Croatian Language

Croatian
hrvatski
Pronunciation	[xř̩ʋaːtskiː]
Native to	Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia (Vojvodina), Montenegro, Romania (Caraș-Severin County), Slovenia, and diaspora
Native speakers	(5.6 million, including other dialects spoken by Croats cited 1991–2006) 1.25 million L2 speakers in Slovenia (2012)
Language family	Indo-European Balto-Slavic Slavic South Slavic Western Serbo-Croatian Shtokavian Neo-Shtokavian Eastern Herzegovinian Croatian
Writing system	Latin (Gaj's alphabet) Yugoslav Braille
Official status
Official language in	Croatia  Bosnia and Herzegovina  Serbia (in Vojvodina)  European Union
Recognised minority language in	Slovakia  Czech Republic  Montenegro  Austria (in Burgenland)  Hungary (in Baranya County)  Italy (in Molise)  Romania (in Carașova, Lupac)
Regulated by	Institute of Croatian Language and Linguistics
Language codes
ISO 639-1	hr
ISO 639-2
ISO 639-3
Glottolog	croa1245
Linguasphere	part of 53-AAA-g
Traditional extent of Serbo-Croatian dialects in Croatia and in Bosnia and Herzegovina
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Croatian ⁱ/kroʊˈeɪʃən/ (hrvatski [xř̩ʋaːtskiː]) is the standardized variety of the Serbo-Croatian language used by Croats, principally in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Serbian province of Vojvodina and other neighboring countries. It is the official and literary standard of Croatia and one of the official languages of the European Union. Croatian is also one of the official languages of Bosnia and Herzegovina, a recognized minority language in Serbia, and neighboring countries.

Standard Croatian is based on the most widespread dialect of Serbo-Croatian, Shtokavian, more specifically on Eastern Herzegovinian, which 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. 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, as well as designed a phonological orthography. Croatian is written in Gaj's Latin alphabet.