Tag Archives: health
Coronavirus Coverage in Russian Posted by Maria on Feb 13, 2020
The new respiratory illness that emerged in China last December and has now been named COVID-19 has also been detected in Russia. COVID-19, caused by a novel coronavirus (коронави́рус), has, understandably, received a lot of coverage in Russian-language media. This post will share some useful vocabulary for talking about this and other seasonal diseases. Seasonal…
Autocomplete Question: “Why Is Russian Life Expectancy So Low?” Posted by Maria on Oct 17, 2019
We are continuing our Autocomplete Questions series — these are questions that pop up in your search bar when you start typing. This time, I put in “Why is Russian…” and one of the questions read “Why is Russian life expectancy so low?” Let’s tackle this question in this post. Some Statistics First, how low…
What’s Considered a Healthy Diet in Russia Posted by Maria on Feb 12, 2019
With obesity being a worldwide problem, people are talking about the importance of eating healthy. However, it often comes up during cross-cultural encounters that different cultures have different ideas of what makes a healthy diet. Even though it’s impossible to generalize the preferences of an entire country, there are some common themes that come up…
Describing States of the Body in Russian Posted by Maria on Jan 22, 2019
You might have noticed that, to talk about physical sensations or afflictions in Russian, you often use an impersonal construction, where the person not feeling well is technically not the subject of the sentence. Here are some of the most common patterns for these sayings. Dative noun + predicative expression First, what’s a predicative expression?…
Не дай мне Бог сойти с ума: Mental Illness in Russian Posted by Maria on Oct 4, 2017
Mental health is a sensitive subject around the world, and Russian certainly attaches a certain stigma to mental health issues. Read about the different ways to refer to mental health in Russian and learn which expressions to use and which to avoid if you want to talk about this delicate issue with compassion. At Wits’…