Total Beginner Question

[elf-inside.livejournal.com]

Does anyone have tips on learning the Russian Alphabet? Should I learn it fully and ignore transliterations (phoenetic spelling using the English alphabet), thus not learning ANY Russian until I master Cyrillic? Are there any good learning aids for this?

I've learned Latin, German and Spanish in the past so I should be able to handle yet another language (and Russian is different enough to avoid cross-contamination of vocabularies in my head, unlike Latin which got obliterated by learning Spanish - oops). However, none of those required learning a new alphabet so that's something that is remarkably harder than I expected. I have reviewed it numerous times, but I just don't "see" the words... it still looks like a mess to me so I think I need a new tactic :).. Advice?

Comments

[gera.livejournal.com]

Should I learn it fully and ignore transliterations

It is probably the easiest non-Latin alphabet for an English-speaker. Besides, Russian language is phonetic, so as soon as know the alphabet you can read even if don't understand what you are reading.

[avysk]

"Besides, Russian language is phonetic".

Not true at all. Many people whose native tongue is Russian erroneously believe this, though ;-)

Well, if you read things as they are written you'll be understood by Russian-speaking people. But that will sound very strange ;-)

Another thing which prevent you from reading Russian even when you know the alphabet is stress in the words. You have to know the word to put the stress on a correct syllable. It's not marked in any manner in written text and there are no rules.

[cema.livejournal.com]

It is not strictly phonetic (unlike Belarusan, for example), but it is still very close.

[gera.livejournal.com]

Not true at all. Many people whose native tongue is Russian erroneously believe this, though ;-)

Well, if you read things as they are written you'll be understood by Russian-speaking people. But that will sound very strange ;-)

It won't sound much more strange than speech of a person who knows all the pronunciation rules (which are few) but just hasn't mastered the sounds yet.
This difference qualifies for "Not exactly, not 100%", not for "Not true at all".

[avysk]

Ok, you're right, I as usually painted everything black and white. At least you'll be understood if you read phonetically. So yes, my error -- not 100%.

[avysk]

But to put stress in a word right IS a problem, isn't it?

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

Yes it is, but you cannot avoid this problem by using transliteration anyway :)

[mananas.livejournal.com]

Just thinking out loud here...

If it isn't phonetic, then why do no dictionaries (that I've seen) offer pronunciation?

[kaersaij.livejournal.com]

I agree. I had it down in no time with no intimidation.

P.S.

[gera.livejournal.com]

The answer to the italicized question - yes.

[freedomcry.livejournal.com]

Some textbooks break it up like this: Аа, Кк, Мм, Оо, Тт — the letters that are the same as in the Latin alphabet (except that in lowercase, some of them are written differently, as scaled-down versions of the uppercase); then Вв, Ее, Нн, Рр, Сс, Уу, Хх which look like Latin letters but stand for a different sound; and then the rest.

[silentreverie.livejournal.com]

Read texts aloud - a lot. And start learning vocab at the same time, I find that after a while you start recognizing words with a quick look at them and you don't have to read every single letter anymore.

this helped me immensely when learning cyrillic:

[frolicsome.livejournal.com]

http://www.alphadictionary.com/rusgrammar/alphabet.html
&
http://www.alphadictionary.com/rusgrammar/pronounc.html

Re: this helped me immensely when learning cyrillic:

[elf-inside.livejournal.com]

Are the words on the first page cognates with english? Or are they simply English words spelled in Cyrillic?

[frolicsome.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure they're mostly borrowed words.

[mananas.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't learn Russian until I've learned Cyrillic, since there are a wide variety of transliteration.

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

>...since there are a wide variety of transliteration

...and none really works :)

[mananas.livejournal.com]

Exactly.

[aciel.livejournal.com]

What I did is just found a table of Cyrillic characters and their mappings to sounds in English words I was familiar with. Then, I started writing English words in Cyrillic.

So basically it got so whenever I had a homework assignment, I'd write it in Cyrillic instead of Roman characters. Since I knew what I'd written it got so I'd start recognizing the letters immediately.

Once you've gotten the hang of that, you'll have to go through the fun process of learning to identify words by sight and without sounding them out. That's nothing though; it happens automatically as you learn the language.

[idealforcolors.livejournal.com]

I worked on the alphabet and practiced reading Russian words, it's the reading practice that helps most. I'd avoid transliterations because some of the letters look the same in the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets (p, n, H, y, for example) but are different letters. That can be confusing if you are trying to learn Russian words written in the English alphabet because you will have Russian sounds in your head but you will be looking at Roman letters. Instead you want to always associate the sound of "r" in a Russian word with the image of the letter "p", it helps avoid confusion.

[branwen.livejournal.com]

I learned the Russian alphabet really quickly. I found it very easy to remember. I learned how to say some words before that, but I didn't understand exactly how they were supposed to sound until I memorized Russian letters, and studied how the letters effect each other by placement. I've never used transliterations using the English alphabet, but I can read them okay.

I found my Living Language Russian coursebook (and tapes) to be very helpful for this. Having a native Russian handy (in person especially) helps, too!