Neodređene zamenice

Overview

Serbian builds four families of indefinite pronoun out of the same two question words, ко (who) and шта (what), plus где (where) and кад(а) (when): a prefix attaches to signal exactly which flavour of un-specified is meant - не- for a real but unnamed someone/something, ни- for no-, и- for any-, and сва- for every-.

This lesson gives the four series, when to reach for each one, the declension they inherit from ко/шта, and one rule that trips up almost everyone at first: a preposition never attaches to the front of a ни-/и- compound - it slides inside it.

Choosing the right series

не- marks a real, existing referent that simply isn't named: „Неко је звонио на врата.“ (Someone rang the doorbell - somebody definitely did, I just don't know who.) сва- marks the opposite extreme, universality: „Свако зна ту причу.“ (Everyone knows that story.)

ни- is negation-a1's own family, and it is never optional there: whenever нико/ништа/нигде/никад appears, the verb must still carry its own не (or fused нисам/нема) too - „Нико не зна одговор.“ и- is the any- series, reserved for genuine questions and conditions where the answer is open: „Да ли је ико видео мог пса?“ (Has anyone seen my dog?), „Ако имаш ишта да кажеш, реци сада.“ (If you have anything to say, say it now.)

The signature rule - a preposition splits the compound

Whenever a ни- or и- pronoun needs a preposition, the preposition is inserted between the prefix and the declined ко/шта-part, never glued to the front of the whole word - see the table below. This is the single most distinctive fact about this pronoun family.

The same split applies to the и- series in questions and conditions: „Да ли причаш ни о чему озбиљно?“ would be wrong as a genuine question (it mixes registers); the natural question form is „Причаш ли о ичему озбиљно?“ - the preposition still sits before the declined ичему, never before an undivided ичему-compound read as one block.

Declension follows ко/шта

Every series inherits the case forms of its base word unchanged, with the prefix simply riding along: ко → кога/коме/ким gives нико → никог(а)/никоме/(ни с) ким, and шта → чега/чему/чиме gives ништа → ничега/ничему/ничим(е). As with ко itself, the кога-shaped form covers both genitive and accusative, since these pronouns are treated as animate.

This means a negated transitive verb needs the declined, кога-shaped object, not the bare nominative нико: „Не видим никог(а).“ - the same object-form logic accusative-case-a2 already established for animate nouns.

Free choice: било ко / ко год

For whoever/whatever/anyone at all - genuine free choice among many options, not just an unspecified single one - Serbian uses било + the question word, or the question word + год: било ко, било шта next to ко год, шта год - the two constructions are interchangeable. Год generalizes to где год (wherever) and кад год (whenever) as well.