Decoding the Difficulty: How Challenging is Russian for English Speakers?
Learning a new language is often a rewarding but challenging endeavor. Russian, with its unique alphabet and complex grammar, often stands out as particularly daunting for English speakers. But how difficult is the Russian language to learn for English speakers, really? This article aims to break down the perceived difficulties and highlight some aspects that might make the journey smoother than expected.
The Challenge and the Allure of Russian
If you’ve dabbled in linguistics or looked into learning a second language, you undoubtedly know that certain languages are harder for English speakers to learn than others. As a general rule, the more a language varies from English, the harder it is for a native English speaker to pick up. That’s the reason why those learning Chinese, Arabic, Japanese, and other eastern languages tend to struggle; these dialects belong to entirely different schools of language with unique rules, writing systems, grammar structures, and, of course, really weird idioms.
But Asia and the Middle East don’t have a monopoly on languages that make you want to pull your hair out; Russia, ever the competitive nation, gives these languages a run for their money. Russian is very different from English in a lot of ways and has a plethora of very difficult rules that can be daunting to the prospective student. But as they say, the bigger they are, the harder they fall. The first time you successfully nail a sentence in Russian is a momentous occasion and brings a sense of pride that you really never forget.
Russian is worth the effort to learn, and the very first step to learning Russian is to understand what exactly you’ll be going up against. The Foreign Service Institute (FSI) classifies Russian as a Category IV language, meaning it requires more time and practice than languages like Spanish or French. The Foreign Service Institute (FSI) estimates about 1,100 class hours for English speakers to reach professional fluency.
But don’t get discouraged; as in everything, give it enough effort and eventually it will just start to click. Learning a second language is rewarding but often challenging. Whichever your reason for learning Russian, make sure it’s a strong one to keep you motivated and persistent. Russia, for example, has a rich literary tradition, with writers such as Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Pushkin considered among the greatest of all time.
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Speaking Russian may also allow you to travel to iconic destinations and experience Russian culture first-hand. Moscow, the capital of Russia, is home to many famous landmarks such as the Red Square, which is a historic city square and one of the most iconic places in Russia, known for its colorful and rich history. It is surrounded by many famous landmarks such as the Kremlin, St. Basil’s Cathedral, and the State History Museum. The Red Square is also the site of many important historical events, including the coronation of the Tsars and the Soviet military parades. Saint Petersburg, on the other hand, is known as the cultural capital of Russia, and it’s home to many museums and galleries that showcase the country’s rich artistic heritage. You can also explore the historic center of the city, which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and admire the architecture of famous landmarks such as the Winter Palace and the Kazan Cathedral.
Learning Russian can greatly aid in the learning process of other Slavic languages. For example, many words in these languages are very similar or even identical to their Russian counterparts. If you’re learning Russian, you’re in luck! Think about it, as a Russian speaker you have access to not only Russia but also countries such as Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine, Belarus, and even some parts of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Furthermore, many countries that were part of the Soviet Union still have strong ties with Russia, making Russian an important language in business, trade and politics. In short, learning Russian is not just about understanding the language itself, but also getting a glimpse into the diverse cultures and histories that have shaped it.
Decoding the Cyrillic Script
The Russian alphabet can be a bit infuriating for a beginning student (it definitely was for me) in that it uses a mixture of characters familiar to us with the same sounds (Т, К, А, М, etc.), characters with familiar shapes but unfamiliar sounds (The Russian “B” sounds like our “V,” their “X” sounds like our “H,” their “H” sounds like our “N,”) and characters that have no English Equivalent (И,Ч, П, Б, Ж, etc.). First of all, it’s important to note that several letters in the Cyrillic alphabet look very similar to their counterparts in the Latin alphabet. For example, the letter “A” in the Latin alphabet is very similar to the letter “А” in the Cyrillic alphabet. The letters “M” and “T” and some others also have similar counterparts in the Cyrillic alphabet.
The first hurdle an aspiring Russian speaker has to overcome is learning to distinguish between these characters and not mix them up with their Latin alphabet counterparts. The Cyrillic alphabet has 33 letters in total, and many of them are formed by combining simple shapes, in a very similar way to what the Latin alphabet does. The Cyrillic alphabet may look intimidating at first, but it is phonetic and consistent. Once you learn the Cyrillic alphabet, Russian pronunciation is largely phonetic. As long as your learning material comes with clear audio so you can hear exactly how words are pronounced then that’s all you need to focus on.
One helpful tip for learning the Cyrillic alphabet is to practice writing the letters by hand. This allows you to form a strong association between the shape of the letter and its sound. It’s worth noting that in addition to the printed version of the Cyrillic alphabet, there is also a cursive version used in handwriting. This cursive version is called “рукописный стиль” (rukopisnyy stil) in Russian. The letters in this cursive version are connected and flow together in a way that makes them appear quite different from the printed versions. The key to learning the cursive version is practice, practice, practice. Start by learning how to write each letter in the cursive style, paying close attention to the way the letters connect to each other. Once you feel comfortable with individual letters, begin practicing writing words and sentences.
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Here are the small hooks for the Russian alphabet: Сс (‘S’ sound in Russian. Пп (pi. Who doesn’t know pi? Фф (phi. These are some of the little hooks I used to remember these letters when I was learning. Уу is a ‘U’ sound. The trickiest two letters of all for English speakers learning Russian are technically not even real letters.
Mastering Russian Verbs
If you’re familiar with any of the romance languages (French, Spanish, German, etc.) you know about verb conjugations. In essence, it involves changing the end of a verb depending on the proper noun used with the verb. There is a standard, unchanged form of a verb is called the infinitive; it equates to the English “to verb” (e.g. to run, to talk, etc.). In English, we have a very simplified form of verb conjugation; we say “I run,” “we run,” “they run,” but also “he runs.” In Russian, you’ll be changing the ending of a verb to match with one of six different pronouns (I, you [informal], you [formal], he/she/it, we, and they). We’ll talk more about informal and formal speech in a second. If we were to apply the same system in English, it could potentially look something like this; “I runi,” “you runu,” “we rune.” The Russian system is more complicated, but follows the same general principle; the ending of a verb always changes to “match” the subject of the verb (the thing or person doing something).
Now, there is a fundamental part of verb usage that foreigners find very hard to learn called tenses. Tenses (or aspect pairs; more on that in a second) are basically Russian’s equivalent of our convoluted time and tense system. For example, in English we have the phrases “I do,” “I am doing,” “I have been doing,” etc. we have auxiliary words and suffixes (have, been, -ing) that denote when and how an action takes place. In Russian, every single verb has two forms, called the perfective and the imperfective. These fulfill a similar function. A verb used in the past tense (I did) in the perfective form has the meaning “I did something once” or “I did something to completion.” It is a finished, or “perfect,” action. The same verb in the imperfective form means “I did something over an indeterminate period of time” or “I did something and didn’t finish it.” It is an action without a definite resolution, or an imperfect action. The difficulty comes in memorizing the two forms of each verb and using them correctly. There an TONS of small nuances (when to use which form, how to find both forms of the word, etc.) that are very difficult for foreigners to learn and for natives to explain; it’s something that comes only with time and extensive practice. Russian verbs can be tricky due to aspect and conjugation rules, but consistent practice and exposure to real-life examples make them manageable.
Russian verbs of motion imply the ‘method’ or ‘kind’ of movement (e.g. I’m walking to (definitively) the school (i.e. I walk to the school (e.g. Russian attaches prefixes to verbs to indicate direction of motion.
The Intricacies of Russian Cases
Cases are arguably the most difficult part of Russian. Similar to verb conjugation, it involves changing the end of a word depending on its relationship to other words in a sentence. However, it’s considerably more complicated. Russian has six grammatical cases (Nominative, Genitive, Dative, Accusative, Instrumental, Prepositional).For English, we use a separate word altogether but in Russian it’s a suffix. E.g. That’s basically what’s happening with Russian noun case suffixes.
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The use of cases, for all intents and purposes, makes word order nearly irrelevant in Russian grammar. In English, we have to say the phrase “I love you” in that order - “I, love, you” in order for it to make sense. In Russian, you can say that sentence in multiple different ways; “you I love,” “I you love,” “love you I,” and so on. This is made possible because in Russian, the end of each word is changed to reflect its proper position in the sentence. I is the subject, and thus is given an ending that denotes that fact (we’ll write it as I[s].) “Love,” following the rules of verb conjugation, matches the word “I” (we’ll write love[i]). “You,” as you probably guessed, is changed to show that it is the object of the sentence (the thing or person someone is doing something to). Thus it becomes “you[o].” With these changes in place, it doesn’t matter which order the words are in, as the [s],[i], and [o] fulfill that role and show us who is doing what to whom.
Word order is flexible. You don’t have to worry about the verb ‘to be’ in the present tense. Questions are formed by simply changing the intonation of regular statements (e.g. Мы смотрим телевизор -> Мы смотрим телевизор?). There are no definite or indefinite articles in Russian!
Note that in Russian, all nouns have a “gender.” This means that each noun is treated differently and connects with other words differently depending on whether it is masculine, feminine, or plural (there is also a “neuter” gender, but very often its use overlaps with the masculine gender, so we’ll skip it for now). Gender is normally denoted by the letter the word ends in, however there are exceptions. A word in Russian that ends in “a,” for example, will almost always be feminine, whereas a word that ends in a consonant will almost always be masculine. Similar to how verbs must match (or agree) with their subjects, all adjectives must match the gender of the noun that they are describing. Thus, in order to say “the tall girl” in Russian, “tall” must be fitted +with a feminine ending (since the word “girl” has a feminine gender).
The tricky part comes in mixing cases with gender. There are six cases in Russian, each used in conjunction with different prepositions (such as on, over, under, around, to, etc.) or different grammatical circumstances. Each gender (masculine, feminine, and plural) has its own set of six word endings that correspond to the six cases. Let’s take for example the words “big house.” Assuming that house is a masculine word, we’ll need to give “big” a masculine ending. Thus it becomes “the big(m) house(m).” Now here’s where it gets a bit harder. In order to say “on the big house,” both “big” and “house” need to agree not only with each other (big(m) house(m)), but also with the preposition “on.” This changes the endings on both of the words, and we end up with this (the number 4 is used to denote which of the six cases the word is using, but since I haven’t defined the cases it’s largely irrelevant): “on the big(m4) house(m4).” The correct gender of the three possible has been used (m), and the correct case of the six has been used (4). Out of 18 possible ways to say “on the big house” (3 potential genders multiplied by 6 potential cases) this is the one correct way.
Softening Factors: Why Russian Might Be Easier Than You Think
Is Russian hard to learn? 9 Reasons why it’s not:I started learning Russian in 2016, and went to Moscow the first time after a couple of months of studying. Even though my grammar was bad, I could still talk about common topics, such as where I was from, what I was studying, and how I liked Russia. So in my experience (and that of my students), Russian doesn’t need to be difficult if you take the right approach. But let’s dive into the reasons why Russian isn’t hard to learn:
- Flexible Word Order: The flexible word order in Russian makes it easy to speak fluently. The Russian language has a flexible word order. That means that you can place words at random places in the sentence, and everything still makes sense. Because you do not have to create the entire sentence in your mind first before you start speaking. The flexible order in Russian frees up a lot of ‘mental RAM’ in your brain. The main benefit of this is that you can speak faster. Your sentences sound fluent a lot earlier, since you cannot make mistakes by putting words in the wrong spot. Not with the Russian language. Once you understand cases a bit, you can simply forget about the word order part.
- Prepositions are always before the word they are attached to. На работу (to work). Возле дома (around the house). К врачу (to the doctor).
- In general, the last word in the sentence is emphasized. Я купил цветы маме (I bought flowers for my mom), has the implicit meaning that you bought them for your mother, not your grandma. This isn’t a hard rule, as you can emphasize any word by stressing it in your pronunciation.
- If you connect two sentences with a word like “and” (и), “but” (но), “or” (или), the words need to stay in their own subsentence.
- If there are multiple Russian verbs that require a specific case, the noun tends to stay close to that verb. “I like to eat pizza” (Мне нравится есть пиццу)
- If you need more structure, you can always use the English word order: Noun + verb + object + indirect object. “I gave flowers to my mother” - я подарил цветы маме.
- Absence of Articles: There are no articles in the Russian language. “The”, “an”, and “a” do not exist in the Russian language. This is frustrating for Russian, who are learning English. But it’s great for us, who are learning Russian. Because it means we cannot not make any mistakes here. This makes Russian one of the easier languages to learn because it eliminates an opportunity for mistakes. In almost every other European language, you need to think about the following things all the time: Should I say an article in front of this noun? Should I say a specific or nonspecific article? (For languages such as German, Spanish, French, Dutch, and more): Which gender is this noun? Eliminating this in the Russian language gets rid of an enormous headache for you. And since fluency in Russian is mostly a matter of getting rid of potential mistakes, the lack of articles makes it easier to achieve a high level of fluency.
- Abundant Learning Resources: There are so many Russian learning resources, it’s impossible to run out. The Russian language is at place number 7 in the list of top spoken languages in the world. 153 million people speak it as their native language. 258 million total speakers. The more people speak a language, the more people will want to learn that language. The natural result of this is that there is much more Russian learning material available to learn Russian, than for many other languages. By Russian language learning material I mean resources you can consume to improve your Russian: Textbooks, Online Russian courses, Video games, Movies, TV shows, Books, Real life classes or tutors, Music. The Russian language is large enough that you can find any type of material to learn the language.
Tips for Success
Here are a few tips to help you in your journey:
- Learn letters in small groups and practice writing them daily.
- Focus on one grammatical concept at a time, practice with real sentences, and use interactive exercises.
- Listen to native speakers and practice repeating words aloud.
- Learn and focusing on the most important vocabulary first.
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