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Russian : why so popular ?

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Itikar
Groupie
Italy
Joined 4670 days ago

94 posts - 158 votes 
Speaks: Italian*

 
 Message 81 of 107
27 February 2012 at 3:48pm | IP Logged 
Марк wrote:

Of course, it is. If you know the gen., which is easy to predict, corporis, then it's
trivial to say that the plural is corpora.
How would you predict all those plurals from the singular forms in Russian?
Дерево has also an obsolete plural in дерева.
Who cares?
Яблоко is irregular.
It's not.


Maybe in this way http://www.gramota.ru/spravka/letters/?rub=plural ?
It doesn't seem so different in action from the Latin grammar rules you quote.

Quote:

A wrong stress makes the word sound very differently. Russian with wrong stresses is
incomprehensible.

I have had several experience in person that showed me the contrary. Or at least, that a wrong stress or a wrong plural in the context of a grammatically correct sentence are rarely extremely critical for being understood. I bet that if I say Я хотел бы малЕнький кофЕ с молОком, instead of мАленький кОфе с молокОм it won't get me an orange juice.

Perhaps are you trying to convince me that Russian is a hard dreadly incomprehensible language that only superhuman beings can learn? Thou wilt never do!
Not even Latin is, and in comparison Russian has just 3 declensions with redundant plurals (genitive excluded). Irregulars are paid off by less ambiguity, and even if pronunciation and stress are a bit harder they are nothing which practice and experience cannot deal with.
If such language was so difficult why was it used as an international language and as a tool of communication? And why then so many people after 20 years from the collapse of the Soviet Union still use it so willingly even with non-Russian foreigners? I don't think they do so for utter spirit of self-harm.

Edited by Itikar on 27 February 2012 at 3:53pm

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Марк
Senior Member
Russian Federation
Joined 5057 days ago

2096 posts - 2972 votes 
Speaks: Russian*

 
 Message 82 of 107
27 February 2012 at 3:59pm | IP Logged 
Perhaps are you trying to convince me that Russian is an hard dreadly incomprehensible
language that only superhuman beings can learn?
I'm not.
Not even Latin is, and in comparison Russian has just 3 declensions with redundant
plurals (genitive excluded).
Just.
If such language was so difficult why was it used as an international language and as a
tool of communication? And why then so many people after 20 years from the collapse of
the Soviet Union still use it so willingly even with non-Russians foreigners? I don't
think they do so for utter spirit of self-harm.
You know the answer yourself.
1 person has voted this message useful



Itikar
Groupie
Italy
Joined 4670 days ago

94 posts - 158 votes 
Speaks: Italian*

 
 Message 83 of 107
27 February 2012 at 4:07pm | IP Logged 
In fact, because Russian has absolutely a potential comparable to English, as international language.
With the difference that while a stress-mark can clear any doubt of pronunciation regarding a text, for English there is not such a simple solution. Nor will never be.
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Марк
Senior Member
Russian Federation
Joined 5057 days ago

2096 posts - 2972 votes 
Speaks: Russian*

 
 Message 84 of 107
27 February 2012 at 4:12pm | IP Logged 
Itikar wrote:
In fact, because Russian has absolutely a potential comparable
to English, as international language.
With the difference that while a stress-mark can clear any doubt of pronunciation
regarding a text, for English there is not such a simple solution. Nor will never be.

It doesn't bexause Russia lost the Cold War. Linguistic features do not play any role.
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Itikar
Groupie
Italy
Joined 4670 days ago

94 posts - 158 votes 
Speaks: Italian*

 
 Message 85 of 107
27 February 2012 at 4:16pm | IP Logged 
I don't think so. For Greek and Aramaic it didn't go that way, and at the end I think Russian can join them too. ;)

Edited by Itikar on 27 February 2012 at 4:22pm

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atama warui
Triglot
Senior Member
Japan
Joined 4702 days ago

594 posts - 985 votes 
Speaks: German*, English, Japanese

 
 Message 86 of 107
28 February 2012 at 7:54pm | IP Logged 
I think we can agree that, while money and economy might be a factor, there are other reasons to study languages as well.

Personally, I stumbled over Japanese when my younger son wanted to watch Japanese anime and there were no more German dubbed episodes, so we watched subbed anime on the net. I fell in love with the sound and serenity of the language.

One might argue that, if Japan wasn't so big in the animation industry, this might not have happened. That might be true. Then again, I had my share of foreign language exposure (living in Germany, with many foreigners all over the place, makes you hear a lot of Turkish, Chinese, Russian and what have you) which didn't cause me to love those languages.

I might add that, as a German, there's no economical reason whatsoever to learn Japanese. We are just as wealthy and all the problems that may arise when living there due to cultural differences (among other things) are in no proportion to the financial benefit (which doesn't even exist TBH).

At the end of the day, I just fell in love with the beauty of the language, and that's all there is to it. At least in my case.
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skeeterses
Senior Member
United States
angelfire.com/games5Registered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 6619 days ago

302 posts - 356 votes 
1 sounds
Speaks: English*
Studies: Korean, Spanish

 
 Message 87 of 107
29 February 2012 at 5:17am | IP Logged 
I'll go ahead and chime in a little on the economics thing. Nway is right to a certain point regarding that it does
take money for a country to project its culture, whether it be through producing films or maintaining military bases
in desolate countries. But now, here's the catch on this GDP thing. Knowing a "big language" like English or
Chinese will only get you a small slice of the action at best, since there's literally millions of other outsiders
competing to get in. It's only a little better with the sciences and engineering. Take the chemistry example. To get
your foot in the door of a science career, you have to get a Masters degree. To have a successful career and be
more than a little lab helper, you have to get a Ph.D or a post-Doc.
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