Archive for 'Uncategorized'
Intro to Russian comedy scene Posted by Maria on Aug 18, 2014
We have touched upon Russian humor in general, so I’m sure you may be curious to get acquainted with the Russian comedy scene. As any aspect of culture, it is too vast to be covered in one post. I will try to present overview of a few household names known to many people in Russia…
Sneak Russian into Your Online Experience Posted by Maria on Aug 4, 2014
There was recently an excellent post of creating language immersion outside the country where that language is spoken. I realize it may be hard to stay motivated to keep up on your language studies in your everyday life. Of course, ideally you should actively pursue your language studies, subscribe to podcasts, listen to music, read…
Take Your Pronunciation to the Next Level – Part II Posted by Maria on Jul 28, 2014
This post is continued from last week. We were talking about the top areas you should concentrate on to drastically improve your Russian pronunciation. 4. ы Ы is a funny sound. It is not considered very pretty-sounding in Russian, and few native words have it. At the same time, it is widely used to form…
Take Your Pronunciation to the Next Level – Part I Posted by Maria on Jul 21, 2014
Does anyone here find Russian pronunciation challenging? Perhaps you are learning Russian abroad and don’t get to hear native speakers very often. Or maybe, despite hearing them, you just can’t grasp how they produce the sounds of Russian and cannot quite repeat them. Let’s hope that’s not the case. But whatever your accent in Russian…
Unexpected Discoveries After Moving to Moscow (Part 2) Posted by Maria on Jun 16, 2014
This post is continued from last week’s post. Read the beginning here. 3. Being Moscow-born matters One of the things you will sometimes hear said with pride around Moscow is “Я коренной москвич/Я коренная москвичка” (I’m a native Muscovite: male/female). Коренной comes from the word корень (root). In other words, “My roots are here.” Interestingly…
Unexpected Discoveries After Moving to Moscow (Part 1) Posted by Maria on Jun 12, 2014
This is part one of a two-part post. Click here to read part two. As you may know from my introduction, I was born in the city of Chelyabinsk (Челябинск) — to quote Lorde, “we live in cities you’ll never see on screen.” In high school, I moved to Moscow. I was fairly anxious about…
Uniquely Russian School Assignments Posted by Maria on May 26, 2014
In a comment to a previous post, I was asked what has changed in the Russian educational system since the Soviet times. From my (perhaps limited) experience with Russian education, the things that have changed actually bring the system closer to that of the US. Four-year university degrees, multiple-choice tests, typewritten papers — you name…