(no subject)

[xswt-cherryx.livejournal.com]

hey guys! i have my russian final tommorow ( i am currently in my first russian course 201) and i just am a little confused about somethings... i hoppe you all can clear them up for me. lol i might be posting more questions later... this language is confusing!! ;D

1) given: я еду в Россию. why is the noun for 'russia' not in the prepositional case?
2) given: Что вы знаете о России. is 'russia' in the prepositional form? and why is that?
3) given: Русские говорят по-русски. the word for 'russians' at the beginning is confusing me. What kind of case is it in and im assuming its plural.... i don't know if someone could just explain the transformation from it's nomtive case.

well thanx so much in advance. i appreciate it.

Comments

[coldrainbow.livejournal.com]

1&2: words in the prepositional case answer the question "What about, whom about" (о чем? о ком?) - what about? о чем? - о России.
3- русские - it's an adjective wich is used as a noun, plural - that's right. And it is nominative - who? (кто?) Russians (русские)

[vimvim.livejournal.com]

1. it's accusative case. (what, whom) we use it with objects, here it means destination, destination or target. Я еду в деревню, ...в Москву, ...в город. Сяду в самолет. We never use prepositional with destinations.
2. because the main idea of the prepositional form is to describe. We use it with "about". If you use "about" (or "of" in the same meaning) than you should use prepositional.
3. It is plural in nomnitive case. in singular it would be Русский. Note that it is only nationality in Russian we call in an ajective-stile word. So русские is a plural for русский like синие is plural for синий. For other nations we use different forms: американец-американцы, немец-немцы, француз-французы.

[zarxos.livejournal.com]

I thought в Москву was dative...

[wire-shock.livejournal.com]

в Москве is dative :-)

[oblomov-jerusal.livejournal.com]

no, it is prepositional

[wire-shock.livejournal.com]

Yes, you're right, sorry for misleading!

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

Nominative (this is what?) Москва
Genitive (this things origins from what? or belongs to what?) Москвы
Dative (you give something to what?) Москве
Accusative (what do you blame for something?) Москву
Instrumental (you affect something with what?) Москвой
Prepositional (you speak about what?) о Москве

Modern advanced linguists also say that there is a few more cases in modern Russian, which is true: new vocative (Ань! Саш! дядь!), old vocative (Господи!), partitive (ложка сахару - сахар is not in the dative here!), and locative/second prepositional (стоять в снегу, as opposed to "true" prepositional думать о снеге). Those "minor cases," unlike the "school cases" listed above, are not universal. i.e. apply only to a very limited amount of grammatical situations.

[vimvim.livejournal.com]

dative would be Москве (the same form as the prepositional here)
the dative case is about the idea of giving. We use it with verbs like to give, to send, to befall, to assign etc. and we mean an object of giving. Он дал Москве возможность превратиться в большой город. Честь провести Олимпийские игры в 1980 году выпала Москве. We usually use no preposition in this case except when we say about walking in an area (on, down, etc). Я иду по Москве, по улице, по площади, по бульвару. Я много ездил по Европе, по миру, по России.

[padruka1988.livejournal.com]

To clarify #1 a little more... You say Россию because it is in the accusative case. You are going there. You would use the prepositional case to say you were in Russia, but I don't think you should say Я еду в России because that doesn't make much sense. It's the difference between "I go to Russia" versus "I go in Russia."

And +1 to coldrainbow's explanation for 2 and 3.

[xswt-cherryx.livejournal.com]

thank you so much everybody!!

[freiburg234.livejournal.com]

1) If you’re already in Russia and now traveling around the country, you could say: “В данный момент ежу по россии.” – “I’m currently traveling around (through) Russia.” – In this event, “Russia” is in the dative case.

2) Preposition “o” requires the referenced noun, Russia, be in the “prepositional” case.

3) “Русские” is often used to refer to “ethnic Russians”. Alternatively, there also exists the term “Россиянин” (singular) or “Россияне” (plural), both nominative. In my experience, this alternative is frequently used by politicians as a means of demonstrating “inclusiveness”, as not all peoples of the Russian Federation are ethnic Russians, i.e. “Русские”. But most, regardless of ethnicity, appear to embrace the label “Россиянин”. My sources tell me that “Россиянин” was quite popular during the Soviet era.

[freiburg234.livejournal.com]

Correction to spelling error in 1) above:

Delete "ежу". Add "езжу".

[http://users.livejournal.com/_superv_/]

“В данный момент еЗжу по России.”

[freiburg234.livejournal.com]

Additional information to 3) above:

There also exists the adjective "российский", i.e. Russian.

For example, "Российская Федерация", i.e. Russian Federation

or, "российский рубль", i.e. Russian ruble

The difference between "русский" and "российский" is that the former generally refers to the Russian people, their language and culture. In contrast, the latter generally refers to the institutions and attributes of the space ("Российская Федерация") whose largest group comprises ethnic "русские".

[freiburg234.livejournal.com]

There is also the term "Русь" that is used to refer to "Russia".

For example, "Святая Русь", i.e. "Holy Russia". Or, "Его Святейшество Патриарх Московский и всея Руси", i.e. "His Holiness the Patriarch of Moscow and all Russia".

Officially, there is no "Русская Республика Нации Руси-России" (Russian Republic of the Russian-Nation of Russia), although the "Российская Федерация" consists of over 80 "subjects" including various "republics" drawn up on essentially ethnic lines.

[freiburg234.livejournal.com]

An alternative spelling of "Русь" appears to be "Рось". Apparently, "русcкие" derives from "Русь", and "Россия" comes from "Рось".

There is also the river "Рось" that formed a natural southern boundary of what used to be ancient Russian territory.
(Located in present day Ukraine, whose root, "край", means "boundary", hence "У края " - at the boundary - transmutes into "на Украине", i.e. "in the Ukraine"; Borderland.)

Some historians believe that the name of this river is related to the birth of the terms "Русь" and "Россия".

[freiburg234.livejournal.com]

Curiously, at least from the perspective of the English native speaker, one can say in Russian, "Мы все не русские, но все мы Россияне - граждане Российской Федерации." -"We're not all Russians, but we're all Russians - citizens of the Russian Federation."

Such a translation, of course, fails to capture the nuances of the different qualities of "Russian" expressed in the original text. So, we need to be a little creative when translating shades of "Russian" into English.

[freiburg234.livejournal.com]

In a related vein, there is the Russian concept of "национальность" that is commonly used to capture what in English more or less equates to the term "ethnicity". In the Soviet Union, a citizen's "национальность" was annotated in his/her government issued identity documents.

In contrast, the English term "nationality" is closer to the Russian "подданство".

So, it's worth noting that "национальность" and "nationality" are what some call "false friends"; they look and sound alike, but their differences are significant.

[mastash.livejournal.com]

What is most exciting about nationalities in Russian is that we use nouns for each and every nationality (e.g. "англичанин" for an English person, "немец" for a German, "француз" for a French, "американец" for an American "болгарин" for a Bulgarian [it's more or less like using "He's an Englishman" instead of "He's English"]), except our own. Instead we use a substantivated adjective, which implies the idea of a certain property of a person, i.e. being a russian is a feature, a characteristic, even a way of life, and that's most probably why it's expressed with an adjective.
So it's like "englishman" for every nationality, except "russian".