# BCMS - sprčio (or sprćio)



## Tassos

As some of you probably know, there is this sketch from the Top Lista Nadrealista program about reading books.

In the end, the "reporter" asks this guy about Ana Karenina, and he responds:
_Da to nije mozda ona﻿ sto je voz na Ilidži sprčio (or sprćio)?_
Can someone explain to me what this means and why it is so funny?

Thanks!


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## Anicetus

A rough translation: "_Isn't that the one who was fucked up by a train in Ilidža?_"

The interrogative construction _da_ + negated verb doesn't really have an English equivalent. I'd say it's used when a speaker gets an idea about something and then asks his interlocutor for confirmation. So, _da to nije ona?_ may be translated as _isn't that the one?_, _maybe that's the one?_ or something like that. As you've surely noticed by now, _da_ really has a lot of meanings... _Sprčiti_ is derived from _prčiti_, a slang term for copulating -- I don't know if "fuck up" is a fitting English translation -- either way, it obviously refers to getting run over by train here. Ilidža is a town near Sarajevo. As you probably know, Anna throws herself in front of a moving train in the novel.


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## DenisBiH

Tassos said:


> and why it is so funny?



I'd have to watch that episode as I don't remember that scene, but in general I guess it would be funny because of the combination of "high" culture and "brutal" local "primitivism" mocking it (and making it its own at the same time). You might be familiar with the "New Primitivism" movement, but in case you're not, that Wikipedia article gives a good starting point for understanding it.

EDIT: I've just watched it on YT and read the comments. People who find it funny may subscribe to an ideal common in (parts of) ex-Yu, that of a "well-educated barbarian" as the ideal human condition - a person well-versed in high culture, but who consciously chooses primitivism (which is not really primitivism) instead of it. That's my understanding, other may disagree.

Here's an understanding of a sociologist (“Anarchy all over Baščaršija”: Yugoslavia's new socialist culture and the New Primitives poetics of the local, Dalibor Mišina, Journal of Historical Sociology)


> The paper analyses Sarajevo's music movement of New Primitives and its “poetics of the local” as a struggle against the cultural hypocrisy of Yugoslavia's “new socialist culture” and its privileging of “external-cosmopolitan” as apotheosis of cultured refinement and sophistication while denigrating “local-parochial” as epitome of uncultured primitiveness. I argue that the movement's praxis is best understood as a call to reject externally-imposed frames of reference as the basis for self-understanding, and to embrace a socio-cultural *awareness that the only way to be in the world is to be authentically “primitive”*– i.e. to exist as a distinct and autochthon socio-cultural self.



To the moderators: sorry for the somewhat longer sociological exposé, I know this forum does not deal with sociology, but some socio-cultural context is IMHO important here for proper understanding, otherwise it's only a vulgar sentence laughed at by vulgar people.  I'll stick to linguistics from now on. 

To get back to linguistics, _sprčiti _used with this meaning seems like an ad-hoc improvisation to me. Generally speaking, _sprčiti _is a vulgar term for a man f*cking a woman, as Anicetus said. Ilidža is more like a part of Sarajevo than a separate town in my book (the tram line ends at Ilidža), and it was so officially before 1992, but now it's officially a municipality in the Sarajevo canton, but not in the (administrative) city of Sarajevo.


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## Tassos

(off-topic mode begins)
I am familiar with the movement but only from a musical standpoint. I think its centrepiece can be considered the "duo" Zabranjeno Pušenje/Top Lista Nadrealista whose members I find really interesting both as musicians and as writers/performers. I keep watching their sketches as a way to familiarise myself with the spoken language. I have to say I find some of them hilarious (well, the parts I can understand). Especially the one about the languages (Jesici) I can't help myself but laugh each time I watch it. I find that it perfectly  describes the "language problem" in the region. Of course, as you say, others may feel that this is a very serious issue and disagree...
Anyway thanks for the socio-cultural context. The use of well-educated vulgarity against the predominant cosmopolitan "refined" culture is something we had experienced in Greece too in theatre and cinema in the beginning of the 80's...
(off-topic mode ends)

My literary questions (sprčiti, Ilidža, Anna Karenina which contrary to what Anicetus might think I haven't read ) were thoroughly covered by your responses so thanks for that...


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## Duya

I think that _sprčiti_ is sort of ad-hoc coined one-size-fits-all verb, which can be used whenever the speaker lacks a better word, and whose meaning must be deduced from context; along the lines of _fuck up_. Although it's vulgar of course, I don't find any sexual connotations in it. Compare:

_Sprčio je tramvaj : She got fucked up (=hit) by a tram_
_Sprčili smo taj pos'o za sat : We fucked (=completed) up that job in an hour_
_Ove jabuke su skroz sprčene : These apples are all fucked up (=rotten/dry)_


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## DenisBiH

Duya said:


> _Sprčio je tramvaj : She got fucked up (=hit) by a tram_
> _Sprčili smo taj pos'o za sat : We fucked (=completed) up that job in an hour_
> _Ove jabuke su skroz sprčene : These apples are all fucked up (=rotten/dry)_



But none of these sound idiomatic to me. It may be regional, or the slang of Sarajevo may have changed with respect to _sprčiti _in these 20+ years, or it may be me, but to me _sprčiti _has only one primary meaning, the sexual one. The closest in meaning would probably be the equally vulgar _zguziti_.


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## Duya

OK, you certainly know Sarajevo slang better than me. For me, possibly as influence of Serbian slang, _sprčiti_ would be rather generic, along the lines of _sjebati_. Does _sjebati_ have any sexual connotation for you?


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## DenisBiH

Duya said:


> OK, you certainly know Sarajevo slang better than me. For me, possibly as influence of Serbian slang, _sprčiti_ would be rather generic, along the lines of _sjebati_. Does _sjebati_ have any sexual connotation for you?



No it doesn't. 

Actually, thinking about it, _sjebati _would fit quite nicely instead of _sprčiti _in the three sentences you listed as examples. Except perhaps for the second one, where _sjebali _would be somewhat ambiguous and could be understood as e.g. _sfušerili _(done poorly) or even _upropastili _(wrecked) instead of _završili _(completed), but I guess it too would probably be understood properly from the context.

I personally sometimes use _zgembati _to do the same job as _sprčiti _(as you understand it), but I'm not sure how widespread it is; Google shows some hits, but not many. It's slang, but unlike _sjebati_ it doesn't carry any vulgar connotation. I wonder if that verb is inspired by the name of Zgembo Handislić (a character from the same Top Lista Nadrealista, for other foreros not familiar with TLN).


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## Duya

Googling for "sprčen" confirms that this is used in a variety of ways in Serbian slang. The primary meaning seems to be "small, narrow, thin, uncomfortable". However, results also include Atheist Rap's _Wartburg Limuzina_: _u nas se škodom zapucao k'o Rus pijan Čeh, auto nam je sasvim *sprčen*, maksimalna šteta_) and this cute typo from Serbian customs office . 

On the other hand, posts from a Sarajevo forum do indicate that it is used with sexual connotation. However, there's also this question asking for a parking which is not "*sprčen* i zabačen", granted, followed by a disclaimer "NIJESAM IZ SARAJEVA" .


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## Morana_

> there is this sketch from the Top Lista Nadrealista



Ah, glory days!

In the eighties, there was this so-called night programme on RTV SLO every night from Monday to Friday, and every night we would wait for the last two shows, TLN and Monty Python. They were on quite late at night, at around 1.00 AM, but were absolutely worth waiting for. 
Oh, how we laughed ... and laughed ... and laughed again ... and then laughed some more. I guess that would be called "rolling on the floor and laughing" nowadays. 

And many of those sketches were quite prophetic, as a matter of fact. Sarajevski zid for instance ...

It's a pity Đuro's lost his edge here in Slovenia, though. And gained large quantities of ego. 

Sorry for off-topic, but even just reading about TLN made me laugh. 



> Anna Karenina which contrary to what Anicetus might think I haven't read


Go read it, Tassos!


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