Learn Hardcore Croatian: Sigurnost djece u parku nam je važna. - The safety of the children in the park is important to us.

Croatian has a group of short unstressed pronouns called clitics (like mi, ti, ga, joj, im, se, će, je, etc.). These almost always stand in the second position in the clause, which is why you see:

Sigurnost djece u parku nam je važna.
lit. “The safety of the children in the park to-us is important.”

You generally cannot put nam just anywhere.

Good:

Nama je sigurnost djece u parku važna. (full form nama, stressed, can stand first)
Važna nam je sigurnost djece u parku.

Wrong or very unnatural:

Sigurnost djece u parku je nam važna. ✗ (clitic after je is not allowed like that)

Why is it djece, not djeca?

Djeca is the nominative plural form of “children,” used for the subject of a sentence:

Djeca su u parku. – The children are in the park.

In Sigurnost djece u parku nam je važna, the children are not the subject. The subject is sigurnost (safety). The phrase djece tells us whose safety it is, so Croatian uses the genitive:

sigurnost koga? čega? → djece
(safety of whom? of the children)

So djece is the genitive plural form, meaning “of (the) children”.

Why is it u parku and not u park?

The preposition u can be followed by different cases depending on the meaning:

u
- accusative → movement into something (direction)
  - Idem u park. – I’m going to the park.
u
- locative → being in something (location)
  - Djeca su u parku. – The children are in the park.

In Sigurnost djece u parku nam je važna, we’re talking about safety in the park (location, no movement), so we use u + locative:

park → locative: parku
u parku = in the park

What is the subject of this sentence?

The grammatical subject is sigurnost (safety).

You can see this because the adjective važna agrees with sigurnost in gender and number:

sigurnost – feminine, singular
važna – feminine, singular

So the basic structure is:

Sigurnost (subject)
djece u parku (genitive + prepositional phrase describing the safety)
nam je važna (is important to us)

Why is it važna, not važan or važno?

The adjective važan (important) must agree with the noun it describes in gender, number, and case.

sigurnost is grammatically feminine singular.
Therefore, the correct form of važan here is važna (feminine singular, nominative):
- Sigurnost djece u parku nam je važna.

If the noun were masculine or neuter, the form would change:

Ovaj problem nam je važan. – This problem is important to us. (masculine)
To nam je važno. – That is important to us. (neuter)

Can je be left out, like in some other languages?

No. In standard Croatian, the present tense of “to be” (biti) is normally not dropped in sentences like this.

Sigurnost djece u parku nam je važna. ✔
✗ Sigurnost djece u parku nam važna. (ungrammatical in standard language)

You can juggle the word order, but je must be present:

Nama je važna sigurnost djece u parku.
Važna nam je sigurnost djece u parku.
Nama je sigurnost djece u parku važna.

Is the word order fixed, or can I move parts around?

The word order is flexible, but there are rules for clitics (like nam, je).

Some common, natural variants:

Sigurnost djece u parku nam je važna. (neutral)
Nama je važna sigurnost djece u parku. (focus on to us)
Važna nam je sigurnost djece u parku. (focus on important)
Nama je sigurnost djece u parku važna.

What you cannot do is put clitics in random positions:

✗ Sigurnost djece u parku je nam važna.
✗ Sigurnost djece u parku važna je nam.

Clitics like nam, je tend to come early in the clause, usually in “second position.”

What is the difference between nam and nama?

Both refer to “us” in the dative case, but:

nam – short clitic form (unstressed), must follow the clitic-position rules
nama – full, stressed form; can be used for emphasis and has more freedom of position

Compare:

Sigurnost djece u parku nam je važna.
– “The safety of the children in the park is important to us.” (neutral)
Nama je sigurnost djece u parku važna.
– “It is to us that the safety of the children in the park is important.” (stronger emphasis on us)

Often both versions are possible, but nam sounds more neutral and “lighter,” nama sounds emphasized or contrastive.

How would I say this more literally as “Children’s safety in the park is important to us”?

You can use an adjective derived from djeca:

Dječja sigurnost u parku nam je važna.

This is very natural and close in style to English “children’s safety.”

Comparing the two:

Sigurnost djece u parku nam je važna.
– The safety of the children in the park is important to us.
Dječja sigurnost u parku nam je važna.
– Children’s safety in the park is important to us.

Both are correct. The first uses genitive (djece), the second uses the adjective dječja.

How would the sentence change if we removed nam?

Without nam, the sentence becomes more general and does not say to whom it is important:

Sigurnost djece u parku je važna.
– “The safety of the children in the park is important.”

With nam, you specify that it’s important to us:

Sigurnost djece u parku nam je važna.
– “The safety of the children in the park is important to us.”

Both are grammatical; you choose based on whether you want to express that “we” care.

How would I say “The children’s safety in the park is very important to us”?

You just add jako (“very”) or vrlo (“very”) before važna:

Sigurnost djece u parku nam je jako važna.
Sigurnost djece u parku nam je vrlo važna.

You can also move elements for emphasis, but keep clitics early:

Nama je sigurnost djece u parku jako važna.
Jako nam je važna sigurnost djece u parku.

Is there any article (like “the” or “a”) in this Croatian sentence?

No. Croatian does not use articles like English “a/an” or “the”.

The noun sigurnost by itself can correspond to:

the safety
safety (in a general sense)

Context tells you whether to translate it as “the safety of the children in the park” or simply “children’s safety in the park.”