Talk:Croatian language: Difference between revisions

Warning: this article is subject to a 1RR limitation. Per the discretionary sanctions authorized in the Macedonia case, this article is subject to 1RR. Reverting more than one time in a 24-hour period may result in a block or a ban from this article and its talk page. All reverts should be discussed on the talk page. This is a bright line, not an entitlement, and reverting exactly once per day is considered disruption, and users doing so are subject to being blocked. Please see this notice about recent edit warring. Editors wishing to make controversial edits are strongly advised to discuss them first.

Discussions on this page often lead to previous arguments being restated. Please read recent comments and look in the archives before commenting, and read through the list of highlighted discussions below before starting a new one: Croatian is a standardized register of a language which is also spoken by Serbs, Bosniaks, and Montenegrins. In English, this language is generally called "Serbo-Croat(ian)". Use of that term in English, which dates back at least to 1864 and was modeled on both Croatian and Serbian nationalists of the time, is not a political endorsement of Yugoslavia, but is simply a label. As long as it remains the common name of the language in English, it will continue to be used here on Wikipedia.

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This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Croatian language article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

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This article has become another battleground. Enough is, quite frankly, enough of the edit warring, as the article is now protected for the fourth time since July due to it. We're going to try something new. Starting now, this article; under the discretionary sanctions authorised in Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Macedonia; is hereby placed on a 1RR restriction. This means one revert, per user, per day. This restriction is per person, not per account. The most obvious vandalism is excepted from this restriction, and I do mean obvious. This restriction applies to all users, and I will place an edit notice of this for the article. Any appeals should be directed towards my talk page in the first instance, or Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement in the second. Courcelles 11:52, 4 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The above timestamp has intentionally been moved forward 15 years, to stop automatic archival. True timestamp: Courcelles 11:53, 4 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The lead paragraph of this article should be more in line with the leads at Serbian language, Bosnian language, and Montenegrin language since these four lects form a clear and well-defined set of varieties of a common language. The leads should reflect that. --Taivo (talk) 14:30, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. -- Director (talk) 15:06, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Likewise. --biblbroks (talk) 16:04, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Please consider joining the feedback request service. An editor has requested comments from other editors for this discussion. This page has been added to the following list: Language and linguistics When discussion has ended, remove this tag and it will be removed from the list. If this page is on additional lists, they will be noted below.

There is a problem with a reference (current #4: Benjamin W. Fortson IV, Indo-European Language and Culture: An Introduction, 2nd ed. (2010, Blackwell), pg. 431, "Because of their mutual intelligibility, Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian are usually thought of as constituting one language called Serbo-Croatian.")

The source does not say that the Croatian is a collection of "varieties of the Serbo-Croatian language" as indicated in the article - hence that particular source does not support the claim made.--Tomobe03 (talk) 17:10, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This article was discussed before. User (forgot name) added his edit without discussion at talk page, so I reverted all thing. --Wustenfuchs 17:20, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I usually keep out of linguistic issues and I did not do much actual research here, but having reviewed the sources at Serbo-Croatian, I am confident that kwami and Taivo did not misquote anyone. I will add that a source that states "Croatian constitutes a part of Serbo-Croatian" is by no means misquoted under WP:SYNTH as supporting the statement that Croatian is a variant of Serbo-Croatian.

Wustenfuchs, please be very careful as this article is under a 1RR restriction. I won't edit-war with you, I'll just report the second revert. -- Director (talk) 17:34, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It is stated in the lead that it is a variant of SC, but lead is different. If you want to report, then please do. --Wustenfuchs 17:40, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The referencing was absolutely correct, Wustenfuchs and has been discussed before. Croatian is part of a complex including Serbian, Bosnian, and Montenegrin and the lead here should match the leads in those other articles, with the same trajectory. It's well-referenced. Thanks, Wustenfuchs for edit warring and getting the article protected (sarcasm). --Taivo (talk) 17:58, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

One may discuss, but the sources must support the claims directly per WP:V.--Tomobe03 (talk) 18:02, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sentence "Croatian, although technically a register of Serbo-Croatian, is sometimes considered a distinct language by itself." claimed to be supported by ref #13 (Cvetkovic, Ljudmila) is not really supported by the sentence. It contains a WP:WEASEL "sometimes" which is absent from the source - AGF inadvertently giving impression that it is rarely considered a distinct language, when opposite is generally the case.--Tomobe03 (talk) 18:01, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

No, Tomobe03, the "opposite" is not the case. In English language linguistic sources outside the former Yugoslavia these lects are nearly always discussed as extremely close variants of a single language that is most commonly called "Serbo-Croatian". It is only very, very rarely that these forms are listed without the comment that they are mutually-intelligible variants of a single language. Artificial labels such as "B/C/S(/M)" have not caught on in the English-language linguistic community yet. For example, in J.P. Mallory and D.Q. Adams, The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World (2006, Oxford), the list of forms for this language in the index is clearly labelled "Serbo-Croatian" (page 722). That's just the very first book I pulled off the shelf that might have relevant information. --Taivo (talk) 18:16, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I dare say it is and this the source. Besides, the point of the objection is that the weasel word "sometimes" is completely absent from the source and use of that source to back up this particular claim is in violation of WP:V--Tomobe03 (talk) 18:19, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Consensus can be reached, and it was reached way before. Just see the archive. The lead that was made by Tavio started a very long discussion before, and probably will do the same in 3 or 4 days. The lead that I reverted was there for months, and it seams it was good for both sides. That is why I reverted Tavio's edit. I think it was very constructive for the article. --Wustenfuchs 18:05, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Wustenfuchs, it was obviously not "good for both sides", since it characterized Croatian as a "standard language of the Croats" - not as a variant of Serbo-Croatian. The sentence that mentions Serbo-Croatian does not even make grammatical sense ("they" are part of Serbo-Croatian?? who's "they"?). The current lede paragraph strikes me as merely a clever/desperate way to avoid stating what the sources support. Its a mangled and deliberately evasive POV wreck. The lede needs to state, plain and simple, that Croatian is a variant/form/standard of the Serbo-Croatian language. All else is compromising for the sake of nationalist sensibilities of Wikipedia users from Croatia. -- Director (talk) 18:13, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"Tavio" made no such edits, Wustenfuchs. --Taivo (talk) 18:20, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"They" are probably dialects, we can correct it if you want, but I think it's clear enough what is "they". Another important thing is that this lead that I made is correct also. Dialects, namely Chakavian, Shtokavian and Kajkavian make Croatian language - so this is correct. Also some users insist it is variant of Serbo-Croatian, if we observe SC as family of languages, then they are also correct. So I think that I made the most optimal lead. --Wustenfuchs 18:23, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, Taivo, I read it wrong it seams. --Wustenfuchs 18:23, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Wgfinley, the sources are unequivocal that Croatian is not a language in its own right other than for nationalistic purposes. The linguistic literature, independent of former-Yugoslav or politically-motivated literature, is crystal clear that Croatian is completely mutually intelligible with Serbian and Bosnian and that the label most commonly applied to this non-Slovenian West South Slavic language is "Serbo-Croatian" (still being commonly used long after the breakup of Yugoslavia). Wustenfuchs, they are not a "family of languages", they are one, single, solitary language--the non-former-Yugoslav linguistic sources are crystal clear on that fact. My edit was simply to bring this article into line with the articles on Bosnian, Serbian, and Montenegrin as part of a cluster of lects that constitute a single language, Serbo-Croatian. --Taivo (talk) 18:28, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm here in an admin capacity, I don't do content disputes. I've had this page on my watch list since 2010 due to the constant disputes that crop here and to direct conversation as needed. You need to discuss the issue amongst yourselves and reach a consensus. If you can do that I can lift the protection earlier but the issues should be discussed as opposed to edit warring or seeking to exclude editors from the conversation citing various infractions, you all seem to be doing a good job on that since I protected the page, progress!! --WGFinley (talk) 18:36, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Oops, I think I misread who had written what above, WGFinley. My comments are probably only directed at Wustenfuchs. My apologies for inserting you into the content issue. --Taivo (talk) 18:40, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

If you look carefully at my edit, there was nothing said that was different than what is already in the lead. All I did was move the clause about Serbo-Croatian to a position following the name to bring it into line with the articles on the other three lects that constitute Serbo-Croation--Bosnian language, Serbian language, and Montenegrin language. Since these four are a mutually-intelligible group of dialects, the intros should reflect that relationship with similar wording. As it is written now, the second sentence barely makes any sense (starting with the strange "they" which doesn't have a real antecedent). --Taivo (talk) 21:20, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Source #4 (David Dalby, Linguasphere (1999/2000, Linguasphere Observatory), pg. 445, 53-AAA-g, "Srpski+Hrvatski, Serbo-Croatian".)is problematic too. Unfortunately it is offline, but the Linguasphere website itself does not support the claim made in the reference quote as it states Srpski+Hrvatski (Serbian+Croatian) but branches further and in no place does it make the equation proposed in the reference quote. This in particular seems like a case of WP:SYNTH.--Tomobe03 (talk) 18:15, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

No, Tomobe03. Linguasphere lists these numbers for languages and then divides the languages up into constituent dialects and sub-dialects. The number 53-AAA-g refers to a single language--Srpski+Hrvatski, Serbo-Croatian, and then lists the constituents dialects for that language with their subdialects. --Taivo (talk) 18:19, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

That's OR - Srpski+Hrvatski in both Serbian and Croatian means Serbian+Croatian. To a casual observer that may appear as two. I don't see where you get the notion that the two mean a single language called "Serbo-Croatian"?--Tomobe03 (talk) 18:28, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

No, Tomobe03, you don't seem to understand the way that Linguasphere labels things. It doesn't use "-", but "+" for some reason in its language names. Thus we find "Hindi+Urdu" for Hindi-Urdu, for example. It's simply a notational artifact of the source and does not imply what you are assuming. The fact that Linguasphere assigns this a number is the indication that this is a language. --Taivo (talk) 18:36, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

All of the above, and those are just the first few checked, are references which fail to directly support the claims in violation of WP:V. If one aims to support a claim that "Croatian language is a variety of Serbo-Croatian" or that it is "usually called Serbo-Croatian", one must provide sources claiming that verbatim (outside wiki per WP:CIRCULAR. Otherwise, that's WP:SYNTH or WP:OR no matter how compelling the case may be.--Tomobe03 (talk) 18:23, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, Tomobe03, but you don't seem to understand WP:V, WP:SYNTH or WP:OR. The references are crystal clear in their statements and in what they demonstrate in the article. --Taivo (talk) 18:30, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I understand them perfectly - don't worry about that. If "sometimes called..." is apparently supported by a source which does not say "sometimes called..." that's SYNTH/OR. Sorry about that, but there's no way around it.--Tomobe03 (talk) 18:32, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You are mistaken. At no point does Wikipedia require that we turn off our brains when writing or evaluating sources. The sources are perfectly fine and demonstrate without any equivocation what they are being used for. --Taivo (talk) 18:37, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

In sentence "Croatian will become an official EU language with the accession of Croatia, though when the other states accede, translation might not normally be provided between the various Serbo-Croat standards, and documents in other EU languages might not necessarily be translated into all of them." the reference #18 ("Vandoren: EU membership – challenge and chance for Croatia – Daily – tportal.hr". Daily.tportal.hr. 2010-09-30. Retrieved 2010-10-27.) does not support the last part of the sentence (starting with "though when other...") and this claim appears to be pure original research.--Tomobe03 (talk) 18:54, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]