Serbia and Croatia.Do they speak exactly the same language?

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áƒ¦â™¥Goxyâ™¥áƒ¦

Serbs DO NOT use only Cyrillic; we're proud of our heritage and our script (and we use Latin script too), but that is not what makes Serbian different from Croatian. It is basically the same language, and this in linguistics is determined on the basis of the percentage of mutual intelligibility. I can assure you that we understand each other perfectly, and use each other's books and other printed material in our daily lives as well as scientific papers. But with the break up of Yugoslavia the language became a political issue and every breaking republic hastened to stand in line for the their own language to be recognized as ONLY their own. Serbs never had that problem; being the biggest people of all South Slavs we are quite aware of the fact that our language is being spoken from the Alps to the Adriatic sea. And where it's not spoken, it's understood. That is enough for us. You can call it any way you like, doesn't bother us at all. The more the merrier.

â™ªâ™ª vivet â™ªâ™ª

For ex-Yugoslavian people it is the same language.
For a foreigner, it is not.

Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian are now three different languages: each country has its own language. There are also some movements to have a new language name for Montenegro.

Serbo-Croatian, Croato-Serbian or Serbo-Croato-Bosnian

The three languages are spoken by about 21 million people in around 24 different countries.The literary language had two major varieties: western, or Croatian, which is written in the Latin alphabet; and eastern, or Serbian, written primarily in the Cyrillic alphabet ( both Latin and Cyrillic officially used ). There was also a de facto Bosnian standard, more often written in the Latin alphabet. Today the region has three official literary languages based on these divisions, but in most ways the three languages differ less than American, British, and Australian English.
This use of different alphabets in Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian reflects the historical religious and cultural differences between the regions. Speakers and writers in the western region became Roman Catholic, adopted the Latin alphabet, and looked to Rome for cultural and religious guidance, whereas the eastern region became Eastern Orthodox, adopted the Cyrillic alphabet, and looked toward Constantinople (now Ä°stanbul) and later toward Russia.

ahamondayaba

Of course, it's not exactly the same, but then again, the English language they speak in Texas and in California is not exactly the same as well.
The whole issue is political rather than linguistic one. But I agree with Vivet and Goxy. One can call it as he pleases. :)
Cyrillic alphabet is used in the official documents, but aside from that, the use of either Cyrillic or Latin is purely a personal preference.

serbia4ever

Croatians uses Serbian language, just they have modify a few words!!! Also like Bosnians (Muslims), the same language with some Turkish words!
THEY ALL SPEAK SERBIAN!!!

it's pretty much the same, some words are said differently though

AnnieD

The languages are not the "exact" same, but very similar. We can understand each other no problem. Just some words are different, dialects, etc.

Butttt some people of former Jugoslavija take offense if you tell them it's all the same language. Or the term "Serbo-Croatian" really bugs them.

I personally say I speak Croatian, none of this "Serbo-Croatian" stuff. And same goes for Serbs and Bosanci (Bosnians). They speak their own.. even if it is almost identical (other than the alphabet and such).

Milan J

Languages called today Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegroan are basicly same language (Serbo-Croatian;Croato-Serbian) with different dialects.

Montenegrin and Bosnian are clearly politicily created artificial names
It is even bigger apsurd when look at the example in Bosnia.
Muslims claim they speak Bosnian, Croats Croatian and Serbs Serbian, even tough they all speak the same dialect wich is different than Serbian in Belgrade or Croatian in Zagreb.
The features referred to in the key refer to dialects marked by their pronunciation of certain words, especially the word for 'what?', which differs radically in these dialects. In some dialects it is "kai" ( Kajkavci or "Kaikavian"), in others it is "cha" ( Cakavci or "Chakavian"), etc. The top three mentioned (in the key chart) are themselves grouped into a general "Shtokavian" complex, ( shto is the word for 'what?' in those dialects, and in other Slavic languages, e.g. in Russian, as well) while the next group is "mixed".

These features do not coincide in any way with the usual divisions into Serbian and Croatian, i.e. they can not be used to determine whether someone is a Croat, a Serb, or a Bosnian. (In fact, during the conflicts following the collapse of Yugoslavia, people who were captured and/or interrogated by one hostile group or another were not identified by their speech, but by their names which would identify them as Catholic, Orthodox, or Muslim.)
The majority of mainstream Serbian linguists consider Serbian and Croatian to be one language, that is used to be called Serbo-Croatian (srpskohrvatski)/ Croato-Serbian (hrvatskosrpski). A minority of Serbian linguists are of the opinion that Serbo-Croatian did exist, but has, in the meantime, dissolved. Before 1900 and also now, a minority agree that a "Serbo-Croatian" language has never existed and that this term designates a Croatian variant of the Serbian language.
The majority of Croatian linguists think that there was never anything like a unified Serbo-Croatian language, but two different standard languages that overlapped sometime in the course of history. Also, they claim that the language has never dissolved, since there was never a Serbo-Croatian standard language.

Standard Croatian, Serbian and so called Bosnian are almost completely mutually intelligible, with only a handful of vocabulary differences and the use of two alphabets that almost perfectly match each other, thanks to Ljudevit Gaj and Vuk KaradÅ¾iÄ‡. The Croats have traditionally used only the Latin script, while the Serbs and Bosnians also use the Cyrillic one, with the Latin one more frequently used.

If there is no reason for American, Australian, Mexican, Brasilian, Austrian, or a Swiss....there is no reason to have Bosnian or Montenegrin.

Here you can find a very interesting map of Serbo-Croatian dialects.
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/540/langdial/serbcrot.html

Joshua k

The languages are very similar, being dialects of one another.

Serbia uses a Cyrillic alphabet and Croatia uses the Roman alphabet; however, the words are generally the same.

FreakOfNature

It's similar but not the same, i compare it to Us english and Uk english, plus Serbs write in cyrilic.

T S

They are very-very similar. I bet they come from the same single parent language.
However, I can only guess that they have been following the One-Nation, One-Religion, One-Language concept.

Serb, Orthodox, Serbian
Croat, Catholic, Croatian
Bosniak, Muslim, Bosnian

Each of these languages, besides the usual differences (less the 100 words), has a lot of religious expressions adopted into the language. my guess is that about 95% of the languages are identical.

Some people don't even call them languages. They call them dialects. Like British English and American English.

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