Is Serbian becoming Croatian? Nationalist counter-reactions to feminist linguistics in Serbia

doi:10.1558/genl.25641

Gender and Language, Vol 11, No 2 (2017)

Is Serbian becoming Croatian? Nationalist counter-reactions to feminist linguistics in Serbia

Simone Rajilic

Issued Date: 20 Jun 2017

Abstract

The paper investigates how nationalism (which flourished since the disintegration of Yugoslavia) and Serbo-Croatian language unity is instrumentalised to block the debates on sexist language in Serbia. Serbian feminists criticise current language practices as being sexist by making women linguistically invisible or rather exclusively visible in stereotypical contexts with only little social prestige. They challenge the supposedly gender-neutrality of so called ‘masculine generics’ and demand a consistent use of gender-specific forms for females. On the contrary, traditional Serbian linguists deny any discriminatory language patterns claiming that nouns for males can be used for females as well because of the ‘nature’ or ‘spirit’ of the Serbian language. Beside those arguments known from similar debates which have been held for other languages, the Serbian anti-feminist discourses on gender and language are even specific: Several gender-specific female nouns are found not to be Serbian but Croatian and should therefore not be used in Serbia. The proposals of feminists for non-sexist language are even accused of endangering Serbian national integrity by turning the Serbian language into Croatian – ignoring the fact that Serbian and Croatian share most of their lexicon being successor languages of Serbo-Croatian.

Download Media

PDF (Price: £17.50 ) Restricted Access

DOI: 10.1558/genl.25641

References

Alexander, R. (2002–3) Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian: one language or three? International Journal of Slavic Linguistics and Poetics 44–5: 1–35.

Alexander, R. (2006) Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian: A Grammar with Sociolinguistic Commentary. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press.

Babić, S. (2006) Hrvatski jezik, zakonodavstvo i ravnopravnost spolova. Jezik 3: 81–7.

Barić, E. (1987) Mocijski parnjaci i njihova upotreba. Rasprave zavoda za jezik 13: 9–18.

Barić, E. (1988) Kada sudac a kada sutkinja? Jezik 3: 85–8.

Berisavljević, S. (1986) Jezik i pol: titule i zanimanja žene u banci. Prilozi proučavanju jezika 22: 119–31.

Bertoša, M. (2001) Jezične promjene i feministička kritika jezika. Revija za sociologiju 1–2: 63–75.

Blagojević, M. (2006) Biti Srbin, biti Muško: Rodne politike i etnički identitet u Srbiji devedesetih. Zeničke sveske – Časopis za društvenu fenomenologiju i kulturnu dijalogiku 3: 69–88.

Bodine, A. (1975) Androcentrism in prescriptive grammar: singular ‘they’, sex-indefinite ‘he’, and ‘he or she’. Language in Society 4: 129–46. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0047404500004607

Bogetić, K. (2013) Normal straight gays: lexical collocations and ideologies of masculinity in personal ads of Serbian gay teenagers. Gender and Language 7(3): 333–67. https://doi.org/10.1558/genl.v7i3.333

Borić, R. (1998) Ženksi identitet u jeziku. Treća 1: 37–44.

Bracewell, W. (1996) Women, motherhood, and contemporary Serbian nationalism. Women’s Studies International Forum 19(1–2): 25–33. https://doi.org/10.1016/0277-5395(95)00061-5

Bugarski, R. (2004) Overview of the linguistic aspects of the disintegration of former Yugoslavia. In Bugarski and Hawkesworth (2004): 3–11.

Bugarski, R. (2005) Pol i rod u jeziku. Forum Bosnae 34: 184–94.

Bugarski, R. and Hawkesworth, C. (eds) (2004) Language in the Former Yugoslav Lands. Bloomington, IN: Slavica Publishers.

Cameron, D. (1992) Feminism and Linguistic Theory. Basingstoke: Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-22334-3

Cameron, D. (2008) Problems of sexist and non-sexist language. In S. Ehrlich (ed.) Language and Gender (vol. II) 273–96. London: Routledge.

Cameron, D. (2010) Gender, language, and the new biologism. Constellations 17(4): 526–39. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8675.2010.00612.x

Canakis, C. (2013) The ‘national body’: language and sexuality in the Balkan national narrative. In F. Tsibiridou and N. Palantzas (eds) Myth of the Other in the Balkans: Representations, Social Practices, Performances 305–20. Thessaloniki: Balkan Myth.

Ćorić, B. (1982) Mocioni sufiksi u srpskohrvatskom jeziku. Belgrade: Filološki fakultet Beogradskog univerziteta.

Ćorić, B. (2008) Tvorba imenica u srpskom jeziku (odabrane teme). Belgrade: Društvo za srpski jezik i književnost Srbije.

Cvetković, D. (2010) Vest je muškog roda – etički aspekti rodne ravnopravnosti u informativnom programu nacionalnih televizija u Srbiji. Kultura 127: 156–75.

Đorđević, K. (2009) Kaže se psihijatresa i ombudsmanka. Politika (18 July). Retrieved on 20 January 2017 from www.politika.rs/rubrike/Drustvo/Kaze-se-psihijatresa-i-ombudsmanka.lt.html.

Đorđević, K. (2006) Borkinje i sudinice. Politika (25 August). Retrieved on 20 January 2017 from www.politika.rs/rubrike/Drustvo/t4736.lt.html.

Ehrlich, S. and King, R. (1994) Feminist meanings and the (de)politicization of the lexicon. Language and Society 23: 59–76. https://doi.org/10.1017/S004740450001767X

Fekete, E. (2008) Jezičke doumice (vol. 1). Belgrade: Makart.

Filipović, J. (2009) Rodno osjetljive jezičke politike: teorijske postavke i metodološki postupci. Anali filološkog fakulteta 21: 109–27.

Filipović, J. (2010) Rod, jezik i rodno osetljive jezičke politike. In UNDP and Gender Equality Directorate within the Serbian Ministry of Labour and Social Policy (eds) Okrugli sto na temu rodno osetljivih jezičkih politika 15–73. Belgrade: UNDP.

Filipović, J. (2011a) Language policy and planning in standard language cultures – an alternative approach. In V. Vasić (ed.) Jezik u potrebi: Primenjena lingvistika u čast Rankom Bugarskom 121–36. Novi Sad: Društvo za primenjenu lingvistiku u Srbije.

Filipović, J. (2011b) Gender and power in the language standardization of Serbian. Gender and Language 5(1): 111–31. https://doi.org/10.1558/genl.v5i1.111

Filipović, J. (2012) Rodno osetljiva upotreba jezika u javnom govoru. In J. Filipović and A. K. Jovanović (eds) Vodič za rodno osetljiv pristup medijama u Srbiji: Preporuke i dosadašnja praksa 76–91. Belgrade: Kosmos.

Friedman, V. (1997) One grammar, three lexicons: ideological overtones, and underpinnings in the Balkan Sprachbund. In K. Singer, R. Eggert and G. Anderson (eds) CLS 33: Papers from the Panels on Linguistic Ideologies in Contact, Universal Grammar, Parameters, and Typology 23–44. Chicago, IL: Chicago Linguistic Society.

Graf, M. (2009) Kako reći: žena borac ili borkinja. Blic (24 October). Retrieved on 20 January 2017 from www.blic.rs/Kultura/117106/Kako-reci-zena--borac-ili-borkinja.

Greenberg, R. D. (2000) Language politics in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia: the crisis over the future of Serbian. Slavic Review 59(3): 625–40. https://doi.org/10.2307/2697348

Greenberg, R. D. (2008) Language and Identity in the Balkans: Serbo-Croatian and its Disintegration. Oxford: Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199208753.001.0001

Hellinger, M. (1985) (ed.) Sprachwandel und feministische Sprachpolitik: Internationale Perspektiven. Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag.

Hellinger, M. (1990) Kontrastive feministische Linguistik: Mechanismen sprachlicher Diskriminierung im Englischen und Deutschen. Ismaning: Hueber.

Hentschel, E. (2003) The expression of gender in Serbian. In M. Hellinger and H. Bußmann (eds) Gender across Languages: The Linguistic Representation of Women and Men (vol. 3) 287–309. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/impact.11.16hen

Hughes, D. M., Mlađenović, L. and Mršević, Z. (1995) Feminist resistance in Serbia. European Journal of Women’s Studies 2(4): 509–32. https://doi.org/10.1177/135050689500200406

Irvine, J. T. and Gal, S. (2000) Language ideology and linguistic differentiation. In P. V. Kroskrity (ed.) Regimes of Language: Ideologies, Polities, and Identities 35–83. Santa Fe, NM: SAR Press.

Iveković, R., Janović, B. and Krese, M. (1993) Briefe von Frauen über Krieg und Nationalismus. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp.

Janjanin, M. (1934) Gospođa Profesor. Naš jezik 7: 202–4.

Jaworska, S. and Krishnamurthy, R. (2012) On the F-word: a corpus-based analysis of the media representation of feminism in British and German press discourse, 1990–2009. Discourse and Society 23 (4): 401–31. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926512441113

Kalogjera, D. (1979) Jezik i spol. Godišnjak Saveza Društva za primenjenu lingvistiku Jugoslavije 3: 109–14.

Kalogjera, D. (1981) O jeziku i polu. Delu 26 (4): 37–52.

Klajn, I. (1980) Jezik oko nas. Belgrade: Nolit.

Klajn, I. (2007) n.t. In J. Vuksanović, R. Gačević and M. Tasić (eds) Spisci odbora za standardizaciju srpskog jezika (vol. 9) 55–6. Belgrade: Beogradska knjiga.

Kojadinović, M. (2006) O terminoligiji korišćenoj za istopolno orijentisane osobe. In Labris (ed.) Čitanka. Od A do Š o lezbejskim i gej ljudskim pravima 83–7. Belgrade: Labris.

Kordić, S. (2010) Jezik i nacionalizam. Zagreb: Durieux.

Kramarić, I. (1988) Još jednom o sucu i sutkinji. Jezik 4: 120–25.

Labris (2006) (ed.) Čitanka: Od A do Š o lezbejskim i gej ljudskim pravima. Belgrade: Labris.

Lakoff, R. (1973) Language and women’s place. Language in Society 2: 45–80. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0047404500000051

Lau, M. (2014) Frauentag: was will das Weib? Die Zeit (7 March). Retrieved on 20 January 2017 from www.zeit.de/2014/11/feminismus-prostitution-internationaler-frauentag.

Maretić, T. (1924) Hrvatski ili srpski jezični savjetnik. Zagreb: Jazu.

Martenstein, H. (2013) Genderforschung: schlecht, schlechter, Geschlecht. Die Zeit (8 June). Retrieved on 20 January 2017 from www.zeit.de/2013/24/genderforschung-kulturelle-unterschiede.

Matejić-Vučković, L. (2006) Žena ženi lomi jezik. Novosti (7 May). Retrieved on 20 January 2017 from www.novosti.rs/vesti/naslovna/drustvo/aktuelno.290.html:183103-Zena-zeni-lomi-jezik.

Miller, C. and Swift, K. (1995) The Handbook of Non-Sexist Writing: For Writers, Editors, and Speakers (3rd edn). London: Women’s Press.

Mønnesland, S. (2004) Is there a Bosnian language? In Bugarski and Hawkesworth (2004): 127–61.

Nikolić, S. (1955) Oblici imena: zvanja, zanimanja, dužnosti i titula ženskih lica. Naš jezik 6: 148–52.

Papić, Ž. (1999) Women in Serbia: post-communism, war and nationalist mutations. In S. Ramet (ed.) Gender Politics in the Western Balkans: Women and Society in Yugoslavia and the Yugoslav Successor States 153–69. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press.

Papić, Ž. (2001) Europa nakon 1989: etnički ratovi, fašizacija društvenog života i politika tijela u Srbiji. Treća 3(1–2): 30–46.

Papić, Ž. (2012) Ženski pokret u bivšoj Jugoslaviji: sedamdesete i odamdesete. In A. Zaharijević, Z. Ivanović and D. Duhaček (eds) Žarana Papić: Tekstovi 1997–2002 279–283. Belgrade: Artprint.

Petrović, J. and Slapšak, S. (2004) Sex/gender distinction, uses and abuses in South Slavic languages in the multilingual Balkan region: Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian in their comparative setting. In R. Braidotti, E. Just and M. Mensink (eds) The Making of European Women’s Studies: A Work in Progress Report on Curriculum Development and Related Issues in Gender Education and Research 80–85. Utrecht: Athena.

Piper, P. (2009) Rodna ravnopravnost i jezik. NIN (13 August). Retrieved on 20 January 2017 from www.nspm.rs/kulturna-politika/rodna-ravnopravnost-i-jezik.html?alphabet=l.

Popov, N. (2000) The Road to War in Serbia: Trauma and Catharsis: Srpska strana rata. Budapest: Central European University Press.

Popović, L. (2004) From standard Serbian through standard Serbo-Croatian to standard Serbian. In Bugarski and Hawkesworth (2004): 25–40.

Pozner, J. L. (2003) The ‘big lie’: false feminist death syndrome, profit, and the media. In R. Dicker and A. Piepmeier (eds) Catching a Wave: Reclaiming Feminism for the 21st Century 31–56. Boston, MA: Northeastern University Press.

Pusch, L. F. (1984) Das Deutsche als Männersprache. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp.

Radić, J. (2010) Rod u prirodi, gramatici i društvu. Glasnik Etnografskog instituta SANU 58(1): 113–27.

Rajić, L. (1982) Jezik i pol. Kultura 57–8: 79–95.

Rajilić, S. (2014) Silovanje jezika! Vergewaltigung von Sprache! Debatten über Gender und Sprache in den serbischen Presse 2001-2012. In C. Voß and W. Dahmen (eds) Babel Balkan? Politische und soziokulturelle Kontexte von Sprache in Südosteuropa 271–93. Munich: Kubon&Sagner.

Romaine, S. (2001) English: a corpus-based view of gender in British and American English. In M. Hellinger and H. Bußmann (eds) Gender across Languages: The Linguistic Representtation of Women and Men (Vol. I) 153–75. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/impact.9.12rom

Sabatini, A. (1987) Il sessismo nellalingua italiana: Raccomandazioni per un uso non sessista della lingua italiana. Rome: Istituto Poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato.

Savić, S. [Савић, Свенка] (1983) Прагматички аспекти рода Номина Агентис у српскохрватском/хрватскосрпском језику. Научни састанак слависта у вукове дане 13: 247–58.

Savić, S. (1989) Language and sex: evidence from Serbo-Croatian. European Journal for Semiotic Studies 1–3: 535–56.

Savić, S. (1995) Jezik i pol (II). Istrazivanja kod nas. Ženske Studije 2–3: 228–44.

Savić, S. (2004) Žena sakrivena jezikom medija: Kodeks neseksističke upotrebe jezika. Novi Sad: Futura Publikacije.

Savić, S. (2005) Ideologija jezikoslovne elite. In M. Blagojević (ed.) Mapiranje mizoginije u srbiji: Diskursi i prakse (vol. 2) 97–102. Belgrade: Ažin.

Savić, S. (2006) Ženski rod za žene. Politika (9 September). Retrieved on 26 March 2014 from www.politika.rs/rubrike/ostali-komentari/t6147.lt.html.

Savić, S. (2007) Politički korektan govor i seksizam u jeziku. In Savet za ravnopravnosti Republike Srbije (eds) Putevi i ostvarivanja rodne ravnopravnosti i jednakih mogućnosti. Od ideje do prakse 56–81. Belgrade: Original.

Savić, S. et al. (2009) Rod i jezik. Novi Sad: Futura Publikacije.

Schümann, H. (2014) Sprachreform: professorin wünscht sich ein X statt des Geschlechts. Tagesspiegel (1 May). Retrieved on 20 January 2017 from www.tagesspiegel.de/meinung/sprachreform-professorin-wuenscht-sich-ein-x-statt-des-geschlechts/9833290.html.

Šinko, M. (2009) Kad Srpkinja zvuči prikladno, a psihološkinja ne. Politika (24 August). Retrieved on 26 March 2014 from www.politika.rs/rubrike/ostali-komentari/Kad-Srpkinja-zvuchi-prikladno-a-psiholoshkinja-ne.lt.html.

Spencer, D. (1980) Man Made Language. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.

Spremno, Z. (2009) Druga strana levo: Kad piskinja postaje sutkinja. Pančevac (24 July). Retrieved on 10 February 2011 from www.pancevac.eu/index.php?module=article&issue_id=234&id=39733&comment=true.

Spremno, Z. (2006) Tuđmanizacija srpskog jezika. Pančevac (22 June). Retrieved on 18 April 2013 from www.pancevac.eu/index.php?module=section&issue_id=53&id=14.

Stanković, B. (2013) Jezik, rod is seksualna orijentacija: Rodne specifičnosti diskursivnih stilova homoseksualnih korisnika internet foruma. Sociologija 55(1): 115–40.

Stojanović, S. (2006) Mocija roda u funkciji emancipacije. Srpski jezik 11(1–2): 285–307.

Stošić, V. (2009) Muke sa ženskim jezikom: autorke protiv supruga. Vreme (30 July). Retrieved on 20 January 2017 from www.vreme.com/cms/view.php?id=878870.

Tašić, V. (2009) Muškarci lako izgovore čistačica, ali teško prevale preko jezika stručnjakinja 10. Borba (18 July): 10.

Vince, Z. (1954) Drugarica direktor, Gospođa profesor ili Drugarica direktorica, Gospođa profesorica. Jezik: časopis za kulturu hrvatskoga književnog jezika 3(4): 113–18.

Refbacks

There are currently no refbacks.

Equinox Publishing Ltd - 415 The Workstation 15 Paternoster Row, Sheffield, S1 2BX United Kingdom
Telephone: +44 (0)114 221-0285 - Email: [email protected]