Croatian language

Croatian (/kroʊˈeɪʃən/ (listen); hrvatski [xř̩ʋaːtskiː]) is the standardized variety of the Serbo-Croatian pluricentric language[8][9][10][11][12] mainly used by Croats.[13] It is the national official language and literary standard of Croatia, one of official languages of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, the Serbian province of Vojvodina, the European Union and a recognized minority language elsewhere in Serbia and other neighbouring countries.

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Croatian
hrvatski
Pronunciation	[xř̩ʋaːtskiː]
Native to	Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Hungary (Bácska), Montenegro (Bay of Kotor), Romania (Caraș-Severin County), Serbia (Vojvodina)
Region	Southeast Europe
Ethnicity	Croats
Native speakers	Native: 7 million (including all dialects spoken by Croats) (2011)[1] L2: 7 million (2011)
Language family	Indo-European Balto-Slavic Slavic South Slavic Western[1] Serbo-Croatian[1][2] Shtokavian New Shtokavian Eastern Herzegovinian Croatian
Writing system	Latin (Gaj's alphabet) Yugoslav Braille
Official status
Official language in	Croatia  Bosnia and Herzegovina (co-official)  Montenegro (co-official)[3]  Serbia (in Vojvodina)  Austria (in Burgenland)  European Union
Recognised minority language in	Slovakia[4]  Czech Republic[5]  Hungary (in Baranya County)[6]  Italy[7]
Regulated by	Institute of Croatian Language and Linguistics
Language codes
ISO 639-1	hr
ISO 639-2	hrv
ISO 639-3	hrv
Glottolog	croa1245
Linguasphere	part of 53-AAA-g
States and regions which recognize Croatian as (co-)official (dark red) or minority language (light red).
Croatian is not endangered according to the classification system of the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger
This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

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Standard Croatian is based on the most widespread dialect of Serbo-Croatian, Shtokavian, more specifically on Dubrovnik subdialect of Eastern Herzegovinian dialect, which the latter is also the basis of Standard Serbian, Bosnian, and Montenegrin. In the mid-18th century, the first attempts to provide a Croatian literary standard began on the basis of the Neo-Shtokavian dialect that served as a supraregional lingua franca pushing back regional Chakavian, Kajkavian, and Shtokavian vernaculars.[14] The decisive role was played by Croatian Vukovians, who cemented the usage of Ijekavian Neo-Shtokavian as the literary standard in the late 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, in addition to designing a phonological orthography.[15] Croatian is written in Gaj's Latin alphabet.[16]

Besides the Shtokavian dialect, on which Standard Croatian is based, there are two other main dialects spoken on the territory of Croatia, Chakavian and Kajkavian. These dialects, and the four national standards, are usually subsumed under the term "Serbo-Croatian" in English, though this term is controversial for native speakers,[17] and paraphrases such as "Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian" (BCMS), are therefore sometimes used instead, especially in diplomatic circles.