Declension of loanwords
Lesson opening
This is the first part of the lesson. The rest, the exercises and the reviews are in the app.
Declension of loanwords: a foreign word in the case machine
In English taxi, menu or radio take a plural -s and never change otherwise. Some languages with cases do much the same: they declare foreign nouns in a vowel indeclinable and leave them alone. Serbian cannot: it has no class of indeclinable nouns in a vowel at all. A foreign word gets a gender, all seven cases and a plural just like a native one — so what you learn here is not a list of exceptions but one short procedure.
Step one: gender from the last letter
The rule from the lesson “Grammatical gender” works for foreign words too: the last letter of the nominative (the dictionary form) decides. There is one adjustment, in the third row of the table.
The first two rows hold no surprises: kompjuter and problem decline like grad, and kafa “coffee”, garaža and plaža “beach” like žena: šolja kafe “a cup of coffee”, u garaži “in the garage”, na plaži “on the beach”.
The third row is the heart of the lesson. A native word in -o or -e is neuter (selo “village”, more “sea”, sunce “sun”), but a loanword in the same vowel (or in -i, -u) is almost always masculine: ovaj taksi “this taxi”, novi auto “a new car”, dug intervju “a long interview”. And being masculine, it declines like grad “city”, and an adjective with it stays masculine in every case: novi auto — u novom autu “a new car — in the new car”, ovaj meni — na ovom meniju “this menu — on this menu”.
Look at the verb: the past tense agrees with the subject in gender, and doneo is masculine (a neuter would take donelo), because žiri “jury” is masculine. As with native words (tata “dad” and kolega “colleague” in “Grammatical gender”), meaning beats the ending: a word naming a woman is feminine whatever its ending (ova ledi “this lady”, naša mis “our Miss”, ta madam “that madam”). Such words, on the other hand, do not decline at all; more on them at the end.
Step two: what to do with the final vowel
A final -o drops off. Serbian feels it as one of its own endings and removes it, as in selo. What remains is the stem (the part endings attach to): auto gives auta, autu, autom.
A final -e, -i or -u stays. It belongs to the stem, and the ending is added on top: bife — bifea, bifeu, bifeom; taksi — taksija, taksiju, taksijem; intervju — intervjua, intervjuu, intervjuom.
Now the -j-. It appears on its own: Serbian avoids i right before another vowel and slips in a j (the y of yes); io, as in radio, is the exception. Hence taksi — taksija, meni — menija, hobi — hobija, žiri — žirija. And hence radio — radija: first the -o drops, leaving a stem in i, and then the same insertion follows — as in studio — studija, scenario — scenarija. No i, no insertion: kakao “cocoa” gives kakaa, u kakau.
All the forms: taksi, bife, auto
One model for each kind of final vowel. The endings are nothing new: the same first declension as grad.
Cheat sheet
The cheat sheet — everything essential from the lesson on one page. In the app it opens at any time.
Declension of loanwords — cheat sheet
Serbian has no indeclinable nouns in a vowel: a foreign word gets a gender and all seven cases.
| Ends in | Gender | Examples | Gen. singular |
|---|---|---|---|
| consonant | Masculine | internet, mejl, sajt, film, tim | interneta |
| -a | Feminine | kafa, pica, tema, garaža | kafe, garaže |
| -o, -e, -i, -u | Masculine | auto, radio, bife, kupe, taksi, meni, intervju, tabu | auta, radija, bifea, taksija, intervjua |
| names a woman | Feminine, indecl. | ledi, mis, madam | — |
Final vowel: -o drops (auto — auta, autu, autom; kakao — kakaa); -e, -i, -u stay in the stem (bife — bifea, taksi — taksija, intervju — intervjua). Between i and a vowel insert j: taksija, menija, hobija, žirija; radio — radija, radiju, studio — studija.
| Case | taksi | bife | auto |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nom. / plural | taksi / taksiji | bife / bifei | auto / auti |
| Gen. | taksija | bifea | auta |
| Dat./Loc. | taksiju | bifeu | autu |
| Acc. | taksi | bife | auto |
| Instr. | taksijem | bifeom | autom |
Plural. One syllable: long -ovi/-evi, never English -s: sajtovi, linkovi, fajlovi, mejlovi, filmovi, timovi, klubovi, šefovi, golovi, čekovi; after a soft consonant mečevi, skečevi, tuševi; Gen. plural sajtova, mečeva. Longer words: plain -i: kompjuteri, menadžeri, restorani. One syllable escapes the k/g/h change: linkovi, blogovi, štrajkovi; longer words do not: psiholozi. Note: sati (hours) vs satovi (clocks); kurs — kursevi.
| Name | Forms |
|---|---|
| in a consonant | Šekspir — Šekspira, o Šekspiru, sa Mocartom |
| in -e / -i | Gete — Getea, o Geteu; Verdi — Verdija |
| man’s name in -a | Dima — Dime, Kusturica — Kusturice |
| French, stressed -o | Igo — Igoa, Igou; Ruso — Rusoa |
| other -o | Otelo — Otela, Monako — u Monaku, Tokio — u Tokiju |
| man’s surname | Marka Petrovića, sa Markom Petrovićem |
| woman’s surname in a consonant | indeclinable: Ane Petrović, sa Anom Petrović |
Abbreviations. In a consonant: masculine, ending after a hyphen: MUP-a, RTS-u, JAT-om (RTS je objavio, though the head word is televizija); NATO-a. In a vowel: indeclinable, gender of the full name: SANU je objavila, u EU, BIA. Become an ordinary word (lower case): declines with no hyphen: Tanjuga. Special: u SAD, u UN — feminine plural, no cases.
Never declines: women’s surnames and women’s names not in -a (za Doris, o Karmen); colours bež, braon, roze, bordo, drap, teget (u braon jakni; but smeđ, ružičast decline); the first part of a compound (na auto-putu, iz radio-stanice, program Radio Beograda); abbreviations in a vowel.