Word
Problem mu nije jasan.
Meaning
The problem is not clear to him.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Questions & Answers about Problem mu nije jasan.
Why do we use mu in this sentence?
The word mu is the short (clitic) form of the dative pronoun for 'he'. In Croatian, expressing that something is 'clear to someone' requires the dative case. Therefore, mu acts as 'to him' in this sentence.
Why is mu placed before nije instead of after it?
The word mu is a clitic, which is a small, unstressed word that strongly prefers to take the second position in a sentence. Because Problem is the first word, mu must immediately follow it. The negative verb nije is a stressed word, not a clitic, so it gets pushed to the third position.
Why does the sentence use jasan instead of the common word jasno?
Adjectives must match the gender of the noun they describe. The word problem is a masculine noun in Croatian, so we must use the masculine adjective jasan. You will often hear jasno (the neuter form) used for general statements like 'It is clear', but here we are specifically describing a masculine noun.