Way to Russia Talk Lounge

llllll · Posted: Mon Jul 17, 2006 5:30 pm Post subject: Does it get easier?

Been learning for a few weeks, but the thing that I'm finding difficult is the different pronuctiation by Russian speakers (makes it hard to pronunce) and the way that they use differen't words for the same thing. I'm using pimsleur, very good it is, but, for example, they use for 'my place' and 'your place', oominya and oovas, you look this up in the Russian dictionary and it's not there Confused

In the dictonary you get, место, on russtran.com my place is: мое место .

and time and again this happens - why?

My head hurts Crying or Very sad

mediashark · Moderator Joined: 04 Nov 2004 Posts: 1601

Errr... common sense? These are a few different phrases!

Try to walk before you run--you need to do away with the 'imitated pronoucnation' of English words in Pimsleur, learn things like prepositions and their usage... before you start flipping through a Russia dictionary. And yes, there are dictionary skills to be learnt as well.

моё место --my place, "mesto" is the direct translation of "place", моё is neuter form of "my".

oominya -- у меня-- "at my place" or "I have" lit. translation: "at me"
oovas-- у вас --"at your(polite form) place" or "you have", lit. translation: "at you"

Stanislav · Posted: Tue Jul 18, 2006 12:47 am Post subject:

In fact, both expressions are idiomatic (like many others) and shouldn't be translated literally, as none of them means "at my home". However, this example reveals something about such courses, doesn't it? That's why some people take language classes, where teachers can also answer your questions and explain things. Also, that's a good example of why words should be learned in contexts, and not just from a dictionary.

llllll · Posted: Tue Jul 18, 2006 4:20 am Post subject:

That's very interesting, unfortunatley there aren't that many russian courses where i am, ie none - Derbyshire england. so these CD pimsleur things is all I have. You can't even get Russian books i had to send for the dictionary from Amazon.

I was most suprised at waht i though to be one word but was infact two or three. That's the draw back to audio tapes.

спасибо (fluent eh?)

mediashark · Moderator Joined: 04 Nov 2004 Posts: 1601

Did the audio books not have any transcription:?: Maybe you should get a good textbook with an accompanying CD/tape. I recommend Hugo's Russian in Three Months textbook + 4 cassetes course. You can check amazon.com. Oh, if you have a CD changer in your car, pop in the pimsleur CDs in there and listen to them as often you can, but do set aside time for real studying with the textbook (do exercises, study grammar etc.) and accompanying audio (if any).

llllll · Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:27 pm Post subject:

krasatulya · VIP Joined: 29 May 2005 Posts: 571

llll- Don't get too discouraged; I think you should continue with the Pimsleur. I've had a lot of success with it and my husband thinks that it has greatly improved my vocab as well as my pronunciation. And when it really comes down to it, although reading and writing are both helpful, the most important thing is one's ability to have a conversation with a native speaker...the other stuff, in my opinion, is icing on the cake.

mediashark · Moderator Joined: 04 Nov 2004 Posts: 1601

Well, the audio books you have are good, it's just that you should not neglect the written language (therefore I suggested you supplement them) or you'll be confused like you are now... especially if you are starting from scartch. Flashcards may help (they don't for me somehow... lol). Perhaps you can make some to go with your Pimsleur CDs.

Beginning reading and writing part is not as hard as you think...

llllll · Posted: Fri Jul 21, 2006 7:43 pm Post subject:

Thankyou for the encouragement lady's and gents, most appretiated.

It's not the actual learning of the words, 95% have gone it. It's the subtle differences that's a little tricky, especially the word order, that a lot of time is opposite way around.

There again nobody said life would be easy Laughing

mediashark · Moderator Joined: 04 Nov 2004 Posts: 1601

Maybe you just need to expose yourself to some real texts and increase your vocab? Get yourself some readers for beginners of Russian--if you can find parallel-text (Russian/English) books, they sometimes work great! You can try to find online resources, but if you don't know where to look they're hard to find.

mediashark · Moderator Joined: 04 Nov 2004 Posts: 1601

llllll · Posted: Fri Jul 21, 2006 9:18 pm Post subject:

Stanislav · Posted: Sat Jul 22, 2006 11:21 pm Post subject:

Russian word order is usually one of the most confusing things for English-speaking students. The thing is that it is free, that is, flexible, and Russians change it to emphasize different parts of the message. Russian nouns, adjectives, and pronouns (but not verbs) have cases, and they are indeed six. They show which word is the subject (it can be at the end of the sentence) and which is the object and so on.
You can always tell a dog's mood by it's tail: whether it's scared, happy, or angry. Russian words are like dogs: they move their tales - change final letters, - to show what they are.
There are other languages with similar structure: Latin, or German to some extent.