Miro Kačić (7 July 1946 – 6 February 2001) was a

Croatia Croatia, officially the Republic of Croatia, is a country in Central Europe, Central and Southeast Europe, on the coast of the Adriatic Sea. It borders Slovenia to the northwest, Hungary to the northeast, Serbia to the east, Bosnia and Herze ...

n linguist. After finishing primary school in Pučišća and

high school A secondary school, high school, or senior school, is an institution that provides secondary education. Some secondary schools provide both ''lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper secondary education'' (ages 14 to 18), i.e., ...

in Zagreb, he enrolled in

Faculty of Philosophy A faculty is a division within a university or college comprising one subject area or a group of related subject areas, possibly also delimited by level (e.g. undergraduate). In North America, academic divisions are sometimes titled colleges, sc ...

at the

University of Zagreb The University of Zagreb (, ) is a public university, public research university in Zagreb, Croatia. It is the largest Croatian university and one of the oldest continuously operating universities in Europe. The University of Zagreb and the Unive ...

where he graduated in

Romance studies Romance studies or Romance philology (; ; ; ; ; ; ) is an academic discipline that covers the study of the languages, literatures, and cultures of areas that speak Romance languages. Romance studies departments usually include the study of Spa ...

(French and Italian). After 1977 he worked as a lecturer in Croatian in France, where he received his Ph.D. at the University of Aix-en-Provence with a thesis ''Le theorie des ensembles et l'analyse linguistique'' ("Set theory and linguistic analysis") in which he developed his theories of algebraic linguistics and which has been published, due to the scientific prominence, at the expense of French government. After 1988 he worked at the Faculty of Philosophy in

Zadar Zadar ( , ), historically known as Zara (from Venetian and Italian, ; see also other names), is the oldest continuously inhabited city in Croatia. It is situated on the Adriatic Sea, at the northwestern part of Ravni Kotari region. Zadar ...

, where he taught general and French syntax, and applied linguistics. In 1992 he relocated to the Department of linguists of the Faculty of Philosophy in Zagreb. After 1996 and up until his death he served as a director of the

Institute of Croatian Language and Linguistics The Institute for the Croatian Language (, IHJ), formerly known as the Institute for the Croatian Language and Linguistics until 2023, is a state-run linguistics institute in Croatia whose purpose is to "preserve and foster" the Croatian language. ...

and a professor of general

linguistics Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...

. His primary interests were theoretical and algebraic linguistics and topics related to

Croatian studies Croatian studies or Croatistics (; ; ; ) is an academic discipline within Slavic studies which is concerned with the study of Croatian language, literature, history and culture. Within Slavic studies it belongs to the South Slavic subgroup. Besid ...

, in which he gave

sociolinguistic Sociolinguistics is the descriptive, scientific study of how language is shaped by, and used differently within, any given society. The field largely looks at how a language changes between distinct social groups, as well as how it varies unde ...

analysis of the influence of politics in the development of

Slavic studies Slavic (American English) or Slavonic (British English) studies, also known as Slavistics, is the academic field of area studies concerned with Slavic peoples, Slavic peoples, languages, literature, history, and culture. Originally, a Slavist or ...

and pointed out the critical role of politically motivated linguistics in the creation and maintenance of Serbo-Croatian myth.

Works

* ''Hrvatski i srpski. Krivotvorine i zablude'' ("Croatian and Serbian. Falsifications and delusions", Zagreb, 1995; translated to German, English and French) * ''Jezikoslovna promišljanja'' ("Linguistic considerations", Zagreb, 2001)

Sources

Umro Miro Kačić

In memoriam: Miro Kačić (1946. - 2001.)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kacic, Miro 1946 births 2001 deaths People from Pučišća Linguists from Croatia Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb alumni Academic staff of the University of Zagreb 20th-century Croatian linguists