Talk:Serbo-Croatian

Neutral formulated first sentences and infobox

I have just tried to find a way where more than one opinion is presented in the first sentences difflink . Additionally the infobox should be re-created.--Croq (talk) 09:27, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Hello Chip, why did you revert this? All the ponts of view are showed there.An we should remove the flags from the infobox, as they are one of the points of view... --Croq (talk) 12:31, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Well, I didn't, I actually held out on reverting it, the first reverter was someone else. I personally feel the new intro breaks WP:WEIGHT at the very least, but I will not revert it again for now.

I don't see how flags are a POV, they are just there to make the infobox better, providing a link with the country names. Also looks better. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 12:34, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Ok, I hope with this new impuls we can find a solution. In case of the flags I think that they are just ilustrating one of the points of view. I think trhat only things that are not disputed thould be in the infobox. --Croq (talk) 12:55, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I reverted, for several reasons. The lead starts off by misleading the readers that there is a complex nomenclature of "Serbo-Croatian", when in fact we mostly have stricter and looser usage of terminology (which we shouldn't nitpick as we did in the discussion above, about Kajkavian and chakavian). It starts with a bulleted list which is highly discouraged in the lead section. It proceeds by WP:WEASEL words "According to some linguists", which gives a WP:UNDUE weight on opinion that the "language has never existed".

I still think that even the current lead (before your edit) is overburdened with fine details, enumerating all shades of meaning of "Serbo-Croatian" in a misguided attempt to satisfy NPOV. We need something much more straightforward and concise, with fine details about the dispute left in the main text. I will try to lay my hands on it when I find some time and inspiration. Your attempt, however, is decisively in the wrong direction. No such user (talk) 12:59, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

If you could do that Nosuchuser, it would be much appreciated. I personally feel like I've been bogged down in this article a bit too much to have a strictly NPOV at the moment. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 13:01, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

OK, until "No such user" will fnd time to do it beter than my version, let us have there the NPOV sign--Croq (talk) 13:39, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Croq, if I may say so, the grammar in your last edit is much better than in some of your previous edits! :) Chipmunkdavis (talk) 13:45, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Since nothing has happened for over a week, I separated out the naming issues from the lede, cutting out some of the more poorly supported assertions. — kwami (talk) 01:40, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

I have added to your new version some additional points of view in the beginning of the article, because the last version showed only one pont of view or one meaning of the this controversal term. And not everyone reads it completely. --Croq (talk) 10:23, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia:MOS#Bulleted and numbered lists

"Do not use lists if a passage reads easily using plain paragraphs." Sorry croq, that edit won't work. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 11:31, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

The fact that the Serbs and Croats have separate standards is obvious from both the lede and the info box. I don't see why it should be emphasized any more than it already is.

I made a slight change of wording to the lede. I'm not sure if it's an improvement or not. — kwami (talk) 15:45, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

I think so. The fact that SC, as a pluricentric language, goes by different names isn't all that straightforward; compare English, which doesn't go by different names. --JorisvS (talk) 15:57, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

It reads funny, could be written better, but I'm not in the right state of mind to copy-edit. Additionally, the lead should not contain information not found in the rest of the article. Suggest an expansion of the name section, which discusses names in other languages. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 16:11, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

The name section does cover it: that SC has been called S, C, or B, without implying that those are different langs, when spoken by Cs, Ss, or Bs.

How about now? — kwami (talk) 16:24, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

I think you're magic kwami Chipmunkdavis (talk) 16:41, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

It´s magic that you try and try to continue your POV pushing. You are behaving like in the former comunist dictatorship. Only the opinion of the party counts... --Croq (talk) 07:29, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

I don't think the former dictatorship was particularly concerned with the truth. Here we are: only reality counts, not fantasy. You're denying that Croatian is SC? Why not claim it's Sumerian? — kwami (talk) 07:55, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

I rewrote it, trying to explain more clearly the differences from the Yugoslav standard and the modern versions. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 07:43, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Hmm, I don't think jumping right into when the standard was established is what the normal reader would expect of a language article. IMO that belongs in the 2nd paragraph or closer to the end of the 1st if the 1st is relatively long. — kwami (talk) 07:55, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Is there a standard layout in some wikiproject? Wikiproject linguistics if that exists? Chipmunkdavis (talk) 08:07, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Not that I know of. You might just want to look at other lang articles about this length, esp. if they're GA or FA. — kwami (talk) 16:27, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Obviously we need some examples here to show you experts, that this languages are not one language. If you like we can start with examples now. Every day at least one. Chip, do you know the word for artifical fertilizer in Croatian and Serbian? And "Serbocroatian"? --Croq (talk) 20:19, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Reasonably high numbers, around 25% of Croats and Serbs, name their maternal language as Yugoslavian. But, while Serbs usually call their language Serbo-Croatian (only a few call it Serbian); Croats call their maternal language for the most part – Croatian, and not Serbo-Croatian or Croatian or Serbian. (see p. 142). Such difference in views on their maternal language among Yugoslav citizens in Sweden led to the decision on making two dictionaries, one under the name Swedish-Croatian dictionary (in cooperation between Božidar Finka PhD, Petar Šimunović PhD and Antun Šojat PhD) and the other under the title Swedish-Serbocroatian dictionary. Both dictionaries were published by Skolöverstyrelsen Statens institut för Läromedelsinformation in Stockholm in the year 1985.

Prilično velik broj, oko 25% Srba i Hrvata svoj materinski jezik naziva jugoslavenskim. Međutim dok Srbi obično jezik nazivaju srpskohrvatskim (samo nekolicina ga nazivaju srpskim), Hrvati svoj materinski jezik uglavnom nazivaju hrvatskim, a ne srpskohrvatskim ili hrvatskim ili srpskim. (usp. str. 142). Takva razlika u pogledima na svoj materinski jezik među Jugoslavenima u Švedskoj dovela je do odluke o izradi dvaju rječnika, jednog pod naslovom Švedsko-hrvatski rječnik (u suradnji s dr. Božidarom Finkom, dr. Petrom Šimunovićem i dr. Antunom Šojatom) i drugog pod naslovom Švedsko-srpskohrvatski rječnik. Rječnike je izdao Skolöverstyrelsen Statens institut för Läromedelsinformation u Stocholmu 1985. godine.

The data is from a 1988 paper by Milica Mihaljević published in Rasprave Zavoda za jezik, book 14, Zavod za jezik Instituta za filologiju i folkloristiku, Zagreb, 1988, p. 127, ISSN 0351-434X

--Sokac121 (talk) 22:35, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes, it does seem to be more of an issue for Croats than for Serbs, though we've had a few of the latter. I think we have plenty of citations that Serbian and Croatian are dialectologically a single language. Croq has admitted as much; the problem is with zealots for whom no amount of evidence will mean anything. — kwami (talk) 22:49, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Indeed, the reason is simply that Serbs outnumber Croats by cca. 2:1, causing a difference in national awareness.

• Serbian thought leans toward the view that Serbs and Croats are the same one, crucially unnamed nation (some attempted names include "Illyrians" and "Yugoslavs"). Serbian nationalists (e.g. Vojislav Šešelj) take it further by claiming that the "one nation" is the Serbian nation ("Croats are actually Serbs, they just don't know it yet"). The latter is extremely offensive and universally unacceptable to Croats - but the general idea of the one nation was rejected by Croats only since the 1920s, when the very real danger of cultural assimilation in the Serbian-dominated Kingdom of Yugoslavia caused strong anti-unitarian sentiment.
• Croatian national awareness (since the 1920s!) is founded on viewing the Croatian national identity as distinctly separate from the Serbian one. Nationalists characteristically take it to the point of absurdity here as well, claiming that Croats are actually superior to Serbs, even claiming non-Slavic "Aryan" heritage and inventing fake unused words ("strijelica") to seperate the Croatian language from Serbian as much as possible.

The above should also explain why we are seeing far more Croatian than Serbian nationalist acrivity: Serbian radical nationalists generally push towards the cultural absorption of Croats (that, however, has of course been an imaginary threat and a thoroughly fantastic prospect virtually since 1945). The actual fact is we are obviously both two sightly differing cultural facets of the same nation - the real tragedy being that the cause of all conflict is the simple lack of a common name for this nation. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 22:51, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

DIREKTOR should stop pushing his POV of a one nation, which is not (and was not) universally accepted. This only shows the true extent of how far he is willing to go.

ISO 639-2/RA Change Notice

ISO 639-1 Code	ISO 639-2 Code	English name of Language	French name of Language	Date Added or Changed	Category of Change	Notes
[-sh]	(none)	Serbo-Croatian	serbo-croate	2000-02-18	Dep	This code was deprecated in 2000 because there were separate language codes for each individual language represented (Serbian, Croatian, and then Bosnian was added). It was published in a revision of ISO 639-1, but never was included in ISO 639-2. It is considered a macrolanguage (general name for a cluster of closely related individual languages) in ISO 639-3. Its deprecated status was reaffirmed by the ISO 639 JAC in 2005.

Source: http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/php/code_changes.php

Serbo-Croatian was just a more common name for Serbian language, since Serbs accepted that name and what it really represented. The source from 1988. is clear about it.

In Sweden, some Australian states and in British Columbia, not to mention USA, Croats used their language freely and under its natural name: Croatian language.--Sokac121 (talk) 22:26, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

There is only one problem with this: Linguistically, Serbian and Croatian are the same language, its English name being Serbo-Croatian. --JorisvS (talk) 22:37, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

Common sense has precedence over your theories. Nobody can put the "genie back into the bottle", not since 1848.

Wikipedia:COMMONNAME is just for naming the articles. Listing the two languages under the same "cap" (or name) is WP:SYN and WP:OR.

From what DIR said, it is clear that the complete issue of blanking Croatian grammar (making it a redirect), is motivated towards the unification of nations, by means of unification of languages.--Sokac121 (talk) 23:11, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

The grammar wasn't blanked, it was merged, because we had the same info in two articles. There was no objection despite several months' notice.

People are free to call their language whatever they like. However, we are neither Croats nor Serbs, and cannot in good conscience call the language either Croatian or Serbian.

If you have a better suggestion for what to call the language of which Serbian and Croatian are registers, let's hear it. But denying it exists won't make it go away. — kwami (talk) 01:35, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Kwami, do you understand what the concept of the natural language is? Humans have this tendency to use a natural language. And Croats decided to elect their representatives in 1990, when the new Constitution of Croatia was passed. The most apparent truths were written, one of those was the naming of the official language of Croatia, that being the Croatian language.

Standardology of the Croatian language is by definition a matter of Sociolinguistics, and you cannot change the natural language of human beings. Linguistics as you perceive it is a matter of a narrow scope, and being produced by a minority of scientists for their own pleasure. That is not the case, nor can it be the case. Linguistics can only describe, and describe from relevant sources, and your sources (for instance Wayles Browne) and other denialists of Croatian language are not relevant – since continue to defy common sense and the International community.

Talk:Serbo-Croatian grammarAll that talk of a consensus being reached is a complete fabrication. You cannot re-start an unsuccessful merge attempt that was started by GregorB (on 16:34, 8 August 2009 (UTC)) and supported by a ardent Yugoslav nationalist Ivan Štambuk (on 17:59, 8 August 2009 (UTC)). And somehow miraculously continue that "proposal", counting in what they said as "current". Then you came and "declared" that you want to continue on the proposal made by GregorB and Ivan Štambuk. This is not following proper procedure, nor you can expect that their "votes" could be counted in. Your proposal is only yours. When you made your proposal (18:38, 23 April 2010 (UTC)), Saxum and Coldipa were agains the merge, and nobody even supported your POV at that time. Then, you acted in defiance of the rules and blanked Croatian grammar, making it a mere redirect. That is what happened.--Sokac121 (talk) 22:58, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

At the risk of wasting my time, since this has been said many many times, I'll go over it again:

Yes, sociolinguistically Croatian is a separate language. That's why we have a separate article at Croatian language: if it were not separate sociolinguistically, we'd simply merge it into this article.

However, Croatian belongs to a node called SC, and we have an article on that node too. That's also the language in the dialectological sense.

None of this has anything to do with "natural" language, except that Standard Croatian is a product of language planning and can be considered artificial in that sense, just as all standardized languages are in some sense artificial.

The merge proposal had unanimous consent among all editors who gave an intelligible response. (I wasn't even aware of an earlier attempt to merge, not that it's relevant.) One editor said s.t. along the lines of 'this is why people don't take WP for serious', but gave no cogent reason for objecting. Thus we had a clear consensus. If you don't like it, you can propose splitting the article, but otherwise complaining about it is a waste of everyone's time. — kwami (talk) 23:12, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

The account Sokac121 is sockpuppeted/abused by multiple users. A few months ago on wiktionary he/she was unable to communicate in basic English, making first-grader errors in spellings and syntax. I suggest that everyone just ignore this troll. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 17:34, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

If Sokac is a sock, it should be blocked. A troll is someone who tries to stir up a fight for its entertainment value, not someone pushing their POV. Also, poor English skills is not a reason to dismiss an editor's argument, unless of course we're arguing about naming in English--though, granted, that's half the problem here. — kwami (talk) 20:27, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Assault is the easiest defence. When you have no arguments, then just assault and divert the topic. It is very sad what Ivan is doing.--Sokac121 (talk) 22:48, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Examples in the section "Division by jat reflex"

May I propose the addition of one more line, perhaps below the word "grějati". In the 1st person singular of the present it is "grějem" which is reflected as "grejem" and "grijem" where "ije" is not a reflex of yat, but only "i" is a reflex of yat. That is very interesting example, won't you say? 193.198.162.14 (talk) 06:19, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Language name obsolete

Term Serbo-Croatian is obsolete. What is show here as less commonly used name should be a primary name. Žarišče (talk) 16:02, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Not in English. --JorisvS (talk) 18:01, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Yes, especially in English (and every non-BCSM language). English terminology has to adjust to use in native language. Žarišče (talk) 10:18, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

No it doesn't have to, and usually doesn't. English is a separate language, its terminology is also separate. Attempts to change english terminology have mixed success, such as East Timor's assertion that its proper name is Timor-Leste. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 05:08, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

That's even worse. It's a simple question of etiquette to use the correct names for persons, towns, states, languages etc..., that is the name native people themself are using. In my eyes failing to do that is bad manners and it ranges from at least ignorance and up to arrogance and rasism. Žarišče (talk) 10:30, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

You're basically arguing that English should use the same vocabulary as SC in this area. Are you going to argue next that it should also use the same vocabulary in other areas? How's that for arrogance? --JorisvS (talk) 14:00, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

Actually, yes I do, but just as far of the names go. Unless there is a very specific historical reason, one should use the name that the native people use. This is not arrogance, this is common good manners. So it is not Bombai, it is Mumbai; it is not Carigrad, it is Istanbul; language is not called Windish, but Slovene. Names of peoples are also sensitive; Americans changed Indians to Native Americans; the whole world changes Gypsies to Roma, etc... — Preceding unsigned comment added by Žarišče (talk • contribs) 18:03, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

But why then only proper nouns, why stop there?

Why do you think it arrogant/bad manners for speakers of different languages not to take over native names anyway? I can't see it. --JorisvS (talk) 19:34, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

There are plenty of cases where we don't do this: Chinese, Japanese, Tibetan, Cambodian, Bengali, India, Persian, Turkish, Greek, Albanian, Hungarian, Austrian, German, French, Dutch, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish, Swiss, Spanish, Irish, Welsh, Basque, etc etc etc. In this case, there is no native name for the language! — kwami (talk) 20:55, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

In which case do you mean, kwami? --JorisvS (talk) 21:33, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

Serbo-Croatian. For those who reject that term, there really isn't anything other than "our language", is there? — kwami (talk) 11:35, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

Right. Yeah, and they'll then probably reject the notion of Croatian and Serbian (etc.) being the same language entirely, thus eliminating the need to have a way to refer to the concept... --JorisvS (talk) 14:42, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

ISO 639-3 is already on that bandwagon by giving Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian separate ISO codes. Language identity is always about 50% politics. --Taivo (talk) 18:35, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

Usually they're objectively distinct as well, even if still mutually intelligible and more political than linguistic. Other than SC and Hindustani, are you aware of any in which the standards are based on the same dialect? — kwami (talk) 20:11, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

ISO-639-3 used to separate Moldovan and Romanian, but deprecated the distinction and retired Moldovan as a distinct form in 2008. The separation of Bosnian, Serbian, and Croatian predates the establishment of ISO 639-3, as did the separation of Moldovan and Romanian. As with the separation of Hindi and Urdu, the continued separation of C/B/S is partially based on orthography differences, which was not the case with Moldovan. There are other cases where different ISO 639-3 labels are applied to what appear to be the same language divided by a political border--Marwari (Pakistan) [mve] and Marwari (India) [rwr], for example. --Taivo (talk) 21:07, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

Croatian Sign Language

We list Croatian Sign Language as a separate language. Does anyone here know anything about it? Serbian and Slovenian SL are considered dialects of a single language; it strikes me as odd that Croatian would be more divergent. (Ethnologue assigns it a separate iso code, but provides no information, presumably because none was available to them. Many previous such cases have turned out to be names in a book with no independent existence on the ground.) — kwami (talk) 20:57, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Differences and similarities

If we take the some of the arguments aside, Serbo-Croatian is a macro language like Dano-Norwegian, which served it's purpose when Denmark and Norway were in a union. Serbo-Croatian had a political purpose during the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. Since the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, does not exist and SFRJ had been buried some time ago, each country that was part of Yugoslavia went it's own merry way, just the same as the Denmark, Sweden and Norway went on their own paths. But is there a push out there to resurrect Dano-Norwegian. Bokmål was adopted as the official language in 1929, and the orthography was officially adopted in 1907. The classification of South Slavnoic languages of the languages should be set in the similar fashion like the Scandinavian languages. SC or BSC are just constructs that are a leftover from the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, and favored by a small vocal group who are pushing their own political agenda. How many Norwegians, Danes or Swedes would like that their languages are mashed together and called Dano-Norwegian, or better Dano-Norwegian-Swedish. It is easy to derive that the linguistic differences are minor. In 50 years time, the differences between the languages like Serbian and Croatian will increase as each nation develops its own separate way. Vodomar (talk) 13:22, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

There are some problems with your analysis. First, ISO 639-3 does not recognize "Dano-Norwegian" as a macrolanguage, but it does recognize "Serbo-Croatian". Second, there is virtually no modern literature written in or about "Dano-Norwegian", but there are thousands of books in English that deal with "Serbo-Croatian" as a single language. Third, Wikipedia isn't about the future, it is about the present, so while 200 years from now there may be relevant differences between Bosnian, Serbian, and Croatian, today they are virtually identical. Fourth, English-speaking readers of Wikipedia are going to be looking for "Serbo-Croatian" because that is the term that they will virtually always encounter in their reading outside Wikipedia. "Serbo-Croatian" is a fact. It is a single language that is nearly universally labelled as such in the English-speaking world. --Taivo (talk) 13:38, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

Also, Dano-Norwegian is a koine. SC is not. The Scandinavians could have chosen a single dialect as the standard for all three nations, but they did not. The Croats, Serbs, and Bosniaks did. The more appropriate analogy is Hindi-Urdu / Hindustani, which is also commonly represented as a single language, including here on WP. — kwami (talk) 20:11, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

SC or BSC is a macro language, not in the sense of ISO 639-3, but in a linguistic sense. It is a artificial hybrid language that is being sold, because of a political agenda and promoted extensively here on en.wikipedia.org and the wiki dicitionary project. I am talking about the present, each country went their own way and they have distinctive languages, which merged at one stage during the Pan South Slavic movement, and it lived for some time during the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, but it was never an official language of Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia. The language in SR Croatia was known as Croatian or Serbian, in SR Serbia it was known as Serbian. There is no reference in law what the official language of SFRJ Yugoslavia was however where the ethnic mix was The promotion of Serbo-Croatian as a language and as a term in some English speaking countries, is something that is supported by a certain group of people. For instance. The premise that "It is a single language that is nearly universally labelled as such in the English-speaking world" is false: check any government website in Australia (example: http://www.fwa.gov.au/index.cfm?pagename=assistlanguage (no Serbo-croatian there), there are other sites like that). The Yugoslav union ended, and so should have the Serbo-Croatian language issue. The Danes and the Norwegians went their own ways in 1815, however their language issue was only resolved in 1929. They also had their issues with Dano-Norwegian language http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1354-5078.2004.00185.x/abstract and they have resolved it their way. Why are there many references, because the separation was so recent, and also anyone in the outside world was too scared to push anything then the Yugoslav agenda so not to upset the delicate balances during the Cold War. Why such a dedication to keep something that has fallen apart, let it go it's own course. Serbo-Croatian is a dead political, and macro linguistic construct that should be recognised that it existed, but not promoted as the official language of the region whatever your belief an however you were raised before. If we are living in the present, and looking into the distant future, please do not live in the distant past. Vodomar (talk) 23:50, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

Croatian, Serbian, and Bosnian are all based on a single dialect of Serbo-Croatian. They're not even as different as Danish and Norwegian. The common English name for that language is "Serbo-Croatian". And you don't know what "macrolanguage" even means if you think it means "artificial hybrid". The politics of the Balkans makes no difference on what English speakers call this single language. Only WP:NCON matters and it is based on common English usage only. Common English usage is to call this language "Serbo-Croatian". --Taivo (talk) 04:03, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Yes under macrolanguage i mean artificial hybrid, that is combining the 3 languages together and giving it a root name. The other reason why i refer this as a macrolanguage, is because if the whole reason is to combine the three languages into one just so save space or for so called practical reasons. The thing is with Danish and Norwegian is that they also had a combined and then separated in 1929. If so like you say the term 'Serbo-Croatian is a common English usage for the three languages then this is what should be said in the definition of this article and name the English speaking countries where this term is used ie: USA, Great Britain, Canada, right at the beginning. BTW the exception is Australia. Instead what is now in place is some kind of a goulash. Vodomar (talk) 10:57, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Then you don't know what the word "macrolanguage" means. This is not a combination "to save space". Before you go rewriting the lead, you need to get a consensus here on the Talk Page. You have no consensus at this point. There is overwhelming evidence that "Serbo-Croatian" is the common English name for this language. You've presented no actual evidence otherwise. Until you do, you will not get a consensus to change this article. --Taivo (talk) 12:45, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

You said the words: The common English name for that language is "Serbo-Croatian", therefore it is a term used in some English speaking countries and it is a space saving device. The thing is that in this forum, consensus will never be reached as this subject is made "controversial" for the sake of holding a certain point of view, which denies the existence of Serbian and Croatian languages prior to establishment of Serbo-Croatian. Serbo-Croatian is a depreciated standard language, which is being held up for clarity sake. Yes I know what a macrolanguage means, since in the article the 3 languages are described as borderline - close, and it being some sort of root the differences as described as minor - hence the grammar and words can be combined in a set of global rules - hence global = macro. Vodomar (talk) 13:25, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian are not "borderline-close", they are a single language. Indeed, the standard forms of these three are even based on the same dialect of a single language. The common English name for that language is "Serbo-Croatian". There is a very clear linguistic entity here that predates Yugoslavia. Since the days of Yugoslavia, that entity has been called Serbo-Croatian in English. You need to actually read Wikipedia policy--WP:NCON--in order to understand that common English usage prevails in the English Wikipedia. --Taivo (talk) 13:39, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

In fact the term far predates Yugoslavia. Thus, the concept of Serbo-Croatian is not the result of some Yugoslav despot's delusion trying to combine different languages into one. --JorisvS (talk) 13:43, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Therefore in the title for this language it should be explicitly written : "common English name...." Otherwise this is article is then a missrepresentation. 03:51, 8 October 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Vodomar (talk • contribs)

For instance Quebec English is the common term for the set of various linguistic and social phenomena affecting the use of English in the predominantly French-speaking Canadian Province of Quebec. Quebec English So Serbo-Croatian is a common term ..... The fact on the ground if you look at the Statistical Bureau's of each of the countries (Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia & Hercegovina, Montenegro) there are a very small number of Serbo-Croatian speakers. Check it out. Yes I have had a look at the policy, but to be honest in writing about this subject, then i think the example to write "common English term" would not hurt the article. Vodomar (talk) 04:06, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Every WP name is the common English name unless we say otherwise.

There are 15 million SC speakers, but only a few thousand call their language that. If Americans started calling their language "American", you wouldn't subtract 300M from the number of English speakers. — kwami (talk) 05:12, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

As I pointed out at Talk:Croatian language, language surveys that rely on speaker identifications are notoriously unreliable. If you've been paying attention to the news this week you will have seen a report on a new language discovered in India. The speakers of that language, Koro, consistently said that they spoke "Aka", although the linguists clearly and unambiguously demonstrated that they spoke a language that wasn't even close to Aka. Yet the speakers all said they spoke "Aka". I worked on a language in California that linguists call "Timbisha" or "Panamint", but all the speakers say they speak "Shoshoni" (even though they don't). Only linguists are really able to conduct accurate surveys of what languages are spoken in a particular region. A speaker on the Croatian side of the border would say he spoke "Croatian", while a speaker a mile away on the other side of the border, who spoke exactly the same language, would say he spoke "Serbian". Indeed, a Catholic speaker would say he spoke "Croatian" while the Orthodox speaker across the street would say he spoke "Serbian" and the Muslim next door would say he spoke "Bosnian". Yet they'd all be down at the pub chattering away to each other with 100% mutual intelligibility on Saturday night. --Taivo (talk) 05:47, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Croatian nationalist Vodomar (a diaspora Croat - these are the worst) recruited from Croatian Wikipedia repeatedly demonstrates exceptional ignorance and a propensity to fabricate history. Standard Serbo-Croatian dates to early 19th century, which is more than a century before any Yugoslavia. It was in fact supported by all the Croatian intelligentsia of the period, which culminated in Vienna Literary Agreement (count how many of the signers were Croats) and a number of dictionaries and grammar written by Croats which have had Serbo-Croatian in their titles, or explicitly equating Croatian with Serbian in a linguistic sense. Here are some examples:

• 1901 Rječnik hrvatskoga jezika by Ivan Broz and Franjo Iveković, largely compiled on the strict Eastern Herzegovinian literary base of folktales and poems collected by Vuk Karadžić and his associates
• 1899 Gramatika i stilistika hrvatskoga ili srpskog književnog jezika by Tomislav Maretić, the most influential Croatian grammarian of all times

These two pieces alone have influenced more what is today called "Croatian standard" than all the collective works of Croats in the history. It's pathetic to see the manner in which Croatian nationalists are trying to paint the picture of "independent Croatian language" being historically somehow "oppressed" by some "evil regimes", when in fact it were Croatian linguists in the first place that have opted for regional unifications with neighboring peoples through common literary standard, because that also meant linguistically unifying Croats as well. (At the period of early 19th century, Kajkavian and Čakakavian dialects were much more widespread than today, and those three are mutually unintelligible). What has been done cannot be undone, the coupling is total and permanent, cemented by country-level bodies of language institutionalization which don't have any desire to shift from Neoštokavian tradition into dialectal separatism.

As regards the comparisons with Scandinavian situation - these are utterly broken analogies, because none of these are comparable with the Serbo-Croatian situation where where have 3 (or 4 if you count the nascent "Montenegrin language") all based on the exactly the same subdialect. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 13:14, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Is it possible that "Serbo-Croatian" means two things? It seems that usage here varies between "a standard language formerly used in Yugoslavia" and "the body of South Slavic varieties spoken in the former Yugoslavia." It is a much more understandable claim to say that the former phenomenon no longer exists (though I don't know the truth to it). Saying the latter doesn't exist is a harder claim, as one not only must make the case that the varieties are separate languages, but that their relationship to each other is too far to even group them together.

Am I correct in understanding that Vodomar means the former definition while the linguists in the room mean the latter? — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɹ̠ˤʷɛ̃ɾ̃ˡi]} 18:42, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

That's probably a fair assessment. Although the linguists are aware of the issue of the standard languages represented by "Serbo-Croatian" in the Yugoslav sense, we also use it to refer to the group of mutually intelligible dialects that are part of "West South Slavic" and are not Slovenian. --Taivo (talk) 18:47, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

It's not a possibility but rather an important point in the dispute. The linguists here (or those who follow descriptive linguistics) use the term "Serbo-Croatian" in both senses while many of the Croats (with the exception of Ivan Štambuk, DIREKTOR and a few others) use only the first sense of the term. The problem is that many Croats (not just on Wikipedia) have a very difficult time with "Serbo-Croatian" referring to a living pluricentric language or to "the body of South Slavic varieties spoken in the former Yugoslavia" as you put it. These very Croats (and some Bosniaks and Serbs) have repeatedly insisted otherwise using reasoning or evidence that has in turn been repeatedly refuted or questioned on the talk pages by people grounded in descriptive linguistics. In other words, the second sense of Serbo-Croatian is inadmissible or effectively denied out of existence by many people from the former Yugoslavia and what's left is to follow their lead and slavishly follow ISO's naming conventions by classifying/viewing the varieties as separate languages within South Slavic as we do for Slovenian, Macedonian and Bulgarian. Vput (talk) 19:16, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

The problem with that of course is that Serbo-Croatian, Croatian, Serbian, Montenegrin, and Bosniak are virtually identical in every respect. What we would do is essentially say "Serbo-Croatian has two meanings: it means a standard language used in SFR Yugoslavia, and a body of South Slavic languages identical with the standard language." Its the same thing folks... --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 21:14, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Being mutually intelligible isn't the same as being identical. There are differences, even if they're relatively minor. — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɹ̠ˤʷɛ̃ɾ̃ˡi]} 21:21, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

They're not just mutually intelligible, and the differences are swamped by dialectical differences. The differences due to the standard languages do filter down and differentiate people based on ethnic identity, but the deciding factor is ethnicity, not dialect. The comparison to Hindi-Urdu is apt. — kwami (talk) 21:45, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

To illustrate: I as a native Croat can have an entire conversation with a person without there even being a reason for me to suspect that this person actually spoke "Bosnian" or "Serbian" throughout. This actually happens frequently, e.g. a person visiting our faculty was a Bosniak (thus supposedly speaking "Bosnian"), while I only learned that afterward - thinking throughout that we were speaking "Croatian". :) --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 22:42, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

User:Ivan Štambuk, how can there be a debate when you write such words as: "Croatian nationalist Vodomar (a diaspora Croat - these are the worst)" in your opening address. This surely sets the tone of your argument: stereotyping and labeling. Call it what you want, with such colorfull language it is really not possible to have a proper debate with such open prejudice. How can one's word be heard. It is very hard to argue the point that "Serbo-Croatian" is a living language, when when you look at the facts it was the official language in the Kingdom of Serbia and the SFR Yugoslavia. Yes Ivan Štambuk, it can not be deniced that the Croatian and Serbian language which were separate and mutually intelligible, converged as part of the Pan-Slavism movement that swept the region in the 19th century , they were merged some time, however most of the practices of the combined language were not followed except for official government business. Even with the agreement in Novi Sad in 1954., which ratified the use of Serbo-Croatian did not stop people using the language as they pleased. With the destruction of Yugoslavia, it can be sure to say that the "Serbo-Croatian" language as pluricentric language is dead and it's corpse has been buried some time ago. Why promote it as a living language, where it is not. In a linguistic sense, yes the languages are mutually intelligible and speakers from the countries of Bosnia and Hercegovina, Croatia, Montenegro and Serbia can understand each other, however there might be some missunderstandings on some of the grammatical constructs and how some words are used but with little training this can be overcome. However, if in each of the countries they do not identify the language they speak as being "Serbo-Croatian" and it does not feature in the different statistical reports. If Serbo-Croatian does not even make it in the Serbian Buerau of Statistics Report 2002, how can this be an error ? Linguists can say that the languages can stick a language in language tree, and that is fine, however making statements that one speaks one language where they surely are not is denying a fact. Each country in the region pluricentric standard, and no one is maintaning the "Serbo-Croatian" pluricentric standard. This fact needs to be in the definition of the article. Not stating this would be denying the truth. Also, what needs to be said is that in the defintion of this artile is that the "Serbo-Croatian" or Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian language is common English term, used by lingists to describe and by the diplomatic circles . Stating that "Serbo-Croatian" is the language that is predominently used in the region with so many variant languages with their own different rules and their unique collection of words in their vocabulary, is denial. Vodomar (talk) 13:55, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Vodomar you display a typical knee-jerk reaction of a Croatian nationalist floating in his reality distortion field bubble that we've chewed over countless time already. Absolutely every single point you raise has been abundantly discussed on this talkpage and elsewhere, and every one of your Croatocentric myths of victimhood repeteadly debunked. Yes, "Serbo-Croatian is dead" if you say so. Right. Perhaps if you repeat it enough times it might be true one day. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 18:09, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Proposed rename

WP:Naming conventions (languages) says that the word "language" should only be part of the article title if it's necessary for diambiguation purposes. Since Serbo-Croatian redirects here, I'm assuming there's no need for disambiguation. Thus we should rename the article Serbo-Croatian. — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɹ̠ˤʷɛ̃ɾ̃ˡi]} 18:52, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. Like "Arabic", there is no use for the term other than as a linguistic label. --Taivo (talk) 19:38, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Not saying I disagree, but why then is Arabic at Arabic language?

Also, during the Illyrian period one spoke of the Serbo-Croatian people, though perhaps that is too distant in time to be relevant. — kwami (talk) 20:48, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Arabic alphabet. — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɹ̠ˤʷɛ̃ɾ̃ˡi]} 21:10, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Even after the Illyrian period there was a movement (late 19th - early 20th century) to build a common identity for Croats and Serbs under the Štokavian umbrella called sh:Srbohrvati (on German wikipedia: de:Serbokroaten), which would literally be "Serbo-Croats" or "Serbo-Croatians". There is currently no article about it on English wikipedia but there could be. The term Serbo-Croatian would then be ambiguous meaning either "Serbo-Croatian language" or "a member of Serbo-Croatian people". --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 21:51, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

So "Arabic" was not the best example, but all the varieties of Arabic, such as Egyptian Arabic don't have "language" attached. --Taivo (talk) 23:00, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Well, that's the generic WP construction for variety X of lang Y, but Latin and Esperanto and good examples. I can't think of any other uses for SC that couldn't be handled with a hat note to a dab page. — kwami (talk) 23:09, 8 October 2010 (UTC)