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Beginning Russian Advice?

  Tags: Beginner | Russian
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Марк
Senior Member
Russian Federation
Joined 5059 days ago

2096 posts - 2972 votes 
Speaks: Russian*

 
 Message 33 of 70
10 April 2012 at 3:24pm | IP Logged 
fabriciocarraro wrote:
Марк wrote:
fabriciocarraro wrote:
About 2 years, give or
take. Yet, never worrying about technical
terms, which suits me quite well.

But how do you pronounce бё or лё for example. Don't you know that ё looses [j] after
consonants?


Let me give you an example, if I'm understanding this correctly. You're saying that
they lose the [j] after a consonant, correct?
How would ледяной be pronounced, then? As [le-da-noj]?
The way I've heard Russians saying it, it was pronounced as something closer to [lji-
di-noj].

Of course it is pronounced [l'id'nOj] "'" indicates palatalization (softness), I
capitalized the stressed vowel. No [j], or "y" sound, as you call it.

Edited by Марк on 10 April 2012 at 3:35pm

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fabriciocarraro
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Speaks: Portuguese*, EnglishB2, Italian, Spanish, Russian, French
Studies: Dutch, German, Japanese

 
 Message 34 of 70
10 April 2012 at 3:35pm | IP Logged 
Марк wrote:
Of course it is pronounced [l'id'nOj] "'" indicates palatalization (softness), I capitalized the stressed syllable. No [j], or "y" sound, as you call it.


Good, then I'm doing it correctly.

The way you said only works then if the syllable is stressed, otherwise it will be indeed softened.
I already knew this "rule", but by using logic and knowing the pattern of how words are pronounced, and not by memorizing it and its terms.

Edited by fabriciocarraro on 10 April 2012 at 3:36pm

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Марк
Senior Member
Russian Federation
Joined 5059 days ago

2096 posts - 2972 votes 
Speaks: Russian*

 
 Message 35 of 70
10 April 2012 at 3:40pm | IP Logged 
fabriciocarraro wrote:
Марк wrote:
Of course it is pronounced [l'id'nOj] "'"
indicates palatalization (softness), I capitalized the stressed syllable. No [j], or
"y" sound, as you call it.


Good, then I'm doing it correctly.

The way you said only works then if the syllable is stressed, otherwise it will be
indeed softened.
I already knew this "rule", but by using logic and knowing the pattern of how words are
pronounced, and not by memorizing it and its terms.

What do you mean? The consonant is always soft, but the vowel depends on the stress.
There are no any [j]. If yyou need to indicate a [j], you have to insert a hard or a
soft sign between the consonant and a vowel, like бьём or объём. then it will sound
byom, without any pauses of course. бём is pronounced [b'om].
But you inserted some extra "j" in your transcription of ледяной after "l".

Edited by Марк on 10 April 2012 at 3:42pm

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blauw
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Belgium
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Speaks: English, Flemish*, French, Italian
Studies: Russian

 
 Message 36 of 70
10 April 2012 at 3:44pm | IP Logged 
The single most useful resource I have found so far in learning Russian has been "Roots of the Russian Language: an Elementary Guide to Wordbuilding" by George Z. Patrick.

When I started out with Russian, I was expecting grammar to be the hardest part. I soon discovered acquiring vocabulary was a lot more difficult. Because most Russian words bear no resemblance to their counterparts in Germanic or Romance languages, it can be very hard to get new words to stick in your memory, especially since you're learning them in a new alphabet (tricky for visual learners).

This book is essentially a list of the most common affixes and roots in the Russian language. I bought it when I knew about 400 words in Russian, and found it to be invaluable. Suddenly, I could see links between words I already knew and the new words I wanted to learn, making the process of memorization much easier.

An example: the Russian word for "airplane" is "самолёт," which is a lot easier to memorize when you know that it contains "сам" (by itself, unassisted) and "лета́ть" (to fly).

I now know about 1500 words in Russian, and whenever I come across one that I find particularly difficult to retain, or one that has a root I've seen in several other words already, I go hunting for morphemes in this book. For instance, when I couldn't get the right order of the letters in "совреме́нный" (modern) to stick, it was very helpful to discover it's derived from "вре́мя" (time).

Knowing the roots and prefixes can also be very useful when trying to make sense of certain parts of the grammar, e.g. aspect. The other day, someone on this forum was kind enough to link me to this blog entry explaining how (im)perfective verbs are formed:

http://www.yearlyglot.com/2010/04/the-magical-aspects-of-rus sian-verb-construction/

Another thing that I want to recommend is to learn all the relevant parts of vocabulary from the start, especially where stress is concerned. I always learn the first and second person singular along with (semi-)regular verbs, because you can derive all other forms AND the stress pattern for the present tense from those two forms.

With nouns, starting from the premise that stress falls either on the stem or on the case ending, I memorize stress patterns based on four rules (I got them from a first-year syllabus for Russian Translation Studies):

1) nouns ending in -о, -е, -ё, -а, -я : same as in the nominative

2) nouns ending in a syllable with a stressed fleeting vowel: stress falls on the case ending   

3) masculine nouns where the last syllable is stressed (but doesn't contain a fleeting vowel): there is no fixed pattern, you'll have to look these up

4) all other nouns: stress falls on the stem

Personally, I've found these rules to be enormously helpful. If a noun deviates from them, or with nouns covered by rule (3), I simply memorize the stress pattern as part of the Russian word.

For instance, the back of my flashcard for "doctor" says "врач (u)" because the stress falls on the case ending ("uitgang" - I used the Dutch word so the abbreviation wouldn't look like a Cyrillic letter). My flashcard for "sunrise" says "восхо́д (s)" because the stress falls on the stem. My flashcard for "city" says "го́род (s/u)" because the stress falls on the stem in the singular forms, but on the case ending in the plural forms. Some nouns have completely irregular stress patterns, and those I just memorize in all their case forms.

You can look up a noun's declension and stress pattern at this address:

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Main_Page

That's about all I've learned so far that I wish I'd known from the start. :-) I hope I explained everything clearly enough (and at least some of it was useful to you). Please don't hesitate to ask for further clarification if I didn't.

Good luck with Russian! It's a beautiful, highly gratifying language, and definitely worth the time and effort.
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Марк
Senior Member
Russian Federation
Joined 5059 days ago

2096 posts - 2972 votes 
Speaks: Russian*

 
 Message 37 of 70
10 April 2012 at 3:50pm | IP Logged 
blauw wrote:


1) nouns ending in -о, -е, -ё, -а, -я : same as in the nominative

грозА - грозУ
водА - вОду
гОловы - головАм
трАвы - трАвам
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blauw
Tetraglot
Groupie
Belgium
Joined 5375 days ago

46 posts - 111 votes 
Speaks: English, Flemish*, French, Italian
Studies: Russian

 
 Message 38 of 70
10 April 2012 at 3:53pm | IP Logged 
Марк wrote:
blauw wrote:


1) nouns ending in -о, -е, -ё, -а, -я : same as in the nominative

грозА - грозУ
водА - вОду
гОловы - головАм
трАвы - трАвам


Yes, I specifically said that there are nouns that deviate from these rules, and that one should learn them separately. Every rule has exceptions, especially in Russian. If you have a better rule, covering the stress patterns of all nouns, nobody would be happier to see it than me.
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dbag
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 5025 days ago

605 posts - 1046 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish

 
 Message 39 of 70
11 April 2012 at 1:19pm | IP Logged 
How is the Princeton course for learning Russian? Better than the penguin course? What
other really thorough courses are available?
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fabriciocarraro
Hexaglot
Winner TAC 2012
Senior Member
Brazil
russoparabrasileirosRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 4718 days ago

989 posts - 1454 votes 
Speaks: Portuguese*, EnglishB2, Italian, Spanish, Russian, French
Studies: Dutch, German, Japanese

 
 Message 40 of 70
11 April 2012 at 3:27pm | IP Logged 
dbag wrote:
How is the Princeton course for learning Russian? Better than the penguin course? What other really thorough courses are available?


Many people like it, and it's indeed a nice course. I know some people that used it for a while and really liked it.
As far as I'm concerned, I prefer the Penguin course, no doubt, especially because of the very well explained grammar part. The Princeton course is much better for listening comprehension and probably also for your pronunciation, if you try to shadow it, but the grammar part seemed weak.


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