Archive for 'language'
An irregular verb that keeps on giving… Posted by Rob on Aug 27, 2012
According to a lot of grammarians, the Russian language has only FOUR basic verbs with “irregular conjugations.” Students of Russian may be skeptical of this. And it’s frankly hard to believe that a verb as wacky as (for example) лечь, “to lie down,” is by any stretch of the imagination regular! After all — just…
“Didja hear the one about…?” (Some Russian анекдоты) Posted by Rob on Aug 22, 2012
Russian анекдоты are not only a fascinating source of insight into Russian culture, but often provide a great opportunity to learn some important grammar and vocabulary. Here are just a few examples I’ve collected from the Internet — hover your cursor over the yellow-highlighted terms for some additional commentary on word usage. Political humor, of…
Verb of the Week: посвящать/посвятить Posted by Natalie on Aug 17, 2012
Всем привет! [Hello all!] It’s been a while since we have done a verb of the week, so I thought it would be a good idea to write a post about yet another wonderful Russian verb (because there’s nothing like a little Russian grammar to spice up your Friday, right?). I opened my verb book…
Beyond «рука» and «нога»: Words for (outside) body parts Posted by Rob on Aug 15, 2012
When you first begin studying Russian, one of the things they tell you is that рука can be translated as either “hand” or “arm” — and similarly, нога can mean either “foot” or “leg.” Well, that’s pretty darn convenient for the beginning student, with fewer new words to memorize! But wait — what if you…
Filler Is Like Filler Does Posted by yelena on Aug 14, 2012
It occurred to me the other day that one of the (many) subjects we haven’t discussed on the Russian blog is the subject of fillers. Somehow we have been, like, totally overlooking the lorem ipsum of Russian language and it’s basically time to, you know, just do it. Here’s the first thing you need to…
I Am In It to Win It Posted by yelena on Aug 9, 2012
The Olympic Games are not over yet. There are still a few medals to win. Yesterday was a particularly good day for российские атлеты (Russian athletes) who won четыре медали (four medals). So let’s talk about why спортсмены со всего мира (athletes from around the world) train so hard; let’s talk about the two…
Hang on, I want to weigh in on something… Posted by Rob on Aug 8, 2012
In her excellent Friday post about telephone-related expressions, Natalie mentioned the verb вешать — which is literally “to hang,” and in the context of telephones can mean “to end the phone call by hanging up.” So I wanted to take a closer look at вешать, along with some other verbs (and a few nouns) that…