Snježana Kordić (; born October 29, 1964) is a Croatian linguist. In addition to her work in syntax, she has written on sociolinguistics. Kordić is known among non-specialists for her numerous articles against the puristic and prescriptive language policy in Croatia. Her 2010 book (Language and Nationalism) popularised the theory of pluricentric languages in the Balkans.
Biography
Education Snježana Kordić obtained a degree from Osijek University (1988) and an M.Sci in Linguistics from the Faculty of Philosophy at Zagreb University (1992). She earned her Ph.D. in Zagreb in 1993. In 2002, she obtained a habilitation in Slavic philology (qualification at professorship level) from the University of Münster.
Academic appointments Kordić taught and conducted research at various Croatian and German universities. From 1990 to 1991 she was an assistant at Osijek University, and from 1991 to 1995 she was an assistant at Zagreb University. She then moved to Germany (96 mins) and was a lecturer at the Bochum University from 1993 to 1998. She later served as an associate professor at the Münster University from 1998 to 2004. After that, she was a visiting professor at the Humboldt University of Berlin from 2004 to 2005. From 2005 to 2007 she was a lecturer at Frankfurt University.
Works and reception Snježana Kordić's main focal points in research and teaching are grammar, syntax, discourse analysis, text linguistics, textual cohesion, pragmatics, lexicology, corpus linguistics, quantitative linguistics, critical linguistics, sociolinguistics and language policy. She has authored over 150 linguistic publications, including textbooks, a grammar book, and three monographs, which have been translated into English, German or Spanish. (conference programme) Each of her books on syntactic issues has gotten more positive reviews from around the world than any other linguistic book published in Croatia.
Monograph on relative clauses in Serbo-Croatian (1995) Her first monograph on relative clauses was well received. Many reviewers commented favourably on it. Ian Press wrote:
Hans-Peter Stoffel underlined:
Monograph on Serbo-Croatian words on the border between lexicon and grammar (2002) In her second monograph, which has also been reviewed with approval, Snježana Kordić examines Serbo-Croatian words that oscillate between having a full lexical status and a functional grammatical status, a factor that has complicated their lexicographic and grammatical description in dictionaries and grammars. These are mainly lexemes which have a high frequency usage and are used in many different ways. The monograph provides information on the syntax, semantics and pragmatics of the usage of selected pronouns, nouns, particle, conjunctions and verbs.
Matthew Feeney concluded his review by saying:
Peter Herrity emphasised that:
Wayles Browne, an American expert on relative clauses, commented both of the books. He noted that Kordić's first book on relative clauses is: In the same review article, Browne pointed out that Kordić's second monograph
Monograph on language and nationalism in Croatia (2010)
Snježana Kordić's third monograph deals with sociolinguistic topics, including Croatia's language policy, the theory of pluricentric languages, and how identity, culture, nation, and history can be misused by politically motivated linguists. Kordić asserts that purism and prescriptivism have been the main features of Croatia's language policy since 1990.; 10 minutes. 10 minutes. A ban on certain words (1 min) perceived as "Serbian" and the idea that a word is more "Croatian" if fewer Croats understood it, resulted in the widespread impression that no one but a handful of linguists in Croatia knew the standard language. 33-36 minute.
With a plethora of quotations from German, French, Polish, and English linguistic literature, Kordić demonstrates that the language of Croats, Serbs, Bosniaks, and Montenegrins is a polycentric language, with four standard variants spoken in Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
These variants do differ slightly, as is the case with other polycentric languages (English, German, French, Portuguese, and Spanish, among others; ), but not to a degree which would justify considering them as different languages. This fact suggests by no means a re-establishment of a common state, since standard variants of all other polycentric languages are spoken in different countries, such as English in the US, UK, Australia, and Canada, and German in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland. The above examples demonstrate that pluricentricity of a language does not imply linguistic unification. Each nation can codify its variant on its own.
Kordić criticizes a romantic view of language and nation, which is widespread in Croatia. CroRIS 782405. 5 minutes. The romantic idea that nation and language must match has its roots in 19th century Germany, but was abandoned by the middle of the 20th century by the scientific community. She also argues against political interference in linguistics. (3 mins)
Regarding the name of the language, Kordić discusses only the name to be used in linguistics, leaving non-linguists to name the language any way they prefer.
The monograph generated significant media coverage. (COBISS-CG) . pg. 2. Kordić gave over sixty interviews discussing her book. Some prominent Croatian intellectuals have praised the book. The book also received negative criticism, in both Croatia and Serbia, where Serbian weekly journals stated that the book was "far more dangerous for Serbian linguistics than for Croatian [linguistics]" and that it was "destructive for the Serbs" because it "makes the language free from the Serbian tradition, it reduces the language to a symbolic-neutral communication tool, it encourages the indifference towards naming of the language and towards the number of different names given to the Serbian language". In Croatia, a group, Hitrec, tried to file a lawsuit against the then active minister of culture arguing that the state should not sponsor the book. (NSK). However, the State's Attorney of Zagreb declined to prosecute. The attempt itself to file the lawsuit was criticised as a "witch hunt" in parts of the Croatian media. In 2017, Kordić's book became the inspiration for the Declaration on the Common Language which also attracted media attention. 14 minutes.
In his review of the monograph on language and nationalism (Jezik i nacionalizam), Zoran Milutinović commented:
Reviewer Tomasz Kamusella wrote:
Reviewer Goran Miljan wrote:
Selected publications See also
Monographs
Contents.
[1st pub . . CroRIS 11765. .]
Other publications in English
[grammar book] [1st pub . . . . HathiTrust 004006395. CroRIS 743991. .] and audiocassette: 65 minutes . .
Media interviews In Croatia
45 minutes.
Alt URL. CroRIS 775078. 62 minutes.
In Bosnia
15 minutes. Alt URL 5 minutes.
7 minutes.
CroRIS 782424. 25 minutes. CroRIS 782423. 15 minutes. CroRIS 782422. 11 minutes.
CroRIS 782420. 8 minutes.
CroRIS 782403. 53 minutes. CroRIS 782399. 30 minutes. CroRIS 782398. 15 minutes. CroRIS 782396. 12 minutes. Alt URL
In Serbia
40 minutes.
Alt URL CroRIS 782425. 30 minutes or transcription. 7 minutes.
In Montenegro
Video fragment 10 minutes.
15 minutes. URL
See also
Ausbausprache Cooperative principle Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts Deixis Demonstrative pronoun Descriptive linguistics Differences between Serbo-Croatian standard varieties Dual Existential clause Folk linguistics Function word Grammatical number Implicature Language policy Language secessionism in Serbo-Croatian Linguistic prescription Mutual intelligibility Personal pronoun Philosophy of language Pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language Possessive Pro-drop language Quantitative linguistics Relative pronoun Relativizer Restrictive clause Serbo-Croatian grammar Serbo-Croatian language Serbo-Croatian phonology Serbo-Croatian reflexive pronoun Serbo-Croatian relative clauses Sociolinguistics South Slavic dialect continuum South Slavic languages Standard language Suppletion Štokavian T–V distinction Word order Vladimir Anić Stjepan Babić Dalibor Brozović Ranko Bugarski Paul Grice Bernhard Gröschel Senahid Halilović Janko Polić Kamov Radoslav Katičić Heinz Kloss August Kovačec Predrag Matvejević Svein Mønnesland Ivo Pranjković Matija Antun Reljković Michael Schmidt-Salomon Dubravko Škiljan Mario Vargas Llosa
Explanatory notes
a. The Durieux-Editor Nenad Popović was honored by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung as one of the six persons that rendered outstanding services to peace in the world in 2010. The reason for this award was the book Language and Nationalism by Snježana Kordić. Alt URL Süddeutsche Zeitung writes the following about the book: "In diesem Jahr machte Popovićs Verlag mit einem Buch der Autorin Snježana Kordić auf dem ganzen Balkan Furore. In ihrem Werk 'Die Sprache und der Nationalismus' kommt die in Zagreb und Münster ausgebildete Sprachwissenschaftlerin zum Schluss, dass die südslawischen Völker – Serben, Kroaten, Bosnier und Montenegriner – eine gemeinsame Standardsprache haben. Die Studie war ein Schlag ins Gesicht der Nationalisten, die nach der staatlichen Unabhängigkeit nun versuchen, das Serbokroatische, die Lingua franca der Region, zu begraben und eigene Sprachen zu erfinden."
b. In Croatia, Jezik i nacionalizam was among the five titles nominated for book of the decade in the field of peacebuilding, nonviolence and human rights.
References
External links
Works by Snježana Kordić at HathiTrust
Works by Snježana Kordić on The LINGUIST List Works by Snježana Kordić at the Croatian scientific bibliography datebase Snježana Kordić at the Who is Who in Croatian Science (Ruđer Bošković Institute Library)
Works by Snježana Kordić at Semantic Scholar
Snježana Kordić's Snježana Kordić at Publons Papers and books by Snježana Kordić in the Social Science Research Network (SSRN) (abstracts; full texts)
(60 minutes) (55 minutes) and a brief interview before the lecture (5 minutes) (2 minutes)