In the Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian cultural region, there is the adverb ‘ubibože’. ‘Ubibože’ means that something is horrible. So, if we say that some book we have just read is ‘ubibože’, it likely means we want to read it never again in our life.

On the other hand, it might be interesting to think of how this word has come to life. In fact, we can recognize one verb and one noun in this word. The verb ‘ubiti’ means ‘to kill’, while the noun ‘bog’ means ‘God’. If we put the verb ‘ubiti’ in the Imperative mood for the 2nd person singular (‘you’ vs ‘ti’), we get the form ‘ubij’. On the other hand, if we put the noun ‘bog’ in the 5th case (Vocative: used in addressing someone by their name), we get the noun ‘bože’, and then we get the phrase ‘Ubij bože’ that literally means ‘God kill’. ‘Ubij’ loses its ‘j’ and, along with the word ‘bože’, builds the expression ‘ubibože’.

Although in BCS this ‘expression’ doesn’t sound as aggressive as in English, if we understand the adverb based on this explanation, it means that we want God to protect us from what is horrible. We ask God to ‘protect’ us by killing it. That’s how this expression can be similar to the expression ‘Sačuvaj me bože’, which literally means ‘God, save me’. People usually say that when they don’t want to deal with something unpleasant or when they have a negative feeling about something or someone. For example: ‘What this man is saying is total nonsense. Sačuvaj me bože…’ At this point, for instance, we can also use the expression ‘ubibože’. But…

Even now when we know how to express our feelings about what we don’t like, we should be careful with the first expression, especially if we live in Serbia and want to say something negative about the president. Even though this word has nothing to do with hate speech, here we never know what can put us in jail. So, you never say that the president is ‘ubibože’ if you want to enjoy a peaceful day. I know this is ‘ubibože’, but just saying!

NOTICE: This text is not peer-reviewed. It aims to inspire and motivate language learners of Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian to think about possible cultural patterns when learning this/these language(s).