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After all, what does prevent ninja from being properly declined? It's morphologically ready to be natively incorporated into the language.

Lopatin is an idiot, his institute connives at illiteracy while its function is protecting the language. Yesterday they allowed leaving Slavic toponyms in -o indeclinable (which I still get sick of), today is ninja, tomorrow they'll permit invariability of trade marks (we can encounter today in ~~many~~ most ads) an so on. With such linguists, we'll completely lose the declension in few decades.

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12barman.livejournal.com

but russian toponyms in -o really are indeclinable

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Nope. Officially, it's allowed to leave them indeclinable in vernacular speech. As a result, people unjustifiedly expand this indulgence. However, indeclinability still must be avoided in literate speech.

"Grammar of Russian Language", 1970: «Только в неизменяемой форме эти топонимы употребляются в следующих случаях: 1) в функции приложения, в особенности когда род географического названия и обобщающего нарицательного слова не совпадает (со словами жен. рода деревня, станция, станица): 2) в функции приложения, когда названы малоизвестные населенные пункты с обобщающими словами село, поселок, становище, и во избежании совпадения с тождественным наименованием городов в муж. роде: 3) в узкой группе наименований, совпадающих с именами собственными: Употребление несклоняемых форм в предложных сочетаниях типа до Клушино, свойственно профессиональной и устной речи; в образцовом литературном стиле (со сцены, с телеэкрана, в радиоречи) эти формы следует склонять.»

I hope it's clear enough.

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Sorry, I've copypasted the quote above without proofing. Of course, it's «во избежание».

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http://spravka.gramota.ru/blang.html?id=167

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spiegelland.livejournal.com

nope.
user

giantantattack is right. check out here (http://www.gramota.ru/dic/search.php?word=%ED%E8%ED%E4%E7%FF&lop=x&gorb=x&efr=x&zar=x&ag=x&ab=x&lv=x&pe=x&az=x)

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spiegelland.livejournal.com

that's right

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j1c-o60pmot.livejournal.com

better:"в неравном бою ниндзя был повержен мной одним ударом Чака Норриса ногой с разворота"

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apakin.livejournal.com

better: "в неравном бою ниндзя был повержен мной одним ударом Президента Путина ногой с разворота"

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j1c-o60pmot.livejournal.com

УЧННР(Удар Чака Норриса Ногой с Разворота) это официально зарегестрированный товарный знак.
http://www.chucknorrisfacts.com/

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Thanks for your contribution, but I have to remind that the working language of this community is English. Many people here have just started learning Russian and they will be unable to appreciate your sense of humour unless you provide a translation. Thanks in advance.

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You're way too tough, matoushka.

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Sorry, I don't create the rules, I just enforce them. Thanks for your understanding.

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That's a lame excuse.
Enforce the rules, but don't be too tough.

Besides, this community is more for gadabout Russians, than for those who actually learn Russian.

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In fact, it is the other way round. Please read the community rules.

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> In fact

In theory.
In fact it's what I said.

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I would like to ask you to avoid off-topic comments. Otherwise I will have to delete them and, if you persist in breaking the rules, ban you from the community. Please do not escalate this problem.

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I did not break the rules, ma'am.
I just discussed them, as well as the life outside the rules (which is also about the rules, eh?).
This all hardly could be perceived as off-topic - if you don't insist on being too tough and rigid, of course.

Take it easy. Don't "выплескивай вместе с водой ребенка" :)

To stay completely on-topic, I suggest our dear readers learn a couple of interesting facts:

* In Russian, a ship is not "she", as in English, but "he".

* There are 33 letters in Russian language, and 12 of them look (not necessarily pronounced!) the same as English: ABCEHKMHOPTX.

* There are very few words in Russian (not counting recent direct loan words) adopted from English - the most famous example is "есть!" (from "yes [, Sir]")

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Thanks.

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galop.livejournal.com

To provide the beginners in learning Russian from misunderstanding the bases of our phonetics I'd like to mention the fact of your mistake: only 11 of 33 lettters look as English. ;)

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Which one of my list does not?

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punkndisorderli.livejournal.com

you put H on there twice

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Oh, yeah, you're right...

It is widely accepted knowledge about 12 letters (actually characters as you can see below), so I just stopped when added 12th letter to the list:)

See http://www.pokras.ca/123/

Also, you could add Y to the list if you wish. It's not exactly the same as "У", but often considered to be interchangeable.

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galop.livejournal.com

I think the Russian "У" can't be considered to be of the same calligraphy as the English "Y" does - because there are languages that use the alphabet of Russian with some facultive letters; for example, Kazakh.

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No contest here.

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There are 33 letters in Russian language

Nope, there are 32 letters only (and one auxiliary).

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Wrong.
There is no such entity as "auxiliary letter" in Russian alphabet.
"Ё" is a regular letter, no matter how often it is replaced by "E" in writing.

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"Ё" is a regular letter, no matter how often it is replaced by "E" in writing.

Its usage is restriced to disambiguation purposes only. It's not a regular letter, it's an auxiliary symbol (so it's «e» which is sometimes replaced with «ё»). This letter should not be used in any official document, it doesn't even its own place in the alphabet, being listed in the same order just as «e».

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If you insist on the view that is not accepted by the majority of sources, it's your responsibility to provide the proof. Can you do that? Sources?

In the meantime, here (http://encycl.yandex.ru/art.xml?art=bse/00067/52000.htm&encpage=bse&mrkp=http%3A//hghltd.yandex.com/yandbtm%3Furl%3Dhttp%253A//encycl.yandex.ru/texts/bse/00067/52000.htm%26text%3D%25F0%25F3%25F1%25F1%25EA%25E8%25E9%2B%25E0%25EB%25F4%25E0%25E2%25E8%25F2%26reqtext%3D%2528%25F0%25F3%25F1%25F1%25EA%25E8%25E9%253A%253A1950%2B%2526%2B%25E0%25EB%25F4%25E0%25E2%25E8%25F2%253A%253A34468%2529//6%26%26isu%3D2)'s what BSE has to say about this issue.

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If you insist on the view that is not accepted by the majority of sources, it's your responsibility to provide the proof. Can you do that? Sources?

For exmple, Ushakov's dictionary (http://www.announcement.ru/enc_word/bukva_490137.html). Also look into any Russian orthography reference book and check whether it's really facultative since 1956. Or just try to use this letter and then look what editors will do to you ;-)

«Взрóслый, как прáвило, спотыкáется при чтéнии подóбных упрощённых тéкстов.» © Art. Lebedev

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> For exmple, Ushakov's dictionary.

Bad example. This dictionary is outdated:

"Работа по созданию 4-томного 'Толкового словаря русского языка' велась Д.Н.Ушаковым с 1934 по 1940 год"

Also, it is not an orthographic reference, to be precise.

Better, more relevant examples:

* Словарь Ожегова (редакция 1991 г.)
* Орфогафический словарь (Д.Н.Ушаков, С.Е.Крючков), издание 1980 г.
* Справочник по орфографии и пунктуации, Д.Э.Розенталь, издание 1996 г.
* Большая Советская Энциклопедия, 3-е издание, 1973-1981 гг.
* Русский орфографический словарь Российской академии наук. В.В.Лопатин. 2001
* Новый словарь русского языка. Толково-словообразовательный. Т.Ф.Ефремова. 2000.

All these sources list "ё" as a regular letter and explicitly display the alphabet tables containg all 33 letters. I hope these sources are authoritative enough for you to accept that your position was incorrect.

You may also look here:
http://slovari.gramota.ru/portal_sl.html?efr_alpha.htm

> Also look into any Russian orthography reference book and check whether it's really facultative since 1956

I did, actually. See the results above.

Also, do not change the topic on the fly. We do not argue on facultativity of the usage, we talk about whether "ё" is a regualar letter or some "auxiliary" one. Can you provide any (contemporary!) source on "ё" being "auxiliary letter"?

> «Взрóслый, как прáвило, спотыкáется при чтéнии подóбных упрощённых тéкстов.» © Art. Lebedev

Art.Lebedev is not an authoritative source for Russian orthography.

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wolk-off.livejournal.com

>just try to use this letter and then look what editors will do to you

I am a media editor with 10+ years of practice, and I have about 17 years of practice as a journalist. From my viewpoint, and according to my experience, the statement you provide is inaccurate and biased. I do use ё, I do not prohibit my authors from using it, and I never have any problems with the editors as an author who uses ё.

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spazzling21.livejournal.com

In theory, everyone in this community can read Russian and English, so Russian comments shouldn't be a problem.

IN FACT, everyone in the community speaks English, but not everyone is so great at Russian. There are several people here who are in first- or second-year Russian and have VERY limited vocabularies (such as myself). So, if you stick to English, everyone can benefit, not just people who are fluent in Russian. Thanks.

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