Serbian for Beginners: E1

This is a podcast dedicated to all Serbian language learners that are just starting

their journey. These episodes will come out at least once per month, and with

them you can develop basic grammar and communication that you can use to construct

your very first sentences.

If you already have experience in Serbian, if you can read and understand most

of this language, then you should check out a different podcast that is, for

now, called Simply Serbian Language Podcast.

Both versions of a podcast come with a transcript, texts in Serbian and English,

so the learning process goes clearly and smoothly.

If you have any questions, if you want to have an online lesson with

me or to acquire the transcript,

You can write me at nikola.pujic at gmail.com So the first lesson can begin.

Здраво, я сам Никола.

Како се ти зовеш?

Hello, I'm Никола.

What's your name?

When you learn any language, one of the first things that you should learn

is how to introduce yourself.

Serbian language is no different from English in that matter.

There are couple of greetings you can use.

Dobar dan, which means good day, zdravo, which means hello, and ciao, which is

something like hi.

As you can guess, dobardan is the most formal way you can greet someone.

We would usually use this when speaking to someone that has a higher authority

than us, with someone who is unknown or older than us.

Basically, it is a very polite greeting.

When you say zdravo, it is less formal than the first greeting.

It is derived from the word zdrav, which means healthy.

You can use this in any occasion that you find comfortable, for example, when

speaking to friends or when you walk into a shop.

Ciao. Ciao is the least formal greeting.

Yes, it is probably borrowed from Italian and it is mostly used when you

talk with your friends or people that you see often and you consider to

be close to you.

While we are at it, let's take a look at how would you use

other greetings. So, you can probably guess that the word dan from dobar dan

means day. Therefore, if word jutro means morning and veče means evening, you

can say dobro jutro, which means good morning and Dobroveče, which means good evening.

When you want to leave, you can say Dovidjenja, which means goodbye, or the

ones from before, zdravo or čao.

It is very important to always learn new words and expand your vocabulary, but

grammar is something that serves as a backbone to your language learning process.

For example, in the sentence I used before.

Verb to be is in the first person singular, and that is some.

I used it with the personal pronoun ya, which means I.

Ya plus some equals ya some.

Like in English, I plus am equals I am.

Now, what if I wanted to say you are?

Logically, I probably won't use all the same words.

I would say TC, which means you are.

As you can notice, the word SČM that we had in the sentence JČSČM

now changed to C in the sentence t-see.

Why? It's actually the same as in English.

We just put it in a different person, in a second person singular, to

be exact. As in English, it does not sound the same.

You cannot say ja-see or t-see-sam, because the personal pronoun and the verb are

not in the same person.

These two things, personal pronouns, ja or I, and the verb to be, like

sam or am, are the backbone to the most of word languages, including

Serbian. And all of this is available in my online Serbian course, lesson by

lesson. So, with these two parts combined, you can easily form your first sentence.

For example, now you know how to say your name.

Ja sam nenad or ja sam milica.

Or you can ask for other person's name.

Tisi nenad, tisi milica.

When you slowly expand your vocabulary, you can combine all sorts of nouns and

adjectives to these type of sentences.

If you know how to say student, which can be student or učenik, or

if you know how to say srećan, which is happy, Then try to use

that in a sentence.

Ty si učenik.

You are a student.

Ty si srećan učenik.

You are a happy student.

Actually, adjectives are quite specific if you compare Serbian language to English.

All adjectives are very fluid words.

What does that mean?

Every word has its form, the way it looks outside.

Adjectives can change their look according to the word they describe.

If a word in Serbian is masculine gender in singular, the adjective that describes

that word will be in masculine gender singular.

If it's in feminine plural, for example, the adjective will also be in feminine

plural. So, if you're speaking to a girl or a woman, you wouldn't say

ti si srečan, You would rather say ti si srećna or ti si srećna

devojka.

Now the word that means happy changed its look.

In this example, it is srećna because it refers and describes a word that

is a feminine gender, devojka.

In the first example, it described a word that is a masculine gender, učenik.

So the word happy was in a different form.

It was srećan.

This is just an example of what Serbian language can do.

There is a lot more than this that can be discovered step by step.

Once you master the grammar, all of this will come naturally and will get

easier and easier.

Now, let's take a look at some words that you probably already know.

What can these words mean?

Adresa, analiza, anatomija, balet, energija,

maj, muzej, politika, sport, turista,

imitacija, čokolada, škola, apartman.

Is there any word that you didn't understand?

If yes, probably just one or two of them.

All these words are internationalisms.

They are used in most of word languages and there is a lot of

them in Serbian, of course.

So that means that you already know a good

amount of vocabulary of the Serbian language.

Let's take a look at this text exercise.

Hvala. Doviđenja. I can give you a translation of this dialogue.

In the hotel.

Good day. What is your name?

Good day. I am Petar Petrović.

You are a Serb?

Yes, I am a Serb.

Aha, you are not a tourist.

I am not.

Here is your key.

Thank you. Where is the apartment?

The apartment is on the left.

Thank you. Goodbye.

Did you understand anything from this conversation?

If yes, then you are already at a good path and you know a

little bit of Serbian.

If not, don't worry.

All of this can be mastered in a couple of basic lessons.

It is good to analyze each text you encounter.

What types of words are in there?

Are there any verbs, nouns or adjectives that you don't understand?

In which form are they showing up?

For example, in this dialogue, we had the verb to be, but in negative

form. In the sentence, aha, niste turista, and the answer nisam.

Word nisam is actually the negative from sam or jesam, which means am, as

in I am, ja sam.

Compare that to I'm not.

Ja nisam. With all of this said, try to experiment with the language you

learn, as much as possible.

Don't be afraid of mistakes, because we learn on them.

It's good to have a tutor or some daily source of language which you

can use to correct your mistakes.

If you learn to say srećan, for example, try to use it in every

sentence of the Serbian language, or try to combine it with other nouns and

verbs just to see how it would look like.

This concludes our first Serbian Language for Beginners podcast.

In the future, I will try to give you more vocabulary and conversational practice

through these podcasts.

They will serve as an addition to my online course as a listening and

understanding exercises. If you want me to send you the transcript of this episode,

or if you want to have an online lesson with me, write me at

nicola.pujic at gmail.com.

See ya!