Archive for 'language'
Are You a Cultured Person? Posted by yelena on May 16, 2010
The other day I was teaching my son not to throw the trash on the ground. «Мусорить плохо» [It’s bad to litter], I said and then added «и некультурно» [lit.: and it is uncultured]. That’s when he asked me what «культурный» means. Good question! Growing up in Russia, I’ve heard the phrase «культурный человек» [a…
Russian Grammar – «по-русски!» [in Russian!] Posted by josefina on May 2, 2010
You don’t have to know a single word in Russian – or know the first thing about Russian grammar for that matter – to find this picture rather scary… I found it on an old circus wagon that had been left to its own fate in a far corner of a public park here in…
Russian News – It’s All in the Comments Posted by yelena on Apr 30, 2010
When planning what to write about in April, I decided to write one news-related post. With so much going on in the world and in Russia, the task didn’t seem too difficult. Except, of course, that April turned out to be one heck of a month with catastrophes and tragedies piling up on top of…
«Осторожно, русский язык!» [Careful, Russian language!] Posted by josefina on Apr 28, 2010
If only this wasn’t a joke «объявление» [advertisement, announcement; declaration, proclamation; notification] made by some «хитрые филологи» [here: clever philologists], but «правда» [truth, verity, fact] instead! «Перевожу с руского на русский» [(I) translate from Rusian to Russian]. Because sometimes that’s just exactly what we all need, right? Today one foreign student here in Yekaterinburg…
DIY Russian Language Immersion Posted by yelena on Apr 26, 2010
Some time ago we asked just this question – What is the most difficult part about learning Russian? – on our Learn Russian Facebook page. Evidently, the question touched the nerve since we’ve got over 150 responses in just a couple of days. One of our participants, Alice, brought up an excellent point in her…
Love Me Russian! or a little something about the diminutive [Part I: Introduction] Posted by josefina on Apr 22, 2010
In English language the grammatical term ‘diminutive’ translates as a diminutive word or suffix word indicating small size (such as “booklet”, etc.), a shortened form of a name or a name indicating fondness and that it can also be used to describe a very small person or a very small thing. In Russian language this…
Real Poetry for Real Russians – Part II Posted by yelena on Apr 14, 2010
Remember the Real Poetry for Real Russians post? At the end of it I promised to tell you whether having to memorize, as children, lots and lots of poems helps Russians in practical daily life. I was all fired up to write the Part II of this post when something quite unexpected happened – I…