По

[jim-24601.livejournal.com]

In another post, somebody used по in a sense I'm not familiar with, as Кто Эдуард по профессии? meaning "What's Edward's job?" I think I got a bit confused with the prefix по- against the preposition по.

Ok, bear with me a moment here. This is what I get so far.

The по- construction (with hyphen) means "in the way of", or at least that's the most general way of expressing it in English. It also seems to do weird things to the following word, so we get по-русски not по-русскому (по русскому would mean "in the opinion of a Russian", right?) and по-мОему "my way" vs. по моемУ "according to my (something)". It's more like a prefix than a preposition.

По without the hyphen is a real preposition taking the dative case whether it's used literally, meaning "along", or figuratively, meaning "according to", or something like "in the sense of" ("Who are you according to your beliefs" would mean in English, to me at least "Who do you believe you are" and not "What are your beliefs".) But you might say "По моим убежениям, Бога нет" (if you were an atheist).

How about "по X" = "as far as X is concerned", as in:

Кто Эдуард по профессии? = "Who is Edward, as far as his job is concerned?"
По национальности я русский = "As far as nationality is concerned, I'm Russian."
По прогнозу синоптиков сегодня будет дождь = "As far as the weather forecast is concerned, it's going to rain today"

It sounds awkward, but then we don't use that construction in English, so any attempt to describe it is going to sound awkward.

(Edit to explain the background)

Comments

[malim-praedari.livejournal.com]

По вкусу, по душе - archaic? zeqfreed is right, you must be from the future. I use them all the time, for one.

[alter-ego.livejournal.com]

Maybe it depends upon the place, age and social group. In my town, age and between those people who communicate with me - both expressions are used very rarely. I believe that it's normal process within all languages. They just become more simple. If one can use one word instead of two or three, some day the more complicated expression shall disappear. In the above case we use simply "нравится" and "люблю" respectively.

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

Speak for yourself, then, and avoid needless generalizations. It is absolutely normal that some people have poorer vocabulary than others, but it is unwise to proclaim such narrow vocabulary a norm, even if you share it with your peers.

[alter-ego.livejournal.com]

Let's not pass judgements upon those who you don't know. I suppose, you don't know me and my peers.

First of all, it's impossible to estimate if I have a poor or rich vocabulary on the basis of not using two words that you use. Besides, as I mentioned, it depends upon the place, age and social group. You are probably not in my social group (profession). Moreover, from your profile I can see that you're older than me by almost 15 years.
What did you expect if every living language changes in 5 years so much!

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

Still you cannot exclude me, as well as those who are 5, 10, 15, ... years older than I (and also 5 and 10 years younger,) from the total amount of living native speakers. As soon as we live (and I hope I'll yet dance at somebody's funeral ;-))), those words are in use, even if you, your peers, your social group and your age stratum already forget them. So, once again: speak for yourself and avoid needless generalizations, young man :-)