SerbianCroatianSlovenian

SerbianCroatianSlovenian is not a standard linguistic term; it is sometimes used informally to refer to the cluster of South Slavic languages spoken in the western Balkans, especially the languages commonly associated with the former Yugoslavia: Serbian, Croatian, Slovenian, and, in older classifications, Serbo-Croatian as a single continuum. The phrase highlights a shared regional linguistic heritage rather than a single codified standard.

Historically, Serbo-Croatian described a pluricentric language that served as an official language in Yugoslavia, with standardized varieties for Serbia (Serbian), Croatia (Croatian), Bosnia and Herzegovina (Bosnian), and Montenegro (Montenegrin). Slovenian was treated as a separate language, though it shares a common Slavic background and substantial mutual intelligibility with Serbo-Croatian varieties in many dialects.

Linguistically, all these languages belong to the South Slavic branch of the Indo-European family; Serbo-Croatian varieties are generally more mutually intelligible with each other than with Slovenian, which forms its own standard and has notable lexical and phonological differences.

Writing systems vary: Serbian uses both Cyrillic and Latin scripts; Croatian and Slovenian use Latin scripts; Bosnia and Herzegovina’s linguistic situation has overlapping standards. Official language policy since the 1990s has recognized Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian, Montenegrin, and Slovenian as distinct standard languages.

Today, the term Serbo-Croatian is primarily of historical or academic interest, while Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian, Montenegrin, and Slovenian are treated as separate national languages with independent standard varieties and terminology, though they retain a common linguistic heritage.