Russian-English Linguistic Perpendicular Posted by yelena on Apr 7, 2010 in Culture, language
Long time ago I read a Russian sci-fi story that was titled, if I’m not mistaken, «Лингвистический перпендикуляр» [Linguistic Perpendicular]. In this short story, we, the Earthlings, were trying to establish communications with the aliens. The aliens were very friendly and peaceful, but unfortunately every word in their language meant some kind of curse word in our language. Everything they said or wrote to us sounded unbelievably foul and offensive and made for a treacherous and exceedingly difficult communications process. The entire situation was referred to as linguistic perpendicular.
I am frequently reminded of this story when I speak or read Russian. There are so many absolutely benign Russian words that sound offensive or obscene in English. Here are some examples (you’ll have to read the Russian words out loud to get the exact idea):
«Филфак» – this is probably my favorite example of linguistic perpendicular! It’s definitely not something you mention to your Grandma in response to her question about your plans for college. Just imagine this exchange:
«Бабушка: Ну, Маша, ты уже решила на кого учиться в институте?» [Well, Mary, have you decided what you want to do in college?]
«Маша: Ба, я ёще не уверена, но попробую пойти на филфак.» [I’m not quite sure, Gran, but I think I might go for филфак.]
Unthinkable! And yet, Russian grandma might smile happily and say to her dear Машенька: «Ты у меня такая умница, скоро будешь доктором наук!» [You are so smart, you’ll get PhD in no time!]. That’s because Masha’s grandma knows that филфак stands for «филологический факультет» [faculty of philology or department of language and literature].
Of course, Masha might change her mind and instead go for «матфак» – «математический факультет» [department of mathematics], «физфак» – «физический факультет» [department of physics], «журфак» – «журналистский факультет» [department of journalism], or even «юрфак» – «юридический факультет» [department of law].
«Фарт»– this is another good one and a bit of digging around on Internet got me a perfect example. What do you think of a company called «Фарт-CB»? What do you think they make? According to this company’s website, they have an established presence in print media market, supplying a wide variety of clients with self-adhesive and thermo-adhesive labels.
So they are unlikely to go global with a name that starts with the word «фарт»; but in Russia «фарт» is a good thing. So good, as a matter of fact, that you want «фарт» to go your way. For «фарт» means luck, especially dumb luck.
Oh, how I long to one day call my brother and tell him:
«Представь себе, я выиграла лотерею! Да, миллион баксов. Вот подфартило!» [Imagine, I won the lottery! Yes, a million bucks. Luck rolled my way!]
«Бублик» – a few years ago we got this cutest cuddliest orange tabby kitten. When he curled in my lap, with the tip of his tail touching his little pink nose, he looked so adorable that I immediately thought of naming him «Бублик». Fortunately, my hubby interfered in the naming process and pointed out all the drawbacks of the name, including the difficulty of pronouncing the soft «и» and all the raised eyebrows and chuckles we’d get from our non-Russian friends, neighbors and staff at a vet clinic.
He suggested naming the cat Bagel, which is the actual translation of «бублик», but it just wasn’t the same. We ended up naming the cat Xander.
Speaking of naming… The only way to rescue one of the most beautiful (in my opinion) Russian names, «Настя», is to change it to «Анастасия» and then transliterate.
Here’s my final word for the day – «самшит». Let’s say you want to do some landscaping and an experienced Russian gardener suggests you plant «самшит» around your house. Relax and don’t cover your kids’ ears. Your gardening neighbor might not be very imaginative, but he definitely doesn’t mean any offence. He simply suggests to plant some good old boxwoods.
Have you had a first-hand experience of a Russia-English linguistic perpendicular?
P.S. This is probably mostly for Russian readers – guys, if you know the book I’m talking about, the one with the story about лингвистический перпендикуляр, please-please let me know the author!
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Comments:
Luciano Eduardo de Oliveira:
As you know, fart is Swedish for speed.
Markk:
Doing German in Year 8, I learned that the word for ‘father’ is ‘Farter’ and ‘grandfather’ is ‘Grossfarter’. This caused the whole class no end of amusement.
dsteve54:
Задумайтесь на минутку:
1) “пуп”, т.е. “пупок”, против “роор”
2) Тут что-то неладно:
А) http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Юи
Б) “фагот” (но, к счастью, произноситься “фагОт”)
3) Гмммм….”хор”, не говоря уже о “как”
4) По-английски “метеор” будет “meteor”. С другой стороны, “метеорист” не “person who studies meteors”
5) В школе,
“Kакое упражнение?” против “Какая испражнения?”
, и т. д. и т. п.
Lisa:
Thanks, Yelena, for mentioning these words! They remind me of when one of my Russian teachers used to say “Это факт” to our class.
Stefaan:
In dutch, the word for добрый день is “goeiedag”. Which sounds something like хуйедах. 🙂
Alex Zhiltsova:
Автора “Лингвистического перпендикуляра” зовут Виталий Бабенко, если я не ошибаюсь.
Спасибо за интересный пост. Русский мой родной язык, но с Вашими постами так здорово узнавать новые тонкости английского!
Ryan:
I’ll never forget, my first term of college I was taking an intro-level Russian literature class, from Pushkin to Chekhov. This was concurrent with Russian 101, which was awesome when we got to watch a film and I was exposed to more Russian than simply “Привет, меня зовут Анна, очень приятно познакомиться.” At any rate, we watched a Soviet-era black-and-white version of Chekhov’s The Lady and the Dog. At some point, I believe after the main character’s mistress comes back to him crying, the camera does a closeup of his face, and he very mysteriously asks “Как?” You can imagine how this affected a class full of college freshmen.
Ernie:
Amusing blog. Thanks!
Is this what you’re looking for?
If the link does not work, do a google search for:
“лингвистический перпендикуляр” никитин
Stephen Farrand:
You’ve overlooked the word факт. This brought deer-in-the-headlight stares from my American secondary school students. I never dared to bring a номер of the fine publication Аргументы и факты into class.
Ernie:
The address I am trying to send, for “лингвистический перпендикуляр” is:
http://lib.rus.ec/b/161146
This is the third time I’ve tried. If at all possible, please don’t post all three attempts.
Sorry to waste your time with the excess messaging. I won’t try again.
Yelena:
Ernie,
thank you so much for the link! It even has the Игоряша “Золотая Рыбка” – my most favorite story in the whole entire book!
Vanessa:
One of my favorites is хулиган – “hooligan”. The word has a similar meaning in both languages, but a much stronger meaning in English. You can’t call an American a хулиган or хулиганка without getting a strong reaction!
Jen:
Unfortunately, I don’t remember the Russian word, but my (female) friends in Russia call each other something that they translated “goat” as a joke, and kept trying to get me to call them that too (in Russian). Their persistance and knowing looks made me suspect that, although calling somebody a goat in English isn’t the most flattering compliment, it doesn’t really mean anything awful; in Russian, it is surely foolish or slightly coarse at best. As a non-Russian, I chose not to get sucked in to the fray. Anybody familiar with this odd nickname, or was it just an inside joke between my friends?
yelena:
@Jen Jen, did your friends call each other “козА”? I also think that it is foolish. The word козёл, the male goat, is often used as a rude and derogatory way of referring to someone. There’s an expression “Все мужики – козлы!” [All men are bastards*]. However, applied to women “коза” [she-goat] does not have the same sense of rudeness. I think it’d be more like saying that a woman is foolish or, perhaps, restless (often with sexual connotation).
dsteve54:
It is simply interesting to note that the Russian word for the ” ‘at’ sign” is
“собака”
. Yes, it also has a more common meaning of “dog”.
So it is a slight source of humor among Russians when they spell-out email addresses aloud to each other.
For example, taniavozchikova@mailsite.com
would be read aloud as
“Tania Vozchikova cobaka мэйл сайт точка кам”,
so it sounds like they are saying among themselves,
“Tania Vozchikova, that dog, mailsite dot com”,
which sometimes causes a little side joke comment or a chuckle, depending on the mood.
(By the way….that was just an example I constructed out of the air…there is no such email address).
Timothy Dew:
I just started trying to learn Russian ,I live near jackson, Michigan. If anyone is nearby that is from Russia, that wouldn’t mind helping me, speak the words corectly, It would be very helpful. My phone # is 517-392-8806 my name is Tim .or email is jackrabit55@yahoo.com Thank you very much.
dsteve54:
Гмммм…….
Есть “о банальной…”
, а потом есть ….. : ))))
см.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMUPRGW7d0E
Всегда хорошо чеканить слова… 🙂
Очень прелестная девушка….
Arioch:
Настя is a good example, but there were worse situations, when both name and surname had to be hastily changed. pda.anekdot.ru/id/603336
That was really bad luck!
For what i remember rather common and beautiful name en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marina would mean “whore” in Norwegian.
@Stephen Farrand yet you english-speaking do have the very that word! en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fact
Laughing at audial similarity of words, well, i saw it, but only not very bright people did it.
@Timothy Dew there are a lot of multi-language communities where people from around the Globe help each other in p2p manner.
Like sharedtalk.com and mylanguageexchange.com and few more but i don’t recall them instantly.