Are people unaware of the existence of "SHTOKAVIAN" which is basically what all 4 BCMS languages are based off of?
Posted by MIkaela39752@reddit | AskBalkans | View on Reddit | 191 comments
BCMS = bosnian, croatian, montenegrin, serbian
for some reason people make up in my opinion really stupid names for all these languages
some being:
"yugoslavian"
"croato serbian"
"materinyi" or "nashki" (directly translated to "motherly" and "ours")
or even just "serbian" since the logic is "well you all understand each other so yeah, you all do speak serbian youre just too nationalistic to admit it"
but apparently... never SHTOKAVIAN which is actually the most accurate name for these 4 languages, the only reason why it isnt used is due to political reasons + it would split kajkavian and chakavian dialects from croatian and make them into their own languages (i actually agree for kajkavian though, its closer to slovene, it should be its own language and im saying this as a croat from a shtokavian speaking area)
krisvelde@reddit
It's only possible in the Balkans. Brazilians don't speak Brazilian, Americans don't speak American, Australians don't speak Australian, Canadians don't speak Canadian, Austrians don't speak Austrian. But here Montenegrins speak Montenegrian. Such a joke.
blitzfreak_69@reddit
Why are you so butthurt about it? Why does it bother you? Brazilians, Americans, Australians, Canadians etc. were colonies. We were not.
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
Just to add: 'Serbian' is also a joke. Serbo-Croatian is the proper term.
krisvelde@reddit
Serbian or Coratian no. Joke is Bosnian and Montenegrin
Apart-Criticism6890@reddit
Bosanski jezik koji se spominje još u srednjem vijeku kada je zabilježeno u Zadru prilikom prodaje djevojke u roblje Veneciji i koji je imao svoj riječnik 150 godina prije srpskog je joke.
Ti si glupan.
krisvelde@reddit
A hercegovački, semberijski, romanijski, spominju li se oni. Čemu takav aparthejd
blitzfreak_69@reddit
Why? You did not create the language, we all share it together. If we are too primitive to all agree on a neutral common name, then we all have equal right to call our respective standardized variants of the language by our own name.
krisvelde@reddit
Ma zovite ga vi kako hoćete, samo je idalje jedinstven slučaj u svetu, da jezik koji je isti, na jednom prostoru ima 10 različitih naziva. Crnogorska i bošnjačka nacija nisu postojale dok se taj jezik uveliko pričao
blitzfreak_69@reddit
Nije ni jedinstven slucaj. Ima i drugih naroda koji su nazalost optereceni ovim stvarima. Hindi/Urdu, Malajski/Indonezanski itd. A nijedna nacija nije postojala dok smo mi pricali isti jezik. Nacije su produkt 19. vijeka, a nasi narodi na ovim teritorijama su govorili zajednickim jezikom otkako su se doselili na Balkan.
krisvelde@reddit
Nacija možda jeste produkt 19. veka, ali osećaj etničke pripadnosti je mnogo stariji od toga. Naravno da nije bilo identično kao danas ali daleko od toga da toga uopšte nije bilo pre 19. veka
krisvelde@reddit
Jel Austrija bila kolonija? Jel San Marino kolonija? Jel Moldavija kolonija? Jel Belgija kolonija?
Reasonable-Crew-3128@reddit
That's not the same. Montenegrins are widely accepted as being able to be a nation of its own if they choose, both officially by Serbia and by the majority of serbs I'd say. So why can they be their own nation, but not have their own language? They don't even speak ekavica, so it's clearly not the same as Serbian from Serbia. And before you say Bosnian serbs don't either, yeah but you didn't accept at those could be their own nation, you did with Montenegrins. If they can be their own nation, they can have their own language.
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
Sure, let's give every village it's own language. 'It's not Serbian - it's Čačakian'
Reasonable-Crew-3128@reddit
Are they their own nation or not? You guys just need to be honest and say you don't accept that they can identify as Montenegrins by nationality, and they need to just be serbs and shut up. Instead of coming with these indirect attacks. They don't even speak ekavica ffs. And the zeta raska dialect, the traditional dialect spoken in much of montenegro is even more distant and unique.
Etsikaietsi@reddit
What does speaking ekavica have to do with being a Serb? Are Serbs from Herzegovina not Serbs? What about the people of Krajina?
You can call yourself a Jedi, but let's be real here.
Call yourself whatever you want, just be honest about it.
TigerOfEU@reddit
Some moldovans also swear by the "moldovan" language, though that's more of an externally forced element by you-know-who.
milic_srb@reddit
because us south Serbs use Torlkarian and we'd be left out too, not just Kajkavian and Chakavian
Tho I'd be okay with us having our separate official language, maybe like that we could preserve it better
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
Add some letters like Monenegrins, be cool
milic_srb@reddit
Idk which ones tho, maybe copy Macedonians and add 's' for /dz/ sound. Maybe we could also add something for schwa /ə/ too when we're at it.
Aggravating_Key2725@reddit
Yeah you would definitely need 'ѕ' and 'ъ'. Torlakian uses 'ъ' more than almost any other East South Slavic dialect, including standard Bulgarian. Torlakian has 'дън', 'съга', 'венъц', 'Лесковъц', while the rest of us have 'ден', 'сега', 'венец', 'Лесковец'.
Stari_vujadin@reddit
Traditionally ь would be used in Torlakian
Aggravating_Key2725@reddit
I know that Serbian authors tend to use 'ь', but that letter never made the sound in question. Even though etymologically some words like 'дън' do come from 'дьнь', others like 'сън' (сънъ), or Turkish loan words like 'сандък', do not. If Torlakian were to have a phonetic writing system, then 'ъ' would be more accurate.
Stari_vujadin@reddit
It's used because of the historical reasons. Serbian ь and ъ merged in the middle ages, so only ь was used for the resulting single sound in the medieval writing. This is indeed a contrast to the bulgarian usage of ъ, but for a serbian dialect it actually makes sense. Sure, if we want to make modern orthography we could follow either model, however I suspect using ъ would instantly raise a lot of eyebrows for being "too bulgarian".
Aggravating_Key2725@reddit
You're right, it probably would. For the same reason, we were forbidden from including it in the Macedonian alphabet, despite the language commissions deciding it was necessary.
BRM_the_monkey_man@reddit
the ъ in the torlakian dialects isnt the same etymologically as the bulgarian ъ, which like in macedonian and torlakian у in many places is from ocs ъ and ѫ, but from vowel reduction, etymologically in the examples you listed it would come from ocs ь but the vowel reduction happens on all non-stressed syllables and it appears in many other east balkan (calling that the continuum to avoid controvercy, you can call it whatever you want) dialects like in pirin and aegean macedonia, around ohrid and prespa, trnovo and thrace
Aggravating_Key2725@reddit
I don't follow you. OCS ь becomes Torlakian ъ and Macedonian/Bulgarian е (with some exceptions like Bulgarian тънко). But Bulgarian and Torlakian do share an etymological ъ from OCS ъ in words like сън or сълнце (in dialects that don't have сунце).
BRM_the_monkey_man@reddit
its not that ocs ь necessarily becomes ъ in torlakian, infact in most dialects it doesnt, it becomes е, although some dialects have ь -> ъ, its that no matter what vowel it is etymologically or under stress, in most torlakian dialects it gets reduced to an ъ when it isnt stressed, so you would also have а -> ъ and e -> ъ just as easily
Aggravating_Key2725@reddit
I had no idea that Torlakian had vowel reduction at all. Is there any academic literature you'd recommend that addresses this? Because I find it very weird that all Torlakian unstressed vowels can be reduced to 'ъ' when that's not the case in Macedonian or Bulgarian dialects as far as I'm aware.
My understanding is that the most common East South Slavic vowel reduction is 'a' to 'ъ', being very widespread in Bulgarian dialects and eastern Macedonian ones. Next would be 'о' to 'у' and 'e' to 'и', both of which exist in Macedonia but to a more limited extent. I have read of 'о' being reduced to 'а' in some southern Bulgarian dialects, but I'm not sure how prevalent that still is.
BRM_the_monkey_man@reddit
i could link you a thing the bulgarian academy of sciences made but it will make you very angry for a reason i suspect you already know, the information inside linguistically is sound, however due to the political climate ill still ask you beforehand if you would like to see it
Aggravating_Key2725@reddit
Hahaha don't worry, I'm not one of those. I've read plenty from БАН, I particularly like their dialectal atlas.
BRM_the_monkey_man@reddit
oh, thats good, because i was gonna show you that atlas too, but if you want some boring texts theres this short document about vowel reduction in general with specific examples from different dialects, theres a short description of a specific gorani dialect on page 52 of this pdf (they have a really weird fixation on that village), a general description of "bulgarian" dialects more or less repeating the information from the interactive map and sadly thats about all i can find freely available online, aside from 5 billion more documents about rahovac which i find redundant, although im sure if i went there tomorrow or on monday in person i could find more, if i remember to
Aggravating_Key2725@reddit
Thanks, I appreciate the effort. I'll take a good look at those. That article on Rahovets seems interesting. I didn't know definite articles extended that far into Kosovo. I thought only Gora itself had them; even speech from Zhupa that I've heard, didn't. Maybe that's why they're fixated on it; it's a very random place for such characterically East South Slavic features to have survived.
HumanMan00@reddit
We do have some words that have that sound.
Dzmni and Dziva are the only ones i know about.
Stverghame@reddit
Dzindza as well
HumanMan00@reddit
Sta znaci?
Stverghame@reddit
Slina
Stari_vujadin@reddit
Слина
HumanMan00@reddit
Mi vikam Dziva za slina.
Stari_vujadin@reddit
Ѕвоно
HumanMan00@reddit
Pa ponekad al uglavnom zvono
Stari_vujadin@reddit
Традиционално је да се користи ь, барем у литератури коју сам ја читао
deviendrais@reddit
I was pleasantly surprised when I found some Torlakian poetry.
Croats are much better at preserving their regional languages and they don't discriminate the native speakers like we do. They even translated some book into Chakavian and Kajkavian.
I think our problem is that Torlakian is more diverse than Chakavian and Kajkavian. The varying amount of cases is the first problem that comes to mind. Would we standardise Torlakian to have 2 cases like in Pirot or 4 cases like in Kruševac?
HumanMan00@reddit
Its not standardized thats the problem. But each subdialect has grammar books and such.
Also about poetry: pesme
BRM_the_monkey_man@reddit
to be fair its really hard to standardise torlakian because of the insane vowel reduction, you would have to either treat vowels like serbian treats consonants or just make it standard bulgarian with 2-3 extra letters depending on which approach you take
SrbskiPlovdiv@reddit
Where are the books on lesser known Serbian dialects?
HumanMan00@reddit
https://dais.sanu.ac.rs/handle/123456789/6163?locale-attribute=sr_RS
Here is for Zaplanjski dialect - im sure u can find more using our academic sources.
Fred_Neecheh@reddit
Because you also have kajkavian and čakavian, which are dialects of the same language, nowadays in Croaria mostly. (Kajkavian around Zagreb, and north of it, almost like a transition to Slovene and Čakavian surviving inthe islands).
In fairness to your point, to me as an ekavian shtokavian speaker, i dont get why those are dialects but the official Croatian which is shtokavian is supposed to be a separate language.
But then again there is an old old linguistics joke a language is a dialect with an army and a navy. The joke is so old no air force is included.
Reasonable-Crew-3128@reddit
Shtokavian would have had to be standardized and normalized in order to work as a language term. I think it could have been fine actually, but history would have had to happen in a different way for that to be the case, it's impossible now. No matter what, it will end up sounding like some intricate linguistic term, it'll never sound normal. I think BCS is the best internationally, and naski when around other people. It's also fair to call your own language Serbian or Croatian, as long as it's not about claiming other nations share that.
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
Serbo-Croatian uses recognized and is active. It has it's own ISO code and I'm not sure why people won't accept that fact.
Reasonable-Crew-3128@reddit
Because it's a politically loaded term connected with yugoslavia, which isn't popular in most countries. And it leaves out other people, just to divide it between the 'big two', there's no Bosnian language in that (nor Montenegrin).
7elevenses@reddit
Standardization and naming of the language happened 68 years before Yugoslavia existed.
Reasonable-Crew-3128@reddit
Yeah, and it was irrelevant for all that time, with the region just going on living in Austro-hungary, doing their own thing, worried about other politics, battling Hungarian influence and Dalmatian Italians, calling themselves Illyrians. It was in Yugoslavia that it became relevant, and it's Yugoslavia that it's politically connected with today. Besides Croats and Serbs are going to have to battle each other out first to begin with, they can fight plenty over that it's 'just Croatian/just Serbian, nothing serbo-croatian over it. And the other point is also a dealbreaker, sorry this is not the 1900s anymore, Serbs and Croats don't just make the big decisions, and these 'small people' like Bosnians or Montenegrins just have to deal with it and conform.
7elevenses@reddit
The language was made official in Austria-Hungary, and kingdoms of Serbia and Montenegro, 50 years before Yugoslavia existed.
And as for the name, does "Indo-European" include Persian? Is the fact that Persia is not mentioned in the name an attack on Persians?
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
They did.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_on_the_Common_Language?wprov=sfla1
jaleCro@reddit
And swastika is a Buddhist symbol.
Professional-Fee-488@reddit
The term Serbo-Croatian was not invented by the communists my man. It was first mentioned by Jacob Grimm (of the Grimm brothers fame😜) way back at the beginning of 19th century, and was later popularized by Jernej Kopitar.
throwawayy00223@reddit
Aye but the standard croatian is based mostly on shtokavian (changed a bit post independence). Thanks to the Vienna language agreement in the 19th century. Basically the brotherhood/panslavic/illyrian idea was way more prominent so they agreed to create a single language for all the central south slavs. Had the croats decided back then to choose kajkavian/chakavian as the standard, things could be very different today.
As things are tho, linguistically these 4 are the same language, even if we look at the standards. Chakavian, Torlakian and Kajkavian have more of a linguistic claim to be classified as languages than say, montenegrin does. The difference is socio-linguistic.
Vuj219@reddit
I don't understand why is Naš or Naški stupid in your opinion. Štokavian doesn't make sense because it is just one dimension of this language. There are other ones for example ekavica vs ijekavica, and the actual dialects are a combination of these sub groups. So in Serbia the most common is Štokavian paired with Ekavica, in Bosnia/Eastern Croatia the most common is Štokavian with Ijekavica while in northern Croatia it is Kajkavski with Ekavica. So in some way the dialect in northern Croatia and in Serbia are similar (both are Ekavica), but in other ways dialect in Serbia is more similar to the Bosnian and Easter Croatian dialects (all of them are Štokavian). Because of this I think the best name would be actually Naški or Naš, because it is not chosen based on one Region or one quality of this language continuity and it is actutally already used a lot by the natives in my experience.
LowDesigner1330@reddit
"Naški" is taken.
It's literally what Molise (Kruč) Croats aka Zlavi or Ščavuni call their language and it's a creole based off super old Western Shtokavian mixed with super old Chakavian and lots of Italian thrown in that none of the BCMS speakers stand a chance of having a conversation with speakers of that language
Vuj219@reddit
I still don't think this makes Naški a bad choice for naming BCMS. Since their language is archaic, it might even suggest, that naški was used even in the past to refer to the language spoken in the region.
mrsimud@reddit
WTF is Banat Bulgarian?
Virtual_Heron_3344@reddit
Here's a grandma speaking Banat Bulgarian (Pavlikenski). They started off as a Paulician sect in the 10th century, were converted by Bosnian Croat Franciscans to Catholicism, and left for Romania after a failed uprising against the Ottomans.
I'm curious how much of her speech you can understand.
Archaeopteryx111@reddit
A lot of the Paulicians later converted to Islam and became Pomaks.
BRM_the_monkey_man@reddit
thats a different group of paulicians and it happened earlier but they are both former members of the same heretical sect
Archaeopteryx111@reddit
Interesting. Are you primal?
BRM_the_monkey_man@reddit
partially
Archaeopteryx111@reddit
Nice. Do they intermarry with Christian Bulgarians?
BRM_the_monkey_man@reddit
yeah, sure, many even convert after, it doesnt happen THAT often but yk its normal
HumanMan00@reddit
Thats awesome - its bulgarian but its phonetically different but also has some forms that remind me of croatian or slovenian. Very unique.
Steinadlerr@reddit
It is because Croatian priests brought our village literature, thats why we write in latin (also because we are catholic) and also we faced Several times the fear of extinction, which luckily never happened
HumanMan00@reddit
Love it! Im glad it didnt! 🙂
Archaeopteryx111@reddit
There is also a Croatian minority in Romania that speaks a distinct dialect.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krashovani
RegionSignificant977@reddit
Fascinating! For some reason many of that woman vocabulary reminds me about my grandmother from Harmanli region, which is quite far from Chiprovtsi.
mrsimud@reddit
I recognize a lot of words, but without subtitles basically nothing. It does sound like Bulgarian dialect.
Steinadlerr@reddit
I am a Banat Bulgar. Basically Catholic Bulgarians who fled Bulgaria because of ottoman empire
Lopsided-Rooster-930@reddit
now extinct community settled by the austrohungarians in modern day Timiș county
Archaeopteryx111@reddit
There’s just a few thousand of them. This map overstates their numbers.
Mysterious-Put1459@reddit
They are the purple dots that are encircled, not the orange area
Archaeopteryx111@reddit
Oh makes sense. But then the number of Slavs is still overstated in orange.
tihomirbz@reddit
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banat_Bulgarians
Stefanthro@reddit
This is so misinformed. Only the standard versions of BCMS are based on shtokavian. All of the other dialects in those respective countries are nonstandard dialects of BCMS - not to mention the local variations of shtokavian that aren’t the standard version.
MIkaela39752@reddit (OP)
it isnt misinformed
i never claimed that every single person in those BCMS countries speaks standard shtokavian, im talking about the 4 standard languages which are based off of it
the "only" standard version of BCMS is literally what over 90% of people use in every single of those countries
even zagreb in croatia which is often lumped as a kajkavian speaking area is basically 99% shtokavian + 1% kajkavian words randomly added in
Stefanthro@reddit
The volume of speakers is irrelevant - it’s about the qualitative criteria to distinguish between a language vs. a dialect. Torlakian, Chakavian, Kajkavian, and Shtokavian simply don’t meet the criteria to be classified as separate languages…
MIkaela39752@reddit (OP)
the reason why they dont meet the criteria to be separate languages is because people just made the criteria that way, why do you see human made lines/criterias as some sort of objective truth, its really not, it is arbitrary
also if chakavian and kajkavian dont qualify as separate languages because of the criteria then the four BCMS standard languages dont either since theyre linguistically closer to each other than lets say chakavian is to shtokavian as an example
Stefanthro@reddit
The hypocrisy is hilarious - “why do you believe their arbitrary system of categorization when you could believe in mine instead”. If we follow your system, Slovenian doesn’t exist and instead there are 50 languages in Slovenia.
Maybe you should also learn what criteria linguists use to differentiate between languages and dialects before calling them arbitrary. It’s only arbitrary to you because you’re unaware.
MIkaela39752@reddit (OP)
i didnt say that standard slovenian doesnt exist, I said it myself as an example of divergence between the 2 languages, 2 being the standard slovene and shtokavian
but yeah you could say that there are also 50 languages in slovenia as well
in what sense is the division between dialects and languages anything but arbitrary?
Stefanthro@reddit
I know you didn’t say standard Slovenian doesn’t exist. I’m saying if we apply the rules you’re proposing here, then Slovenia would have 50 langages and not one language with many dialects.
It’s only as arbitrary as any classification system that humans develop, like defining what a species is, or what to call colours. If go and read about what the criteria actually are before critiquing them, you might have a leg to stand on
MIkaela39752@reddit (OP)
you literally debunked your own argument
thats literally my point, thats why im calling the division between dialects and languages as arbitrary
and it is, right? you literally just called it arbitrary
i dont understand what are you trying to achieve here
Stefanthro@reddit
Lol man.. you somehow completely misunderstood.. I will have to spoon feed you...
What I said is not that linguistic criteria for what constitutes a language is arbitrary. I said it's the same amount of arbitrary as any other scientific classification system. What does that mean? It means the natural and social world does not fit into neat little boxes. So scientists come up with the best possible classification systems, but as good as they are, they are not perfect. But they are sure as hell better than the theories of a random person not educated in linguistics - who doesn't even seem to have the desire to understand linguists' criteria for a language vs. a dialect before criticizing them.
What am I trying to achieve? Your post was claiming that attempts to name BCMS with one term are "stupid" - yet you don't even realize the stupidity of your own argument. My goal is to point that out to you.
Antibacterial_Cat@reddit
"Dinaroslavic linguistic area" for Shtokavo-Serbian, Shtokavo-Croatian, Shtokavo-Bosnian and Shtokavo-Montenegrin language.
"Balkanoslavic linguistic area" for Torlako-Serbian, Goranian, Macedonian and Shopo-Bulgarian language.
BRM_the_monkey_man@reddit
or if were gonna try pissing off everybody anyways we go back to the early 20th century and call them serbocroatian and bulgarian
Saymoran@reddit
Šta bre
mrmanzfield@reddit
Ča brate
-Against-All-Gods-@reddit
Kaj bratec
Ha55aN1337@reddit
We are not supposed to call languages “our” or “mother tongue”? Rofl.
MIkaela39752@reddit (OP)
im not saying you cant use them
i just think it sounds stupid thats all
Ha55aN1337@reddit
When an english speaking person says he is speaking “their” language or his “mother tongue”, it is also stupid? The whole world uses these phrases.
Soft-Ruin-9182@reddit
English speakers don’t say they speak “ours”
MIkaela39752@reddit (OP)
why are you so moody
yeah i think it sounds stupid, so what
no but genuinely, what is the harm here?
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
'Our' is totally valid
CuriousAsshole@reddit
I cannot even comprehend to have an opinion on this untill someone here gives me a direct comparison between shtokavian, kajkavian, chokavian and torlakian.
Why is the shtokavian thing uniting our language? Is it agnostic to ekavica/ijekavica?
I am truly asking these questions from a point of pure ignorence.
Kovalski94@reddit
It's a dialect, not a language. While politically recognized as different, "BCMS" is linguistically one language. And if you break down shtokavian dialect further more, you would get local sub-dialects on a more granular level.
MIkaela39752@reddit (OP)
pretty much yes
which are all pretty much mutually intelligble though, thats why we consider the 4 standard languages (BCMS) - THE same language, its the reason why i dont see an issue using the label "shtokavian" instead of BCMS or serbo-croatian
Kovalski94@reddit
Because you can not use it in "language" terms. Would be the same for example using Cockny or Scouse in terms of language. You are comparing two different things. Dialect is part of the language, it can be a language itself, since some people in BCMS use different dialect to shtokaviqn, as can be shown on the map.
MIkaela39752@reddit (OP)
but does anyone call cockny and scouse as different languages though?
but either way, i dont see how the existence of torlakian, chakavian, kajkavian dialects makes the use of "shtokavian" for all 4 standard languages not possible? they can be separate languages, now im not sure how different torlakian is to shtokavian serbian, i never heard torlakian but in general, if theyre different enough, they can be considered different languages right? take slovenian vs bcms, slovenian is different enough to be considered its own language
Kovalski94@reddit
That is my point, nobody calls them, because they are not languages, but dialects of the English language. Same as shtokavian is not a language, but a dialect of lingusticly one language, but politically four languages, hence, it couldn't be used to summarize BCMS. You are mixing grannies and frogs as we would say.
Its_Stavro@reddit
I know it’s cliche, but this map should stop calling the language here “Macedonian”, people from FYROM are Slavs (with some Bulgarian and Albanian) and so their language, they are unrelated to Greeks. No hate tot them, we are all humans. But this treating them like Macedonia is a lie, and I’ll be firm on that because it’s just not true.
slight_digression@reddit
No, the majority of the people are Macedonian and speak the Macedonian language. Given that there is no other Macedonian language, I don't see how it can be an issue.
Yes, there are other people, minorities, including Albanians and a very small Bulgarian minority living in the country, that is correct.
Its_Stavro@reddit
Again they have nothing to do with Macedonians nor Greeks, they have a Slavic (non-Greek) ancestry and their language is Slavic.
Macedonians are Greeks, and people there aren’t that.
Your definition of Macedonia is fundamentally wrong.
slight_digression@reddit
There is only one ethnic group that identifies as only Macedonian. If you ask a Macedonian how they identify they will tell you that they are Macedonian and that will be it. No Slavic, no Greek, no Turkish, no British.
If you go to Greece and ask what they are, they will tell you Greek and maybe after they will explain how they are Macedonian and try to justify it.
Its_Stavro@reddit
That’s not how it works, if here in Athens we start identifying as Chinese, that doesn’t make it true.
Macedonians in Greece are genetically, linguistically and culturally Macedonians. The people from FYROM are Slavic culturally and linguistically, they role play they are, but they aren’t and again they speak Slavic and are genetically fully unrelated with real Macedonians.
Normal-Cook-2946@reddit
So in greece there are two kind of peoples: greeks and macedonians and they are all greeks?
Its_Stavro@reddit
No, we are all Greek, but we also have sub-ethnic groups, like Macedonians, cretans, thesalians, Peloponnesians and etc.
slight_digression@reddit
Oh so it's like I said:
Tell me, those Greek-Macedonians, what language do they speak?
Its_Stavro@reddit
Greek. Macedonia is tied to Greece, Macedonians are and were always a Greek “tribe”. Macedonias are fully unrelated to Slavs.
slight_digression@reddit
No, not really. Given that the contemporary Greeks used to consider the Macedonians as barbarians or partially Greek.
Then there is the undeniable mixing of people in the Balkans.
Its_Stavro@reddit
That’s absolutely wrong, with all respect and good faith. Just because some immature people back then thought this doesn’t mean it’s true. Almost all modern historians, scientists AND Ancient Greeks disagree. Back then they had a tendency to call anyone beyond their city state barbarian.
If you truly care see this video, please see it as it explains my point perfectly: https://youtu.be/hi6EMhGT4ek?is=RF8NVV5X920j7D3y
As for the mixing in the Balkans, just because Greeks have a small (again small) Slavic admixture, it doesn’t mean we are Slavs, it’s just a small admixture.
Mixing happens, populations for from here to there, but the core is the same, no matter these small admixtures, we are Greek and primarily Greek, that’s our core, regardless of these. And there is also the continuity argument.
Normal-Cook-2946@reddit
you also have albanians as sub-etnic group. Why you are not frustrated over Albania?
Its_Stavro@reddit
I mean SUB-ethnic, not ethnic groups. There is a difference.
With ethnic groups I mean all the types of Greeks. Albanians are not Greeks they are a separate ethnic group.
But Cretans and Macedonians are the same ethnic group (Greek), but separate SUB-ethnic groups.
Normal-Cook-2946@reddit
Dude what you don't understand, they are MACEDONIANS living in North Macedonia. I dont know what you greeks can't understand. Go ask Tsipras maybe he will explain it to you.
Its_Stavro@reddit
They are genetically fully unrelated to Greeks and Macedonians. They have nothing to do culturally not linguistically either. Just because they are on this location and call themselves this, doesn’t mean it’s true.
Normal-Cook-2946@reddit
Slavs might not be related to Greeks. But today people that live in North Macedonia might be a mix of Slavs and antic Macedonians. How do we know that there was border and slavs did not cross south and greeks to north???? My grandmother and grandfather were born in Pozharsko todays Lutraki. So are they Slavs born in grece? How did they end up there??????
Its_Stavro@reddit
Just because Greeks have some small or moderate Slavic admixture doesn’t make Greek Slavs. Genetic mixtures happen, but the core is the same.
And again we speak about a country (FYROM) that’s clearly Slavic in genetics, language, history and culture. Unlike the Greek Macedonia which is all the above.
D0nkeyHS@reddit
You think kajkavian is a different language? What do you think makes kajkavian kajkavian? Don't tunnel on the most extreme examples, where is the line between kajkavian Croatian and shtokavian Croatian.
Like is somebody who basically speaks standard shtokavian but with kaj instead of što really somebody speaking a different language?
MIkaela39752@reddit (OP)
i would say no
D0nkeyHS@reddit
But are they speaking kajkavian? What makes something kajkavian?
MIkaela39752@reddit (OP)
subjectivity as an argument is a double edged sword
EbbPlane1749@reddit
what is this recent thing with people just avoiding respecting kosovo? we do not speak any type of slavic language, we speak albanian. the serbs that live there in the north of the country speak whatever this is about
LowDesigner1330@reddit
Because Kosovo doesn't exist.
It's a hoax made up by James Belushi and Slobodan Milošević to syphon federal funds in former Yugoslavia but you're not fooling anyone anymore.
Archaeopteryx111@reddit
There is also a Croatian minority in Romania that speaks a weird dialect.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krashovani
SafeCoconut573@reddit
also in austria and hungary too
MintCathexis@reddit
Shtokavian is a supradialect of BCMS, it is not a language in and on itself. Since you say you're Croat, I'm surprised you didn't hear about it until now, or you didn't learn that it's a dialect in school. It is also further subdivided into Western Shtokavian and Eastern Shtokavian.
LowDesigner1330@reddit
Eastern and Western shtokavian don't exist any more they are historic dialects.
Both modern standard Serbian and modern standard Croatian (and Bosnian, and Montenegrin) are based off Neoshtokavian
throwawayy00223@reddit
linguistically it is
JovanThePlatypus456@reddit
Shtokavian is dialect of serbo croatian. Vuk karadics reforms of serbian that all speakers of bcms adopted was based on that dialect. That doesnt mean other dialects are incorrect
No_Designer_8203@reddit
They are not languages, they are one language. They're not based off of shotkavian, this one language is shtokavian.
LowDesigner1330@reddit
Neoshtokavian, not shtokavian, the old shtokavian was many different dialects
AdvantageStatus4635@reddit
don't tell them it is serbian
9307911@reddit
I can speak Serbian (Montenegrin) language (C2 level) but I don't live in that region anymore so anytime I mention my knowledge of it I just call it Serbian because it's the most known among foreigners and it has the shortest (and easiest to pronounce) name
No_Designer_8203@reddit
I won't, I do not want to scare them.
LowDesigner1330@reddit
Shtokavian ia a group of dialects, mostly extinct.
The four literary standards are based off Neoshtokavian, a language that developed by mixing East and West Shtokavian speakers and then by Ilyrian/Vukian, and later Novi Sad linguistic reforms.
vladasr@reddit
This map is hundred years old. People bellow 85 years dont speak Torlakian. Probably same for most fringe languaged.
Capable_Studio_6631@reddit
All 4 languages are based off Bulgarian.
Reasonable-Crew-3128@reddit
Sorry, can you repeat that in Cyrillic, that alphabet from Russia?
Capable_Studio_6631@reddit
Serbian in Denmark? Damn.
Reasonable-Crew-3128@reddit
i'm not serbian lol. and i'm not against bulgarians, but if you make stupid statements i'm gonna make annoying jokes.
RegionSignificant977@reddit
Cyrillic and spreading of orthodoxy didn't affect anything?
shortEverything_@reddit
Why not claim all Slavic languages while you’re at it
Stverghame@reddit
They sometimes do lol
MomcheMusic@reddit
I don’t see how that is possible. I understand Russians more than i understand Bulgarians.
Tsitsmitse@reddit
Using the name Shtokavian would be just as imprecise as calling everything “Serbo-Croatian” or any other name.
Shtokavian is not a single language/dialect. It is a broad dialect group that includes several distinct subdialects, but the four standard languages are all based on just one of those subdialects, specifically Eastern Herzegovinian Neo-Shtokavian. That means calling the standards “Shtokavian” lumps together many Shtokavian speakers who actually use different subdialects that are not the basis for the literary norms. On the other hand, calling it “Eastern Herzegovinian dialect Neo-Shtokavian” would be at the very least tiresome.
MIkaela39752@reddit (OP)
so youre calling my use of "shtokavian" too broad? ok i get it but doesnt that apply to nearly every single language? there are a lot of differencts accents in lets say britain + even specific regional words, and all that gets lumped as "english"
guy_from_the_lab@reddit
I thought all language is based either on albanian or hungarian
el_salinho@reddit
It’s one of the dialects of BCMS
nanpossomas@reddit
Što ka?
Whole-O@reddit
From an imaginary look at an Ausländer's CV in Germany, BCMS looks very professional and corporate friendly to me. Shtokavian looks like the CV owner is a terrorist from Chechnya.
Archaeopteryx111@reddit
Yes, I agree. BCMS also sort of sounds like Bose-Einstein condensates.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bose%E2%80%93Einstein_condensate
AdvantageStatus4635@reddit
FCSB
Ur-Best-Friend@reddit
I mean, it's not Bose C'nstein Mondensate?
I don't really see how it sounds like it lmao.
User20242024@reddit
In the past, it was called Illyrian language.
Stverghame@reddit
Let everyone call it how they want. The funny and weird thing is, for example, some Croats (I spoke to) that love to say the language is not the same, get pissed off when I address them in English.
caesarj12@reddit
So the question I have now is. How much do you guys understand Bulgarian and vice versa? Is Macedonian closer to shtokavian than Bulgarianm
milic_srb@reddit
As someone speaking Torlakian Serbian, not Shtokavian, Macedonian is defiantly much closer to Bulgarian grammatically from what I've seen.
But it's much easier to understand, probably due to vocabulary and style of speech.
Shtokavian Serbian has 7 cases, our Torlakian 3 (online often I see 2 but they always forget Vocative), and Macedonian and Bulgarian have 0.
So idk how well Shtokavian Serbs can understand Macedonians, but I do belive they generally can, unlike Bulgarians which you'd need a couple drinks to understand.
Stverghame@reddit
Technically, they have 2. Nominative and Vocative.
RegionSignificant977@reddit
Apperantly some in regions Torlakian doesn't use cases at all. I don't know if it applies to Torlakian in Serbia or only about Torlakian in Macedonia and Bulgaria. I don't know how if Shtokavian people understand Bulgarian. For me standard Serbian is very hard. It would require more than few drinks.
milic_srb@reddit
maybe, tho that would definitely then be an influence of Bulgarian or Macedonian bcs from what I read online having the Nominative and Objective cases is one of the defining features of Torlakian, but I might be wrong, I'm not a linguist
Aggravating_Key2725@reddit
Pirot would be the closest. They only have Nominative for neuter singular and all plurals. They have Nominative and Oblique for masculine and feminine singular. This puts it pretty much in the same category as Tran in Bulgaria or Kumanovo in Macedonia, especially since they all also have definite articles. Which makes sense since that's the periphery of the Torlakian area.
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
As a Serb: 100% Croat, Bosniak and Montenegrin
70%: Slovene, Macedonian, Bulgarian
Slovenes, Macedonians and Bulgarians understand us much better.
Reasonable-Crew-3128@reddit
Macedonian is eastern south-slavic, together with Bulgarian as the only south slavic languages. So closer to Bulgarian than Shtokavian. It has serbian influence as well, but not enough to not make it closer to Bulgarian than Serbian. Though the issue is that Bulgarian was standardized on eastern Bulgarian dialects, instead of western. If it had been standardized on western bulgarian dialects, the difference would be even less. And also southern Serbs do better with both Macedonian and bulgarian than others.
RegionSignificant977@reddit
Torlakian is transitional language that shares also a lot with Bulgarian. In some regions it lacks case system. Macedonian and Bulgarian are only Slavic languages without cases which is also true for torlakian and it is partially true with Northern torlakian. It is much more intelligible for Bulgarians, although it shares vocabulary with Serbian that are different. Serbian is much less intelligible as is Bulgarian for Serbians. Overall, I can have a simple conversation with Serb, but I have to use translator for Serbian news or r/Serbia. Macedonian is intelligible for Bulgarians that have good command of Bulgarian including obsolete vocabulary and some dialects even from Eastern part of South Bulgaria. Bulgarian from first half of 20th century will be even closer. Both Macedonian and Bulgarian have gone through significant reforms in forties of 20th century and the level of mutual intelligibility was even greater before that. Because of those reforms Bulgarian might be harder for Macedonians to understand. On the other side, because of Yugoslavia and strong presence of Serbian in Macedonia trough media they are much better with Serbian than Bulgarians.
MomcheMusic@reddit
Not that much. Unless you are Macedonian.
krisvelde@reddit
I am from Šumadija. I can understand Macedonian 90%, Bulgarian 60% . But If you are Serb, and other person is Bulgarian, It's very easy to understand each other. You can speak Serbian, and that person can speak Bulgarian, you will find way to understand each other 😁
mrsimud@reddit
Macedonian is closer to Bulgarian, but since serbo-croatian (shtokavian) was official language of Yugoslavia, and with larger influence in music, movies, TV etc. Macedonianas (and to a lesser extent Bulgarians) understand shotkavian much more then vice versa.
Comfortable_Cress194@reddit
As a Bulgarian i can say that for a basic conversion we can understand each other enough to understand what the person wants.Macedonian has a big influence from Serbian but Bulgarians understand it better.
Live-Method-219@reddit
Torlaks understand Macedonian extremely well, Bulgarian a little bit less. Western Shtokavians can understand Macedonian, let's say 80-90% and it sounds a little bit funny (since it's less synthetic than shtokavian), for Bulgarian, you get context and meaning, but you have to be fully alert and know many archaic words
Also, Slovenian dialects are most synthetic, while east Bulgarian ones are most analytic
Kooky_Resource6348@reddit
It depends from where in Bulgaria/Macedonia/Rest of Balkans you are. East Macedonians understand West Bulgarians naturally more than Serbian, but North Macedonians understand South Serbian naturally more than Bulgarian.
VladimirLogos@reddit
That is not a language, it's just the most widespread variant.
crivycouriac@reddit
One thing I miss is Bosnia introducing a lingua franca, since its ethnicities cannot agree on what language they speak. Consider that the choice for this is usually the language of the former colonizer, this lingua franca should then be German or Turkish
But yes, otherwise I do refer to this language as Shtokavian and I don’t know why others don’t
saraspaludoa@reddit
Well we do have lingua franca in a way and it's called bosanski, but two other peoples decided they are not speaking it.
Live-Method-219@reddit
20 years more and we are declaring Republic of Serbian Vijena and southern Bavaria/s
Judestadt@reddit
And wdym in 20 years its Serbian since like forever???
Judestadt@reddit
*Beč, not Vijena
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
How should we refer to standard Slovenian that has 50 dialects on its own?
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
OP got triggered by that last post about Montenegro.. didn't she
tinmanjk@reddit
There is no spoon
alkorisno@reddit
Bring back shtokavia!
Archaeopteryx111@reddit
Romania and Moldova basically have as many people as all the South Slavic countries put together.
krisvelde@reddit
Shtokavian is not language
deviendrais@reddit
Oh God they’re gonna ban questions regarding the differences between Serbo-Croatian aren’t they
silentmarrow@reddit
Wait.. you onto something actually
Live-Method-219@reddit
It's supradialect or narječje as we would call it
It's early elementary school thing