moldova, which are not Slavic but are Orthodox, also used Cyrillic until 1860 and 1989, respectively, and it is still used in Transdnistria.

See also

• Differences in official languages in Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia
• Yat

External links

• Burgenland Croat Center (in English, German and Croatian)

• Articles lacking sources from November 2007
• South Slavic languages