Serbo-Croatian

Serbo-Croatian
srpskohrvatski / српскохрватски
Native to	Serbia Croatia Bosnia and Herzegovina Montenegro Kosovo (existence disputed)
Native speakers	18 million
Language family	Indo-European Slavic South Slavic Serbo-Croatian
Early forms	Proto-Indo-European Proto-Slavic Proto-South Slavic
Standard forms	Serbian Croatian Bosnian Montenegrin
Dialects	Shtokavian Torlakian Chakavian Kajkavian
Writing system	Cyrillic Latin Glagolitic (9th century) Arabic (16th century bosnian)
Official status
Official language in	Serbia Croatia Bosnia and Herzegovina Montenegro European Union
Recognised minority language in	Austria Hungary Italy Romania Slovakia Czechia North Macedonia
Language codes
ISO 639-1	sh
ISO 639-2	hbs
ISO 639-3	–

Serbo-Croatian language on the Balkan peninsula, in 2005

Different dialects

Street sign in Dalj, Croatia, showing road names in Latin and Cyrillic

Serbo-Croatian is the name of a South Slavic language, which is spoken in modern-day Croatia, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro. After the breakup of Yugoslavia, it has been divided into four variants. The variants of this language are all based on a single dialect, Shtokavian. Speakers of these variants can understand each other.

History

Between 1954 and 1992, it was one of the official languages of Yugoslavia (the others were Slovenian and Macedonian). The term Serbo-Croatian was first used in the 1830s. Today, people often speak about Croatian, Serbian, Bosnian and Montenegrin languages. Research has also shown that what is called Serbo-Croatian language, is in fact a number of slightly different sub-dialects. People speaking one of the dialects easily understand other people speaking a different dialect. People in Croatia use the Latin alphabet to write the language, while people in other parts use both the Latin and Cyrillic alphabet

Writing and pronunciation

Writing

Unlike English, Serbo-Croatian words are written the same way they're said, with every letter representing one sound.

Vowels

Serbo-Croatian has 5 vowels.

Latin Alphabet	Cyrillic Alphabet	English (not exactly)
A a	А а	father
E e	Е е	den
I i	И и	seek
O o	О о	sock
U u	У у	look

Consonants

Serbo-Croatian has 25 consonants.

Latin Alphabet	Cyrillic Alphabet	English (not exactly)
B b	Б б	ball
V v	В в	vax (roughly)
G g	Г г	good
D d	Д д	dad
Đ đ	Ђ ђ	jam
Ž ž	Ж ж	vision
Z z	З з	zero
J j	Ј ј	you
K k	К к	call
L l	Л л	loss
Lj lj	Љ љ	million
M m	М м	mom
N n	Н н	nose
Nj nj	Њ њ	news
P p	П п	poll
R r	Р р	rat
S s	С с	son
T t	Т т	tax
Ć ć	Ћ ћ	Qing
F f	Ф ф	fork
H h	Х х	loch
C c	Ц ц	pots
Č č	Ч ч	check
Dž dž	Џ џ	George
Š š	Ш ш	Sharp

Comparison of Serbo-Croatian dialects

Main article: Comparison of standard Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin and Serbian

English	Croatian	Bosnian	Serbian
January	siječanj	januar
February	veljača	februar
March	ožujak	mart
April	travanj	april
May	svibanj	maj
June	lipanj	juni	jun
July	srpanj	juli	jul
August	kolovoz	august	avgust
September	rujan	septembar
October	listopad	oktobar
November	studeni	novembar
December	prosinac	decembar