дати / дозволити + да + Clause

In Serbian, permissive modality ('allowing or letting someone do something') is expressed through a set of dedicated verbs:

• дозволити / дозвољавати (and its synonym допустити / допуштати): Denotes explicit or formal permission ('to permit, allow'). Standard across formal, conversational, and administrative contexts.
• дати / давати: Denotes informal, colloquial permission ('to let, allow'). In the negative (не дати), it is the most frequent colloquial way to express refusal or prohibition (e.g., Отац му не да да иде).

Syntactic Structure and Complements:
1. The Dative Recipient: The person receiving permission is expressed in the dative case. In natural speech, this is almost always an unstressed clitic pronoun placed in the second-position clitic cluster (e.g., ми, ти, му, нам).
2. Finite Complement vs. Infinitive:
• With colloquial дати, standard Serbian strictly requires a clause introduced by да with a verb in the present tense (e.g., Дај ми да видим!). A direct infinitive (*Дај ми видети!) is ungrammatical.
• With дозволити and допустити, standard Serbian allows both a да + present construction and an infinitive complement (e.g., Дозволите ми да кажем нешто or Дозволите ми рећи нешто; Лекар му је дозволио да устане or Лекар му је дозволио устати). In normative grammar, using the infinitive is fully standard and stylistically favored to prevent the awkward repetition of consecutive да conjunctions (e.g., Молим вас да ми дозволите рећи неколико речи, avoiding clumsy repetition like ...да ми дозволите да кажем...). In administrative registers, permission is often phrased impersonally with verbal nouns (e.g., дозвољава се коришћење).
3. Impersonal Permissive Expressions: The passive participles дозвољено је / није дозвољено (or допуштено је / није допуштено) readily combine with either a direct infinitive or a да-clause (e.g., Овде није дозвољено пушити or Није дозвољено да се овде пуши).
4. Subject Control and Exceptions: By default, the matrix dative recipient controls the subject of the dependent verb (e.g., Мајка му не да да изађе). When permission involves an independent third party, an overt nominative subject may appear in the subordinate clause (e.g., Директор ми је дозволио да колеге присуствују састанку).

Key Distinctions:
• дозволити vs. пустити: Pay close attention to case government. While дозволити and дати strictly take a dative complement, the verb пустити ('to let go, release') governs an accusative object (e.g., Пусти ме [Acc] да спавам! vs. Дај ми [Dat] да спавам!).
• Permissive дати vs. Modal дати се: Do not confuse permissive дати with the reflexive modal construction дати се + инфинитив, which expresses possibility or feasibility ('can be done', e.g., То се да лако решити = 'That can easily be resolved').