Russian language

Why Etymology Matters

The question of why some words look suspiciously similar in Russian and English first arose when I started learning English […]

Any language has many words that have literal definitions but are rarely used in their direct meanings. For example, nobody

Russian has many ways of expressing your affection for someone. One of the most common is adding a diminutive suffix

he first thing I learned about the German language was that all nouns in German are written with a capital

The Russian language, like many other languages, has many words that derived from the names of geographical places. The French

Outside Russia, Russian literature is associated with names of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. No doubt, these writers deserve to represent Russia

Like in many other languages, Russian names have two forms — a full name for official communication and a diminutive

Often enough, my students get frightened by long Russian words. A student, who normally reads fluently, stops in terror upon

Why do people anticipate Winter holidays? Because this is the time to switch off an alarm clock and sleep longer.

When an English-speaking person wants to report his or her likes and dislikes, (s)he normally says, “I like it”. The

Up until recent times, personal automobiles have been rare in the Soviet Union. The principal mode of suburban transport has

1. The Russian alphabet is weird itself. Some characters are exactly like in the Latin alphabet, while others look the