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Three official languages have emerged in the Balkan region that was formerly Yugoslavia: Croatian in Croatia, Serbian in Serbia, and both of these languages plus Bosnian in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian, a Textbook introduces the student to all three. Dialogues and exercises are presented in each language, shown side by side for easy comparison; in addition, Serbian is rendered in both its Latin and its Cyrillic spellings. Teachers may choose a single language to use in the classroom, or they may familiarize students with all three. This popular textbook is now revised and updated with current maps, discussion of a Montenegrin language, advice for self-study learners, an expanded glossary, and an appendix of verb types. It also features: • All dialogues, exercises, and homework assignments available in Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian • Classroom exercises designed for both small-group and full-class work, allowing for maximum oral participation • Reading selections written by Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian authors especially for this book • Vocabulary lists for each individual section and full glossaries at the end of the book • A short animated film, on an accompanying DVD, for use with chapter 15 • Brief grammar explanations after each dialogue, with a cross-reference to more detailed grammar chapters in the companion book, Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian, a Grammar.

Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian, a Grammar analyzes and clarifies the complex, dynamic language situation in the former Yugoslavia. Addressing squarely the issues connected with the splintering of Serbo-Croatian into component languages, this volume provides teachers and learners with practical solutions and highlights the differences among the languages as well as the communicative core that they all share. The first book to cover all three components of the post-Yugoslav linguistic environment, this reference manual features: · Thorough presentation of the grammar common to Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian, with explication of all the major differences · Examples from a broad range of spoken language and literature · New approaches to accent and clitic ordering, two of the most difficult points in BCS grammar · Order of grammar presentation in chapters 1–16 keyed to corresponding lessons in Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian, a Textbook · \"Sociolinguistic commentary\" explicating the cultural and political context within which Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian function and have been defined · Separate indexes of the grammar and sociolinguistic commentary, and of all words discussed in both

This paper highlights a fundamental tension between the representations required for case syncretism versus the representations required for case priority. Case syncretism is captured with a feature decomposition based on the patterns established in Caha 2009. However, a different decomposition is required for case priority relations, which are instantiated in Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian (BCS) numeral constructions and in BCS and German relative constructions. The paper proposes that this conflict can be resolved by introducing two levels of representation into the case system: priority is determined by set structures in the syntax, while syncretism is analyzed following a post-syntactic unification operation.

Modal verbs like must express two distinct non-actual meanings: deontic (e.g. obligation) and epistemic (e.g. likelihood inference). How do young children understand these modals? What factors affect their interpretation as deontic or epistemic? We report a picture preference task testing preschool children‟s interpretations of Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian (BCS) morati 'must' as deontic or epistemic. Prior work on English must shows that despite an early deontic comprehension bias at age 3, by age 5 children have flipped to a strong epistemic bias, including constructions for which adults prefer deontic interpretations (must + eventive verbs). However, properties of English leave open multiple explanations for this non-adult behaviour, as must is primarily epistemic in the input, and must + eventive verb constructions can also receive epistemic interpretations. BCS morati provides a natural comparison: morati is overwhelmingly deontic in the input, and BCS syntax provides categorical cues to deontic versus epistemic interpretation. Our results show that BCS children are more adult-like at age 3 than English children, a difference we attribute to clearer syntactic cues to flavour in BCS. But, by age 5, BCS children behave like English counterparts, selecting epistemic scenes even for constructions that are deontic-only in BCS. We argue this cross-linguistic result is best explained pragmatically: deontic uses of both morati and must invite a likelihood inference that obligations will be normatively carried out. This inference was first proposed to explain diachronic meaning changes from root > epistemic. We show older preschool children commit to this likelihood inference more than adults.

A long-standing question in syntax is what role linear order plays in a hierarchical grammar. Phenomena that on the surface show sensitivity to linear order have been particularly illuminating. When agreeing with coordinated subjects with different gender features, participles in Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS), Slovenian, and other languages allow multiple options including agreeing with the linearly closest conjunct. This pattern motivated an analysis where linear order can play a role in a syntactic operation such as agreement (Marušič et al. 2015; Willer-Gold et al. 2016 among others). On the other hand, Murphy & Puškar (2018) show that the pattern can be accounted for without resorting to linear order. This paper provides novel evidence from Coordinate Structure Constraint violating movement in BCS to argue for the non-linear approach. If the argument is on the right track, agreement can be kept within syntax without resorting to PF conditions.

Constituent order can encode grammatical relations in a language. The visual-spatial modality imbues sign languages with characteristics such as simultaneity or the use of space which raise the question of the appropriate unit of analysis in constituent order studies. In this paper, we provide empirical evidence on the order of core constituents in elicited declarative clauses for non-reversible, reversible and locative states-of-affairs in Serbian Sign Language (SZJ). Forty (near-)native deaf SZJ signers, ranging in age between 18 and 70 years old, participated in the data-collection. We consider linguistic and social factors in 810 clauses elicited for the purposes of this study. Our findings suggest that SVO is a preferred order in non-locative clauses with two overtly expressed arguments, whilst GROUND-FIGURE-LOCATIVE RELATION is the most frequent pattern in locative clauses. We argue that our results provide some support for the claim that sign language discourse can be analysed in terms of constituent order in the clause, but that other strategies typical of the visual modality such as the simultaneous expression of core constituents, and manual and non-manual features, the use of space, core argument incorporation into the form of the verb and core argument omission, complicate the traditional notion of sequential constituent order clause as a central grammatical element in SZJ and, by extension, in other sign languages. Consequently, the description of relations between core constituents calls for careful consideration and analysis of different types of data as a way of gaining a clearer insight into the nature of a sign language.

Croatian tongue-twisters are defined by the lack of euphony, and the abundance of sound patterns that lead to speech errors. The major feature that contributes to this anti-euphonious patterning is the significant presence of consonant clusters in the syllable onset. This research combines a phonostylistic approach, computational analysis, and statistical methods in order to detect and differentiate sound patterning and its effect on euphony in tongue-twisters. The paper presents the results from research that focuses on the computational analysis of these features and their comparison with other similar folklore genres (counting-out rhymes, lyric and epic poetry, proverbs, and narratives).

In some languages, nominal case is distributed over several adnominal elements, such ademonstrative pronouns, adjectives, participles, numerals and the nominal head itself. In this article, two hypotheses concerning case distribution are compared. According to the TWO-PART MODEL, case assignment to DPs as a whole (determiner phrases or maximal nominal projections) in syntax is based on a different grammatical mechanism than case distribution within those DPs. According to the ONE-PART MODEL, case distribution within DPs and syntactic case assignment to DPs are based on the same case assignment mechanism. Relying upon case distribution data from Finnish, Estonian, Polish, Russian and Serbo-Croatian, this article argues in favor of the onepart model. Furthermore, it is suggested that the one-part case distribution mechanism interacts with two independent morphological principles, one which regulates the overt morphological realization of elements which function as case assigners and another which states that the grammar is subject to a particular type of case hierarchy.

Our previous research showed that Russian children commit fewer gender-agreement errors with diminutive nouns than with their simplex counterparts. Experiment 1 replicates this finding with Russian children (N=24, mean 3;7, range 2;10–4;6). Gender agreement was recorded from adjective usage as children described animal pictures given just their names, varying in derivational status (diminutive/simplex), novelty, and gender. Experiment 2 extends the gender-agreement elicitation methodology developed for Russian to Serbian, a language with similar morphosyntactic structure but considerably fewer diminutives in child-directed speech. Serbian children (N=22, mean age 3;8, range 3;0–4;1), exhibited an advantage for diminutive nouns of almost the same magnitude as the Russian children. The fact that the diminutive advantage was found in a language with a low frequency of diminutives in the input suggests that morphophonological homogeneity of word clusters and membership in dense neighbourhoods are important factors that contribute to the reduction of inflectional errors during language development.

The book covers three major topics crucial for contemporary syntactic research. Firstly, it offers a sketch of a general theory of dependency in natural language. Different types of linguistic dependencies are distinguished (semantic, syntactic, and morphological), the criteria for their recognition are formulated, and all possible combinations are discussed in some detail. Secondly, it demonstrates the application of the general theory in two specific domains: establishing the system of Surface-Syntactic Relations in French and linear positioning of clitics in Serbian. Thirdly, it presents a formal sketch of Head-Driven Phrase-Structure Grammar modelled in terms of syntactic dependencies.