# All Slavic languages: animacy of masculine nouns



## Athaulf

In most Slavic languages, the accusative case in singular is formed differently for animate and non-animate masculine nouns: it is identical to the genitive for the former, and to the nominative for the latter ones. I've never studied this issue systematically, but based on my native language and a limited sample of Russian, my impression is that this Slavic animacy is normally used very restrictively. By this I mean that the nouns marked for animacy are normally only those that literally denote humans or animals (whereas in some other languages, animacy markers are often used even with nouns denoting metaphorical personifications of non-living things or abstract concepts). 

In colloquial Croatian, however, there is one major exception to this restrictive use: the names of cars are often animate. While the masculine nouns _automobil _and_ auto_ (meaning_ car_) are always inanimate, the names of particular car brands are often animate when used to refer to a specific car belonging to someone:

_On vozi Mercedes. = He's driving a Mercedes._ (inanimate)
_On vozi Mercedes*a*._  = _He's driving a Mercedes._ (animate)

While I would always use the inanimate version in a formal context, the animate version is also possible (and indeed very frequent) in colloquial speech. What is really curious is that cars of certain brands are animate more often than others. For example, you'll often hear _Mercedes_ in both animate and inanimate versions, but a VW Golf is almost always animate! 

This usage of animacy, as far as I can tell, is restricted to cars; I don't remember hearing it used for any other vehicles (it would indeed sound very unnatural). I'm curious about whether it also exists in any other Slavic languages? Also, can you think of any other examples where Slavic animacy is used for nouns that don't refer to people or animals?


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## Maroseika

In Russian this rule also causes some curious things.
For example труп (corpse) is gramatically unanimated, while покойник (descedent) and мертвец (corpse, dead body) are both animated. 
Микроб (microbe) - animated, вирус (virus) - unanimated.
Unanimated nouns are declined as animated if applied figuratively to the animated subjects:
В лесу я видел дуб (I saw an oak in the wood).
Такого дуба как ты я еще не видел (I've never seen such a numskull like you).
Cars in Russian also are declined as animated sometimes, half-jokingly (Жигуля<Жигуль , Москвича, even Форд*а,* but not Мерседеса...).
On the other hand, I believe such a motorcycle like ИЖ is always animated, except maybe offcicial style. Я своего ИЖа разбил (I've broken my IZH).
It's still a question for me whether the billards ball animation is meant when the players say "забить, положить шара" (to score)б and they say only this way.


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## Athaulf

Maroseika said:


> In Russian this rule also causes some curious things.
> For example труп (corpse) is gramatically unanimated, while покойник (de *s *cedent) and мертвец (corpse, dead body) are both animated.



Same in Croatian! _Trup_ is a false friend, which normally means _torso_ or _hull_ (even though _corpse_ is an archaic meaning), but both _trup_ and _leš_ (= _corpse_) are inanimate, whereas _mrtvac_ and _pokojnik_ are animate. However, I'm not sure if this striking similarity is truly primordial or due to the influence of Church Slavonic on Russian.



> Cars in Russian also are declined as animated sometimes, half-jokingly (Жигуля<Жигуль , Москвича, even Форд*а,* but not Мерседеса...).
> On the other hand, I believe such a motorcycle like ИЖ is always animated, except maybe offcicial style. Я своего ИЖа разбил (I've broken my IZH).


In Croatian, it also heavily depends on the brand. For example, Renault is almost always inanimate, Peugeot and Mercedes are animate perhaps half the time, and VW's models, especially Golf, are animate much more frequently. Curiously, Moskvich is always animate as far as I can tell, and so is Fićo. 

I think this would be an extremely interesting topic for a thesis (or at least a paper) in linguistics.


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## Stripped

Maroseika said:


> On the other hand, I believe such a motorcycle like ИЖ is always animated, except maybe offcicial style. Я своего ИЖа разбил (I've broken my IZH).



I wonder if this is caused by the fact that the name of the motorcycle rhymes (or at least evokes)  "чиж" or "ёж". With other Russian bike brands it's less common: I'd rather say "Разбил 'Урал'" or "Разбил "Восход"' than use an animate noun.


On the other hand, bicycles appear to be animate: "разбить 'Орлёнка'". 
Go figure...


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## kelt

Hey,

the Czech language uses standard paradigms for animate objects even though they are inherently inanimate nouns. I'd say it is pretty normal even in a formal style.

Although Mercedes is way too long to decline it animately, and as such mostly used as an inanimate noun, most car-brands are now declined as animate ones.

_Řídí Forda, Peugeota, Renaulta, ....
_
In the most formal style I'd completely rephrase as:_
Jezdí s autem Ford, Peugeot, Renault, ...
_


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## Maroseika

kelt said:


> Hey,
> 
> _Řídí Forda, Peugeota, Renaulta, ...._


[Pezhota] and [Renol'ta]?


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## cajzl

Yes, [pežota] and [renolta]. The mute consonants at the end of the French names are usually pronounced in all cases except nom. sing. Generally the French words bring mess-up into our declension system.


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## cajzl

I should add that the animacy is merely a grammatical category in the Czech language (like the gender). The animate nouns can denote dead human cadavers (umrlec, nebožtík, ...), dead animals (slaneček = pickled/salted herring), anthropomorphic things (panák = dummy; sněhulák = snowman; robot), even ledoborec (= ice breaker) can be animate (as the noun borec is animate).

There is a curiosity in Czech: the nom. (voc.) plur. ending -OVÉ is always animate even if it is used for the nouns which are inanimate in other cases:

národové (nations), dnové (days), hrobové (graves), chlebové (breads), ...

BTW, the noun národ (nation) is inanimate, what an incongruousness!


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