Functional Text: An Official Form

Czech officialese — the language of forms, permits and applications — is a register in its own right, and it runs on grammar that ordinary speech avoids. Where a person says chci si vyřídit občanku ("I want to sort out my ID card"), the form says žádost o vydání občanského průkazu ("application for the issuance of the identity card"). The difference is entirely grammatical: officialese replaces finite verbs with verbal nouns, stacks genitive on genitive to name things precisely, gives instructions with the impersonal imperative, and keeps the human agent out of sight through passive and reflexive constructions. This page dissects a realistic úřední formulář so you can read one without flinching — and recognise the register instantly.

The text

ŽÁDOST O VYDÁNÍ OBČANSKÉHO PRŮKAZU

Vyplňte hůlkovým písmem. Nesprávné údaje škrtněte.

Jméno a příjmení žadatele: ........... Datum a místo narození: ...........

Žádost se podává na příslušném úřadě. K žádosti se přikládá jedna fotografie.

Prohlašuji, že veškeré uvedené údaje jsou pravdivé.

Datum a podpis žadatele: ...........

Almost nothing here is a normal sentence with a personal subject. The document is a chain of noun phrases and impersonal instructions. That is the register — economical, agentless, precise — and each feature is worth naming.

Verbal nouns instead of verbs: žádost, vydání

The title alone contains two nominalizations. Žádost ("application, request") is a noun derived from the verb žádat ("to request"); vydání ("issuance, issuing") is a verbal noun in -ní from vydat ("to issue"). Officialese prefers these to finite verbs: not žádám, aby mi vydali občanský průkaz ("I request that they issue me an identity card") but the compressed žádost o vydání občanského průkazu ("application for the issuance of the identity card").

Two grammatical points ride along. First, žádost o + accusative: the thing applied for follows o in the accusative — žádost o vydání (accusative vydání looks like the nominative here, but the pattern is o + accusative, e.g. žádost o povolení, žádost o příspěvek). Second, the verbal noun vydání is neuter and keeps the aspect of its source; it names the act of issuing as an abstract entity that the rest of the phrase can then modify.

For how these nouns are formed and used, see Verbal nouns and Nominalization; the register as a whole is Administrative officialese.

The stacked genitive: vydání občanského průkazu

Now the signature move of officialese. Vydání občanského průkazu means "the issuance of the identity card" — and občanského průkazu is a genitive hanging off the verbal noun vydání: "issuance of what? — of the identity card". The adjective and noun agree: občanský průkaz (nominative) → občanského průkazu (genitive). This "X of Y" chain is how officialese specifies exactly what document, what act, what person is meant. See The genitive of possession and belonging.

Officialese loves to stack these genitives one inside another. A real form heading might read potvrzení o převzetí žádosti o vydání cestovního dokladu — "a confirmation of the receipt of the application for the issuance of a travel document" — a genitive nested in a genitive nested in a genitive. Each noun governs the next in the genitive, and the case endings alone hold the chain together.

The dative of the applicant: žadateli

The person filling in the form appears not as an "I" but as a third-party role, žadatel ("the applicant"), and the case it takes tells you what is being done to or for them. In Jméno a příjmení žadatele ("name and surname of the applicant"), žadatele is the genitive ("of the applicant"). But when the form records something granted to the applicant, it switches to the dative: průkaz se vydává žadateli ("the card is issued to the applicant"), žadateli se sděluje ("it is communicated to the applicant"). The dative is the case of the beneficiary/recipient, and officialese leans on it precisely because it can name the recipient without ever writing "you".

The impersonal imperative and the reflexive passive

Instructions on a form are given with a bare imperative in the polite plural: Vyplňte ("Fill in"), Škrtněte ("Cross out"), Přiložte ("Attach"). There is no "please", no subject — the plural imperative addresses whoever is holding the form, impersonally. This is the tone of every set of official instructions.

To state what happens to the application, officialese uses the reflexive passive with se: žádost se podává ("the application is submitted"), fotografie se přikládá ("a photograph is attached"). This construction deletes the agent entirely — nobody is named as the doer — which is exactly the agentless, impersonal effect the register wants. It is the everyday alternative to the fuller participial passive (žádost je podávána); both are covered on The participial passive.

The instrumental of means: hůlkovým písmem

The instruction Vyplňte hůlkovým písmem ("Fill in in block letters") uses the instrumental case to say by what means something is to be done. Hůlkové písmo ("block/stick lettering") becomes hůlkovým písmem — the instrumental is Czech's case for the tool or manner of an action, answering čím? ("by what means?"). You meet the same instrumental in napsáno perem ("written with a pen"), placeno kartou ("paid by card").

Finally, the declaration Prohlašuji, že veškeré uvedené údaje jsou pravdivé ("I declare that all the stated data are true") is the one place a first-person verb surfaces — prohlašuji ("I declare") — because a legal attestation must be personally owned. Note uvedené ("stated, given"), a passive participle used as an adjective modifying údaje: officialese even nominalizes and participializes inside its rare full sentences.

Common mistakes

Key takeaways

• Officialese replaces finite verbs with verbal nouns (žádost, vydání), and applies for things with žádost o + accusative.
• Its signature is the stacked genitive: vydání občanského průkazu, nested as deep as potvrzení o převzetí žádosti o vydání dokladu — each genitive answers "of what?" about the noun before it.
• The applicant is named as žadatel and cased by role: genitive žadatele ("of the applicant"), dative žadateli ("to the applicant").
• Instructions use the impersonal polite-plural imperative (vyplňte, škrtněte); events use the agentless reflexive passive (žádost se podává).
• "By what means" takes the instrumental: hůlkovým písmem.