Learning Serbian language

If you have ever wondered how Serbian language is difficult to learn, you might find the answer at http://zidbits.com. It is stated that it takes 1.110 class hours to learn it and obtain language proficiency. However, time that it takes to learn a language is rather individual and it depends on few factors such as motivation, method of learning/teaching, time devoted to learning via listening, reading, practicing. Some students are highly motivated whereas others need constant additional motivation. 

There are thirty sounds and thirty letters in Serbian language. Vuk Karadzic Stefnovic’s principle Write as you speak and read as it is written might seem tempting and create an illusion that it is quite easy to learn it. However, the number of pronouns, genders, cases and other things might well put you off. Long tables with information don’t seem to work very well all the time. For example, I had this difficulty while learning German language. In fact, I still do and I still haven’t reached proficiency in German. Some of my students had the very same problem while learning Serbian, so I had to think of some more creative way to try to teach them. For instance, I use a lot of colours and pictures and I always make audio recordings with examples, vocabulary and anything that my students find confusing and necessary.

Source: www.escb.co.uk

Latin or Cyrillic Alphabet

I think that it is widely known fact that you can use both alphabets. The most common question is whether they have to learn both of them. Well, I do insist on both if it’s not only for tourist purpose. As a tourist, you might easily get by with English language as well. If you want to get deeper into the language, and that means the culture as well, it is important to learn both alphabets. To my surprise, some students even claimed that Cyrillic is easier to use and read. You get quite comfortable reading it in no time. Moreover, not all signs are written in Latin, not to mention the books, newspapers. For native speakers there is no difference in these two alphabets while reading or writing. I can read a book written in Latin alphabet and take notes in Cyrillic without even noticing it.

Pronunciation of some Letters     

The greatest difficulty are letters č, ć, š, đ, ž, lj, nj, dž (ч, ћ, ш, ђ, ж, љ, њ, џ). For Spanish speakers great issue might be to make a difference between s and š, z and ž and for majority the most difficult is to differentiate č from ć, đ from dž. I have tried to consult some of my colleagues to see what I can do to make these things easier for my students and some of them have told me that foreigners will never learn to pronounce these sounds correctly. I strongly disagree and believe that practice is everything. 

This may help:

Latin alphabet		Cyrillic alphabet		English word
Č	č	Ч	ч	chocolate
Ć	ć	Ћ	ћ	tube
Dž	dž	Џ	џ	Jake, jungle
Đ	đ	Ђ	ђ	due
Lj	lj	Љ	љ	million
Nj	nj	Њ	њ	minion
Š	š	Ш	ш	bush
Ž	ž	Ж	ж	pleasure

Here are some words that you can try to pronounce. The meaning in these cases is irrelevant. Pay attention to placing your teeth, tongue and mouth as natural as possible.

Č: ČAČKALICA, ČIČA, ČAŠA, ČIČAK, ČAČAK, ČINIJA, ČAS, ČIVILUK, ČAPLJA, ČONOPLJA, NAČIN, ČORBA, ZAČIN, ČIZMA

Listen here.

Đ: ĐEVREK, ĐERAM, ĐUVEČ, LAĐA, GAĐATI, GRAĐA, ĐUMBIR, ĐURĐINA, ĐAK, ĐUVEGIJA

 

DŽ: DŽAK, DŽOMBA, ODŽAK, ODŽAČAR, DŽABA, DŽIN, HADŽIJA, DŽEBANA

Listen here (letters Đ and Dž).