question about the gentitive case...

[costumier.livejournal.com]

hello to all.

I'm trying to learn the genitive case, and I was wondering how one would write "______ of (foreign name here)." I'm very new to all this, so bear with me...
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**FEMININE Names:
Russian: of Юля = Юли? or Юляи?

Foreign: of Кайли(Kylie) = Кайли-?

**MASCULINE Names:
Russian: of Борис = Борися?
-->"Саша" is a masculine name; and the genitive endings for masculine nouns are "-a" and "-я"; yet "of Саша" is written "Саши", right? Why?

Foreign: of Роберт(Robert) = Роберт-?
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Upfront apology for any mistakes...

THANKS FOR ANY HELP! :-)

Comments

[kasak.livejournal.com]

The Genitive case (родительный падеж) of foreign names is declined in the same way as Russian nouns, with a few exceptions...

The Genitive singular of Юля is Юли, because the я is a soft vowel, so it changes into и, another soft vowel. If the name was, say, Ирина, then the Genitive singular would be Ирины, since a was a hard vowel.

The correct declension of Борис would be Бориса, since with Masculine nouns, all you do is slap a a or a я on the end, depending on the softness of the original Nominative (именительный падеж) ending.

Роберт -> Робертa

In the case of Саша, it is declined as if it were a feminine noun, BUT you would use masculine adjectives and verb forms when talking about him if Саша is a male. If Саша is a female, just make everything feminine.

Foreign women's names sometimes don't decline very easily in Russian. If the name ends in a a or a я, then it is declined normally. However, if it ends in a consonant or the vowels е, о, и, у, then it is INDECLINIBLE. Take the common name of Kim, for instance. Though it is a woman's name, it is INDECLINABLE. So "Kim's house" or "house of Kim" would be дом Ким. The name Кайли would fall under this category as well. "Kylie's book" would be книга Кайли.

If you have any more questions, don't hesitate to ask!

[costumier.livejournal.com]

EXCELLENT explanation! much appreciated. thank you for such a coherent explanation of foreign names!! :-)

[nicolya.livejournal.com]

Though nobody knows how to decline correctly such foreign names as Клаудиа. Клаудии? Клаудиы? That's quite a problem:-))

[moon-aka-sun.livejournal.com]

Клаудии. No problem at all.

[nicolya.livejournal.com]

Nevertheless, "Клаудии" - this is from Клаудия, not Клаудиа:-) In fact, in Russian there's no rules for declining such names.

Female last names

[welgar.livejournal.com]

AFAIK foreign female last names are normally all indeclinable. E.g.: Даниэла Джонсон - у Даниэлы Джонсон - о Даниэле Джонсон etc. If it were Дэн (male), we would decline it: у Дэна Джонсона - о Дэне Джонсоне.

The same goes even if the last name sounds feminine, e.g.: Ирина Хакамада - у Ирины Хакамада - об Ирине Хакамада. However, many Russians don't know this and decline the names like nouns (Хакамады - Хакамаде etc.).

Re: Female last names

[ekeme-ndiba.livejournal.com]

Bah. Please don't invent unexisting rules, there's no such a rule that prevents declining foreign feminine names (last, first, whatever) by default. You shouldn't decline them only if they cannot be declined - e.g. the final letter is a consonant or an "irregural" vowel, such as "u" etc. Thus, Hakamada must be declined, as far as it meets all requirements for the 1st declension. By the way, I've never met anyone who doesn't decline "Hakamada". Nevertheless, there are many people who think that Slavic toponyms ending with "o" shouldn't be declined (and, yes, they think that there's a rule for it). But, again, it's quite wrong.