Russian language

Russian (русский язык (russkij yazyk)) is the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages.

History

Early historical records of the territory European Russia point to predominance of tribes of the Finno-Ugric language group. Slavic speakers appear to have established sparse settlements of forts in the borderland areas near Belarus and Ukraine between the 6th and the 9th centuries. The incorporation of much of European Russia into the empire of Rus' ushered in the use of Old Church Slavonic in worship and literature, beginning as early as 989. Documentation of the language of this period is scanty, making the question of the relationship between the literary and spoken language difficult at best. Nevertheless, the assimilation of the surrounding Finno-Ugric majority through conquest and conversion by small outposts of Slavic settlement led to massive contributions of the Old Church Slavonic language to the embryonic Russian dialect.

Major divergences with the Old Ruthenian language of Kievan Rus' to the south were evident by the 1100s, and these were magnified by the political separations of the break-up of the state of Rus', leading to the incorporation of the closest Slavic neighbors of the Russians into the Lithuanian and Polish states after periods of local independence. The Russian portions then fell under Mongolian hegemony, leading to new influences on the developing language. Divergences from Old Slavonic increased over the 11th to the 17th centuries to the point of complete separation. Upon Russia's opening to the West, new borrowings from Europeans languages of English, German, French, Polish and Ukrainian occurred.

In summary, the Russian language developed from early native Slavic settlement influenced by Finno-Ugric surroundings. An early overlay and infusion of Old Church Slavonic was very decisive in local language formation. Later political developments brought Mongolian then European influences. The Russian scholar Meleti Smotritsky provided some of the early standardization of Russian language. Reforms were also introduced at the time of Peter the Great, and the orthography was simplified in the 20th century around the time of the Russian Revolution.

Classification

Geographic Distribution

Russian is primarily spoken in Russia and other nations of the former Soviet Union, and was also widely taught in schools in countries - satellites of the Soviet Union and Communist states. In Soviet times, Russian was often strongly promoted to the detriment of other local languages. While many of the countries of the former Soviet Union are now promoting their local languages rather than Russian, Russian remains widely spoken in these areas and is often used for intercommunication between these countries.

Russian is also spoken widely in Israel by the approximately one million ethnic Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union. Much of the Israeli press and websites frequently include articles written in Russian for local readers.

Official Status

Russian is the official language of Russia, and an official language of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. Russian is one of the six official languages of the United Nations.

Dialects

There is a number of dialects spoken in Russia. Some linguists divide the Russian language into two dialects, "Northern" and "Southern," with Moscow lying on the zone of transition betwen the two. Others divide the language into three dialects, Northern, Central and Southern, with Moscow lying in the region of the Central dialect. Russian imperial political policy formerly asserted that the Ukrainian and the Belarussian were not separate languages in their own right, but were to be considered part of the Russian language. Linguists, however, distinguish these three as separate languages of the East Slavic group.

Derived Languages

Russenorsk is a pidgin language combining Russian and Norwegian. Russian sign language allows deaf people to communicate.

Sounds

Russian is written using the Cyrillic alphabet.

Notes on the Alphabet and Pronunciation of Russian

1. In old times the letters of the alphabet had mnemonic names.
2. While Russian has a mostly phonetic orthography, there are exceptions. Below are a few of the most common.
   
   • In a small number of extremely common instances, "г" is pronounced as /v/: in masculine and neuter singular genitive pronouns (such as "его" his, him), and masculine and neuter singular genitive adjective endings ("~ого" and "~его").
     
   • Voiced consonants with voiceless counterparts lose their voicing at the end of a word, e.g. "строганов" (stroganoff) is pronounced /stroganof/.
     
   • Voiceless consonants with voiced counterparts become voiced before voiced consonants, e.g. "футбол" (soccer/football) is pronounced /fudbol/.
   • Similarly, voiced consonants with voiceless counterparts become voiceless before voiceless consonants, e.g. "водка" (vodka) is pronounced /votka/.
     
   • Vowel is only fully pronounced when it is under accent. In the non-accented (weak) position, vowel is "reduced" to the neutral sound. Spelling, on the other hand, doesn't depend on whether position is accented or not.
     
3. The hard sign (Ъ/ъ)indicates that the preceding consonant is not palatized.
   
4. The soft sign (Ь/ь)indicates that the preceding consonant is palatized.
   
5. The vowels Е/е, Ё/ё, И/и, Ю/ю, Я/я make the consonants before them palatal consonant. This means that one pronounces the consonant with the middle of the tongue raised, pressing against the hard palate.
   
6. Feeta is similar to Greek theta.
7. Izhitsa is similar to Latin Y.

Related articles

• Russian grammar
• Russian humour
• Common phrases in different languages
• Reforms of Russian orthography
• List of English words of Russian origin
• Volapuk encoding
• Non-native pronunciations of English

External links

• Russian Alphabet with sound (languagehelpers.com)
• Reference Grammar
• Wikibooks Russian
• East Slavic languages
• Old Russian language
• Russian - English Dictionary
• Generator for Russian typographical filler text