Russian language: Difference between revisions

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'''Russian''' (in its own [[language (general)|language]]: русский язык, ''russkiy yazyk'' ['ruskʲɪj jɪ'zɨk]) is the most widely-used language across [[Eurasia]]. It is one of the [[Slavic languages]], [[written language|written]] in the [[Cyrillic alphabet]].
<!-- not implemented, to reconsider
{{Infobox Language
|name=Russian
|nativename=русский язык ''russkiy yazyk''
|states=[[Russia]], [[Post-Soviet states|former Soviet republics]], [[Mongolia]], [[Svalbard]], and [[Israel]].
|speakers=primary language: about 145 million<br>secondary language: 110 million (1999 WA, 2000 WCD)
|rank=8 (native)
|familycolor=Indo-European
|fam2=[[Balto-Slavic languages|Balto-Slavic]]
|fam3=[[Slavic languages|Slavic]]
|fam4=[[East Slavic languages|East Slavic]]
|script=[[Cyrillic alphabet]]
|nation=[[Russia]], [[Belarus]], [[Kazakhstan]], [[Kyrgyzstan]], [[United Nations]], [[Crimea]], [[Abkhazia]], [[South Ossetia]], [[Transnistria]], and [[Gagauzia]].
|agency=[[Russian Academy of Sciences]]
|iso1=ru|iso2=rus|iso3=rus|map=[[Image:RussianLanguageMap.png|center|300px]]<center><small>Countries of the world where Russian is spoken.</center></small>}}-->
 
'''Russian''' (in its own language: ''русский язык, russkiy yazyk'' ['ruskʲɪj jɪ'zɨk]) is the most widely spoken language of [[Eurasia]] and the most widespread of the [[Slavic languages]].
 
Russian belongs to the family of [[Indo-European languages]]. Within the Slavic family, Russian is one of three living members of the [[East Slavic languages|East Slavic group]], the other two being [[Belarusian language|Belarusian]] and [[Ukrainian language|Ukrainian]].
 
Written examples of East Slavonic are attested from the 10th century onwards. While Russian preserves much of East Slavonic synthetic-inflexional structure and a [[Proto-Slavic language|Common Slavonic]] word base, modern Russian exhibits a large stock of borrowed international vocabulary for politics, science, and technology. A language of great political importance in the 20th century, Russian is one of the official languages of the [[United Nations]].
 
<small>'''NOTE'''. Russian is written in a non-Latin script. All examples below are in the [[Cyrillic alphabet]], with transcriptions in [[International Phonetic Alphabet|IPA]].</small>
 
==Classification==
Russian is a [[Slavic languages|Slavic language]] in the Indo-European family. From the point of view of the [[spoken language]], its closest relatives are [[Ukrainian language|Ukrainian]] and [[Belarusian language|Belarusian]], the other two national languages in the [[East Slavic languages|East Slavic]] group. (Some academics also consider [[Rusyn language|Rusyn]] an East Slavic language; others consider Rusyn just a dialect.) In many places in [[Ukraine]] and [[Belarus]], these languages are spoken interchangeably, and in certain areas traditional bilinguism resulted in language mixture, e.g. Surzhik in central Ukraine.
 
The basic vocabulary, principles of word-formation, and, to some extent, inflexions and literary style of Russian have been heavily influenced by [[Church Slavonic language|Church Slavonic]], a developed and partly adopted form of the [[South Slavic languages|South Slavic]] [[Old Church Slavonic]] language used by the [[Russian Orthodox Church]]. Many words in modern literary Russian are closer in form to the modern [[Bulgarian language]] than to Ukrainian or Belarusian. However, the East Slavic forms have tended to remain in the various dialects that are experiencing a rapid decline. In some cases, both the [[East Slavic languages|East Slavic]] and the [[Church Slavonic]] forms are in use, with slightly different meanings. ''For details, see [[Russian phonology]] and [[History of the Russian language]].''
 
Russian phonology and syntax (especially in northern dialects) have also been influenced to some extent by the numerous Finnic languages of the [[Finno-Ugric languages|Finno-Ugric subfamily]]: [[Merya language|Merya]], [[Moksha language|Moksha]], [[Muromian language|Muromian]], the language of the [[Meshchera]], [[Veps language|Veps]] etc. These languages, some of them now extinct, used to be spoken right in the center and in the north of what is now the European part of Russia. They came in contact with Eastern Slavic as far back as the early Middle Ages and eventually served as substratum for the modern Russian language. The Russian dialects spoken north, north-east and north-west of Moscow have a considerable number of words of Finno-Ugric origin. <ref>{{cite web|title=Academic credit|publisher=Вопросы языкознания. - М., 1982, № 5. - С. 18-28|url=http://www.philology.ru/linguistics2/filin-82.htm|accessdate= 2006-04-29}}</ref>  <ref>{{cite web|title=Academic credit|publisher=Прибалтийско-финский компонент в русском слове |url=http://www.ksu.ru/f10/publications/konf/articles_1_1.php?id=5&num=17000000|accessdate= 2006-04-29}}</ref>
 
Outside the Slavic languages, the vocabulary and literary style of Russian have been greatly influenced by [[Greek language|Greek]], [[Latin]], [[French language|French]], [[German language|German]], and [[English language|English]]. Modern Russian also has a considerable number of words adopted from [[Tatar language|Tatar]] and some other Turkic languages.
 
According to the [[Defense Language Institute]] in [[Monterey, California]], Russian is classified as a level III language in terms of learning difficulty for native English speakers,<ref>{{cite web|title=Academic credit|publisher=Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center|url=http://www.dliflc.edu/academics/academic_affairs/dli_catalog/acadcred.htm|accessdate= 2006-04-20}}</ref> requiring approximately 780 hours of immersion instruction to achieve intermediate fluency. It is also regarded by the [[United States Intelligence Community]] as a "hard target" language, due to both its difficulty to master for English speakers as well as due to its critical role in American foreign policy.
 
==Geographic distribution==
Russian is primarily spoken in [[Russia]] and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics of the [[Soviet Union|USSR]].  Until 1917, it was the sole official language of the [[Russian Empire]]. During the Soviet period, the policy toward the languages of the various other ethnic groups fluctuated in practice. Though each of the constituent republics had its own official language, the unifying role and superior status was reserved for Russian. Following the break-up of 1991, several of the newly independent states have encouraged their native languages, which has partly reversed the privileged status of Russian, though its role as the language of post-Soviet national intercourse throughout the region has continued.
 
In [[Latvia]], notably, its official recognition and legality in the classroom have been a topic of considerable debate in a country where more than one-third of the population is Russian-speaking, consisting mostly of post-[[World War II]] immigrants from Russia and other parts of the former [[USSR]] (Belarus, Ukraine). Similarly, in [[Estonia]], the Soviet-era immigrants and their Russian-speaking descendants constitute about one quarter of the country's current population.
 
A much smaller Russian-speaking minority in [[Lithuania]] has largely been assimilated during the decade of independence and currently represent less than 1/10 of the country's overall population. Nevertheless, around 80% of the population of the Baltic states are able to hold a conversation in Russian and almost all have at least some familiarity with the most basic spoken and written phrases.  In [[Finland]], once part of the Russian Empire, only a few Russian-speaking communities still exist.
 
In the twentieth century it was widely taught in the schools of the members of the old [[Warsaw Pact]] and in other [[Communist state|countries]] that used to be satellites of the USSR.  In particular, these countries include [[Poland]], [[Bulgaria]], the [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], and [[Albania]].  However, younger generations are usually not fluent in it, because Russian is no longer mandatory in the school system.  It was, and to a lesser extent still is, widely taught in Asian countries such as [[Laos]], [[Vietnam]], and [[Mongolia]] due to Soviet influence.  Russian is still used as a [[lingua franca]] in [[Afghanistan]] by a few tribes. It was also taught as the mandatory foreign language requisite in the [[People's Republic of China]] before the [[Sino-Soviet Split]].
 
Russian is also spoken in [[Israel]] by at least 750,000 ethnic [[Jew|Jewish]] immigrants from the former [[Soviet Union]] (1999 census). The Israeli [[Mass media|press]] and [[website]]s regularly publish material in Russian.
 
Sizeable Russian-speaking communities also exist in [[North America]], especially in large urban centers of the [[United States|U.S.]] and [[Canada]] such as [[New York City]], [[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]], [[Los Angeles, California|Los Angeles]], [[San Francisco]], [[Seattle]], [[Toronto]], [[Baltimore]], [[Miami, Florida|Miami]], [[Chicago, Illinois|Chicago]], and the [[Cleveland, Ohio|Cleveland]] suburb of [[Richmond Heights, Ohio|Richmond Heights]]. In the former two Russian-speaking groups total over half a million. In a number of locations they issue their own newspapers, and live in their self-sufficient neighborhoods (especially the generation of immigrants who started arriving in the early sixties). It is important to note, however, that only about a quarter of them are ethnic Russians. Before the [[dissolution of the Soviet Union]], the overwhelming majority of [[Russophone]]s in North America were Russian-speaking [[Jews]]. Afterwards the influx from the countries of the former [[Soviet Union]] changed the statistics somewhat. According to the [[United States 2000 Census]], Russian is the primary language spoken in the homes of over 700,000 individuals living in the United States.
 
Significant Russian-speaking groups also exist in [[Western Europe]]. These have been fed by several waves of immigrants since the beginning of the twentieth century, each with its own flavour of language. [[Germany]], the [[United Kingdom]], [[Spain]], [[France]], [[Italy]], [[Belgium]], [[Greece]], [[Brazil]]  and [[Turkey]] have significant Russian-speaking communities totaling 3 million people.
 
Two thirds of them are actually Russian-speaking descendants of [[German people|Germans]], [[Greeks]], [[Jews]], [[Armenians]], or [[Ukrainians]] who either repatriated after the [[USSR]] collapsed or are just looking for temporary employment. But many are well-off Russian families acquiring property and getting an education.
 
Earlier, the descendants of the Russian émigrés tended to lose the tongue of their ancestors by the third generation. Now, when the border is more open, Russian is likely to survive longer, especially when many of the emigrants visit their homelands at least once a year and also have access to Russian websites and TV channels.
 
Recent estimates of the total number of speakers of Russian:
 
{| align=center cellpadding=4 cellspacing=0 border=0
|-
!Source||Native speakers||Native Rank||Total speakers||Total rank
|-
|G. Weber, "Top Languages",<br>''Language Monthly'',<br>3: 12-18, 1997, ISSN 1369-9733||160,000,000||8||285,000,000||5
|-
|World Almanac (1999)||145,000,000||8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;(2005)||275,000,000||5
|-
|SIL (2000 WCD)||145,000,000||8||255,000,000||5-6 (tied with Arabic)
|-
|CIA World Factbook (2005)||160,000,000||8||
|}
 
===Official status===
Russian is the official language of [[Russia]], and an official language of [[Belarus]], [[Kazakhstan]], [[Kyrgyzstan]], the [[Crimea|Autonomous Republic of Crimea]] and the [[List of unrecognized countries|unrecognized]] [[Transnistria]], [[South Ossetia]] and [[Abkhazia]]. It is one of the six official languages of the [[United Nations]]. Education in Russian is still a popular choice for many of the both native and RSL (Russian as a second language) speakers in Russia and many of the former Soviet republics.
 
97% of the public school students of Russia, 75% in Belarus, 41% in Kazakhstan, 25% in [[Ukraine]], 23% in Kyrgyzstan, 21% in [[Moldova]], 7% in [[Azerbaijan]], 5% in [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]] and 2% in [[Armenia]] and [[Tajikistan]] receive their education only or mostly in Russian, although the corresponding percentage of ethnic Russians is 78% in [[Russia]], 10% in [[Belarus]], 26% in [[Kazakhstan]], 17% in [[Ukraine]], 9% in [[Kyrgyzstan]], 6% in [[Republic of Moldova|Moldova]], 2% in [[Azerbaijan]], 1.5% in [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]] and less than 1% in both [[Armenia]] and [[Tajikistan]].
 
Russian-language schooling is also available in Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania, despite the government attempts to reduce the number of subjects taught in Russian.
 
Russian has co-official status alongside [[Romanian language|Romanian]] in seven Romanian [[Commune in Romania|communes]] in [[Tulcea County|Tulcea]] and [[Constanţa County|Constanţa]] counties. In these localities, Russian-speaking [[Lipovans]], who are a recognized ethnic minority, make up more than 20% of the population. Thus, according to Romania's minority rights law, education, signage and access to public administration and the justice system are provided in Russian, alongside Romanian.
 
===Dialects===
Despite levelling after 1900, especially in matters of vocabulary, a number of dialects exist in Russia. Some linguists divide the dialects of the Russian language into two primary regional groupings, "Northern" and "Southern", with [[Moscow]] lying on the zone of transition between the two. Others divide the language into three groupings, Northern, Central and Southern, with Moscow lying in the Central region. [[Dialectology]] within Russia recognizes dozens of smaller-scale variants.
 
The dialects often show distinct and non-standard features of pronunciation and intonation, vocabulary, and grammar. Some of these are relics of ancient usage now completely discarded by the standard language. Also cf. Moscow pronunciation of "-чн-", e.g. "булошная" (''buloshnaya'' - bakery) instead of "булочная" (''bulochnaya'').
 
The [[northern Russian dialects]] and those spoken along the [[Volga River]] typically pronounce unstressed {{IPA|/o/}} clearly (the phenomenon called [[okanye]] ''оканье''). East of Moscow, particularly in [[Ryazan Region]], unstressed {{IPA|/e/}} and {{IPA|/a/}} following [[palatalize]]d consonants and preceding a stressed syllabus are not reduced to {{IPA|[ɪ]}} (unlike in the Moscow dialect) and are instead pronounced as {{IPA|/a/}} in such positions (e.g. несл'''и''' is pronounced as {{IPA|[nʲas.'lʲi]}}, not as {{IPA|[nʲis.'lʲi]}})  - this is called [[yakanye]] ''яканье''<ref>{{cite web|title=The Language of the Russian Village|language=Russian|url=http://www.gramota.ru/book/village/map13.html|accessdate= 2006-07-04}}</ref>; many southern dialects palatalize the final {{IPA|/t/}} in 3rd person forms of verbs and [[spirant]]ize the {{IPA|/g/}} into {{IPA|[h]}}. However, in certain areas south of Moscow, e.g. in and around [[Tula, Russia|Tula]], {{IPA|/g/}} is pronounced as in the Moscow and northern dialects unless it precedes a voiceless plosive or a silent pause. In this position {{IPA|/g/}} is spirantized and devoiced to the fricative {{IPA|[x]}}, e.g. друг {{IPA|[drux]}} (in Moscow's dialect, only Бог {{IPA|[box]}}, лёгкий {{IPA|[lʲoxʲkʲij]}}, мягкий {{IPA|[mʲaxʲkʲij]}} and some derivatives follow this rule). It should be noted that some of these features (e.g. the spirantized {{IPA|/ɡ/}} and palatalized final {{IPA|/t/}} in 3rd person forms of verbs) are also present in modern [[Ukrainian language|Ukrainian]], indicating either a linguistic continuum or strong influence one way or the other.
 
The town of [[Velikiy Novgorod]] has historically displayed a feature called chokanye/tsokanye (чоканье/цоканье), where {{IPA|/ʨ/}} and {{IPA|/ʦ/}} were confused (this is thought to be due to influence from [[Finnish language|Finnish]], which doesn't distinguish these sounds). So, '''ц'''апля ("heron") has been recorded as 'чапля'. Also, the second palatalization of [[velar]]s did not occur there, so the so-called '''ě²''' (from the Proto-Slavonic diphthong *ai) did not cause {{IPA|/k, g, x/}} to shift to {{IPA|/ʦ, ʣ, s/}}; therefore where [[Standard Russian]] has '''ц'''епь ("chain"), the form '''к'''епь {{IPA|kepʲ}} is attested in earlier texts.
 
Among the first to study Russian dialects was [[Mikhail Lomonosov|Lomonosov]] in the eighteenth century. In the nineteenth, [[Vladimir Dal]] compiled the first dictionary that included dialectal vocabulary. Detailed mapping of Russian dialects began at the turn of the twentieth century. In modern times, the monumental ''Dialectological Atlas of the Russian Language'' (''Диалектологический атлас русского языка'' {{IPA|/dʲəʌˈlʲektəlʌˈɡʲiʨəskʲəj ˈatləs ˈruskəvə jəzɨˈka/}}), was published in 3 folio volumes 1986-1989, after four decades of preparatory work.
 
The ''standard language'' is based on (but not identical to) the Moscow dialect.
 
===Derived languages===
* [[Fenya]], a criminal [[argot]] of ancient origin, with Russian grammar, but with distinct vocabulary.
* [[Surzhyk]] is a language with Russian and Ukrainian features, spoken in some rural areas of Ukraine
* [[Trasianka]] is a language with Russian and Belorusian features used by a large portion of the rural population in [[Belarus]].
* [[Quelia]], a pseudo pidgin of German and Russian.
* [[Russenorsk language|Russenorsk]] is an extinct [[pidgin]] language with mostly Russian vocabulary and mostly [[Norwegian language|Norwegian]] grammar, used for communication between [[Russians]] and [[Norwegians]] in [[Svalbard]] and [[Kola Peninsula]].
* [[Runglish]], Russian-English pidgin. This word is also used by English speakers to describe the way in which Russians attempt to speak English using Russian morphology and/or syntax.
 
==Writing system==
===Alphabet===
[[Image:Meletius Smotrisky Cyrillic Alphabet.PNG|thumb|[[Meletius Smotrytsky]] presented the Cyrillic alphabet in this 1619 publication describing the "Slavonic" language.]]
{{main|Russian alphabet}}
Russian is written using a modified version of the [[Cyrillic alphabet|Cyrillic (кириллица)]] alphabet, consisting of 33 letters.
 
The following table gives their upper case forms, along with [[International Phonetic Alphabet|IPA]] values for each letter's typical sound:
 
{| align=center cellpadding=4 style="text-align:center;"
|-
|[[A (Cyrillic)|А]]<br>{{IPA|/a/}}||[[Be (Cyrillic)|Б]]<br>{{IPA|/b/}}||[[Ve (Cyrillic)|В]]<br>{{IPA|/v/}}||[[Ge (Cyrillic)|Г]]<br>{{IPA|/ɡ/}}||[[De (Cyrillic)|Д]]<br>{{IPA|/d/}}||[[Ye (Cyrillic)|Е]]<br>{{IPA|/je/}}||[[Yo (Cyrillic)|Ё]]<br>{{IPA|/jo/}}||[[Zhe (Cyrillic)|Ж]]<br>{{IPA|/ʐ/}}||[[Ze (Cyrillic)|З]]<br>{{IPA|/z/}}||[[I (Cyrillic)|И]]<br>{{IPA|/i/}}||[[Short I|Й]]<br>{{IPA|/j/}}
|-
|[[Ka (Cyrillic)|К]]<br>{{IPA|/k/}}||[[El (Cyrillic)|Л]]<br>{{IPA|/l/}}||[[Em (Cyrillic)|М]]<br>{{IPA|/m/}}||[[En (Cyrillic)|Н]]<br>{{IPA|/n/}}||[[O (Cyrillic)|О]]<br>{{IPA|/o/}}||[[Pe (Cyrillic)|П]]<br>{{IPA|/p/}}||[[Er (Cyrillic)|Р]]<br>{{IPA|/r/}}||[[Es (Cyrillic)|С]]<br>{{IPA|/s/}}||[[Te (Cyrillic)|Т]]<br>{{IPA|/t/}}||[[U (Cyrillic)|У]]<br>{{IPA|/u/}}||[[Ef|Ф]]<br>{{IPA|/f/}}
|-
|[[Kha|Х]]<br>{{IPA|/x/}}||[[Tse (Cyrillic)|Ц]]<br>{{IPA|/ʦ/}}||[[Che (Cyrillic)|Ч]]<br>{{IPA|/ʨ/}}||[[Sha|Ш]]<br>{{IPA|/ʂ/}}||[[Shcha (Cyrillic)|Щ]] <br>{{IPA|/ɕː/}}||[[Yer|Ъ]]<br>{{IPA|/-/}}||[[Yery|Ы]]<br> {{IPA|[ɨ]}}||[[Soft sign|Ь]]<br>{{IPA|/◌ʲ/}}||[[E (Cyrillic)|Э]]<br>{{IPA|/e/}}||[[Yu (Cyrillic)|Ю]]<br>{{IPA|/ju/}}||[[Ya (Cyrillic)|Я]]<br>{{IPA|/ja/}}
|}
 
Old letters that have been abolished at one time or another but occur in this and related articles include {{Unicode |'''ѣ'''}} {{IPA|/ie/}} or {{IPA|/e/}}, '''і''' {{IPA|/i/}}, {{Unicode |'''ѳ'''}} {{IPA|/f/}}, {{Unicode |ѵ}} {{IPA|/i/}} and {{Unicode |'''ѧ'''}} that merged into '''я'''. The [[yer]]s '''ъ''' and '''ь''' were originally pronounced as ''ultra-short'' or ''reduced'' {{IPA|/ŭ/}}, {{IPA|/ĭ/}}, actually {{IPA|[ɪ]}}, {{IPA|[ɯ]}} or {{IPA|[ə̈]}}, {{IPA|[ə̹]}}.
 
''For information on an informal approach on transliterating Russian into English, see the article [[Romanization of Russian]].''
 
===Orthography===
{{main|Russian orthography}}
 
Russian spelling is reasonably phonemic in practice. It is in fact a balance among phonemics, morphology, etymology, and grammar; and, like that of most living languages, has its share of inconsistencies and controversial points.
 
The current spelling follows the major reform of 1918, and the final codification of 1956. An update proposed in the late 1990's has met a hostile reception, and has not been formally adopted.
 
The punctuation, originally based on Byzantine Greek, was in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries reformulated on the French and German models.
 
==Sounds==
{{main|Russian phonology}}
 
The phonological system of Russian is inherited from [[Common Slavonic]], but underwent considerable modification in the early historical period, before being largely settled by about 1400.
 
The language possesses five vowels, which are written with different letters depending on whether or not the preceding consonant is [[palatalization|palatalized]].  The consonants typically come in plain vs. palatalized pairs, which are traditionally called ''hard'' and ''soft.'' (The 'hard' consonants are often [[velarization|velarized]], although in some dialects the velarization is limited to hard {{IPA|/ɫ/}}). The standard language, based on the Moscow dialect, possesses heavy stress and moderate variation in pitch. Stressed vowels are somewhat lengthened, while unstressed vowels (except {{IPA|/u/}}) tend to be reduced to an unclear [[schwa]]. (See also: [[akanye]].)
 
The Russian [[syllable]] structure can be quite complex with both initial and final consonant clusters of up to 4 consecutive sounds. Using a formula with V standing for the nucleus (vowel) and C for each consonant the structure can be described as follows:
 
(C)(C)(C)(C)V(C)(C)(C)(C)
 
===Consonants===
{| border="2" cellpadding="5" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; line-height: 1.2em; border-collapse: collapse; text-align: center; font-family: Doulos SIL, GentiumAlt,  Lucida Sans Unicode, Gentium, Code2000, Chrysanthi Unicode, TITUS Cyberbit Basic, Bitstream Cyberbit, Bitstream Vera, Arial Unicode MS, Hiragino Kaku Gothic Pro, Lucida Grande; font-size: 110%; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaa solid;"
|- style="font-size: 80%;"
| colspan=2|&nbsp;
! [[Bilabial consonant|Bilabial]]
! [[Labiodental consonant|Labio-<br>dental]]
! [[Dental consonant|Dental]] & <br> [[Alveolar consonant|Alveolar]]
! [[Postalveolar consonant|Post-<br>alveolar]]
! [[Palatal consonant|Palatal]]
! [[Velar consonant|Velar]]
|-
! rowspan=2 style="font-size: 80%; text-align: left;"|[[Nasal consonant|Nasal]]
|style="font-size: 70%;" |hard
| {{IPA|/m/}}
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/n/}}
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
|-
|style="font-size: 70%;" |soft
|{{IPA|/mʲ/}}
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/nʲ/}}
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
|-
! rowspan=2 style="font-size: 80%; text-align: left;" | [[Stop consonant|Plosive]]
|style="font-size: 70%;" | hard
| {{IPA|/p/}} &nbsp; {{IPA|/b/}}
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/t/}} &nbsp; {{IPA|/d/}}
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/k/}} &nbsp; {{IPA|/g/}}
|-
|style="font-size: 70%;" | soft
| {{IPA|/pʲ/}} &nbsp; {{IPA|/bʲ/}}
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/tʲ/}} &nbsp; {{IPA|/dʲ/}}
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/kʲ/*}} &nbsp; {{IPA|[gʲ]}}
|-
! rowspan=2 style="font-size: 80%; text-align: left;" | [[Affricate consonant|Affricate]]
|style="font-size: 70%;" |hard
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
|{{IPA|/ʦ/}}&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
| &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
|-
|style="font-size: 70%;" |soft
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
|{{IPA|/tɕ/}}&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
|-
! rowspan=2 style="font-size: 80%; text-align: left;" | [[Fricative consonant|Fricative]]
|style="font-size: 70%;" |hard
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/f/}} &nbsp; {{IPA|/v/}}
| {{IPA|/s/}} &nbsp; {{IPA|/z/}}
| {{IPA|/ʂ/}} &nbsp; {{IPA|/ʐ/}}
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/x/}} &nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;
|-
|style="font-size: 70%;" |soft
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/fʲ/}} &nbsp; {{IPA|/vʲ/}}
| {{IPA|/sʲ/}} &nbsp; {{IPA|/zʲ/}}
| {{IPA|/ɕː/}}* &nbsp; {{IPA|/ʑː/}}*
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|[xʲ]}} &nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;
|-
! rowspan=2 style="font-size: 80%; text-align: left;" | [[Trill consonant|Trill]]
|style="font-size: 70%;" |hard
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/r/}}
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
|-
|style="font-size: 70%;" |soft
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/rʲ/}}
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
|-
 
! rowspan=2 style="font-size: 80%; text-align: left;" | [[Approximant consonant|Approximant]]
|style="font-size: 70%;" |hard
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/l/}}
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
|-
|style="font-size: 70%;" | soft
| &nbsp;
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/lʲ/}}
| &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/j/}}
| &nbsp;
|}
 
Russian is notable for its distinction based on [[palatalization]] of most of the consonants. While {{IPA|/k/, /g/, /x/}} do have palatalized [[allophone]]s {{IPA|[kʲ, gʲ, xʲ]}}, only {{IPA|/kʲ/}} might be considered a phoneme, though it is marginal and generally not considered distinctive (the only native [[minimal pair]] which argues for {{IPA|/kʲ/}} to be a separate phoneme is "это ткёт"/"этот кот"). Palatalization means that the center of the tongue is raised during and after the articulation of the consonant. In the case of {{IPA|/tʲ/ and /dʲ/}}, the tongue is raised enough to produce slight frication (affricate sounds). These sounds: {{IPA|/t, d, ʦ, s, z, n and rʲ/}} are [[dental consonant|dental]], that is pronounced with the tip of the tongue against the teeth rather than against the [[alveolar ridge]].
 
==Grammar==
{{main|Russian grammar}}
 
Russian has preserved an [[Indo-European languages|Indo-European]] [[Synthetic language|synthetic]]-[[inflection|inflexional]] structure, although considerable levelling has taken place.
 
Russian grammar encompasses
* a highly [[Synthetic language|synthetic]] '''morphology'''
* a '''syntax''' that, for the literary language, is the conscious fusion of three elements:
** a polished [[vernacular]] foundation;
** a [[Church Slavonic language|Church Slavonic]] inheritance;
** a [[Western Europe|Western European]] style.
 
The spoken language has been influenced by the literary one, but continues to preserve characteristic forms. The dialects show various non-standard grammatical features, some of which are archaisms or descendants of old forms since discarded by the literary language.
 
==Vocabulary==
[[Image:1694 Russian ABC book page.GIF|thumb|This page from an "ABC" book printed in Moscow in 1694 shows the letter '''П'''.]]
 
See [[History of the Russian language]] for an account of the successive foreign influences on the Russian language.
 
The total number of words in Russian is difficult to reckon because of the ability to agglutinate and create manifold compounds, diminutives, etc. (see [[Russian grammar#Word Formation|Word Formation]] under [[Russian grammar]]).
 
The number of listed words or entries in some of the major dictionaries published during the last two centuries, and the total vocabulary of [[Pushkin]] (who is credited with greatly augmenting and codifying literary Russian), are as follows:
 
{| align="center" cellpadding="4" style="text-align:left"
|-
! Work||Year||Words||Notes
|-
|Academic dictionary, I Ed.||1789-1794||43,257||Russian and Church Slavonic with some Old Russian vocabulary
|-
|Academic dictionary, II Ed||1806-1822||51,388||Russian and Church Slavonic with some Old Russian vocabulary
|-
|Pushkin opus||1810-1837||21,197||-
|-
|Academic dictionary, III Ed.||1847||114,749||Russian and Church Slavonic with Old Russian vocabulary
|-
|Dahl's dictionary||1880-1882||195,844||44,000 entries lexically grouped; attempt to catalogue the full vernacular language, includes some properly Ukrainian and Belarusian words
|-
|Ushakov's dictionary||1934-1940||85,289||Current language with some archaisms
|-
|Academic dictionary||1950-1965||120,480||full dictionary of the "Modern language"
|-
|Ozhegov's dictionary||1950s-1960s||61,458||More or less then-current language
|-
|Lopatin's dictionary||2000||c.160,000||Orthographic, current language
|}
 
Philologists have estimated that the language today may contain as many as 350,000 to 500,000 words.
 
(As a historical aside, [[Vladimir Ivanovich Dal|Dahl]] was, in the second half of the nineteenth century, still insisting that the proper spelling of the adjective ''русский'', which was at that time applied uniformly to all the Orthodox Eastern Slavic subjects of the Empire, as well as to its one official language, be spelled ''руский'' with one s, in accordance with ancient tradition and what he termed the "spirit of the language". He was contradicted by the philologist Grot, who distinctly heard the s lengthened or doubled).
 
=== Proverbs and sayings ===
{{main|Russian proverbs|Russian sayings}}
Russian language is replete with many hundreds of proverbs (''пословица'' {{IPA|/pʌ.'slo.vʲi.ʦə/}}) and sayings (''поговоркa'' {{IPA|/pə.ɡʌ.'vo.rkə/}}). These were already tabulated by the seventeenth century, and collected and studied in the nineteenth and twentieth, with the folk-tales being an especially fertile source.
 
==History and examples==
{{main|History of the Russian language}}
{{seealso|Reforms of Russian orthography}}
 
The history of Russian language may be divided into the following periods.
*[[History of the Russian language#Kievan period and feudal breakup|Kievan period and feudal breakup]]
*[[History of the Russian language#The Moscovite period (15th-17th centuries)|The Moscovite period (15th-17th centuries)]]
*[[History of the Russian language#Empire (18th-19th centuries)|Empire (18th-19th centuries)]]
*[[History of the Russian language#Soviet period and beyond (20th century)|Soviet period and beyond (20th century)]]
 
Judging by the historical records, by approximately 1000 AD the predominant ethnic group over much of modern European [[Russia]], [[Ukraine]], and [[Belarus]] was the Eastern branch of the [[Slavic peoples|Slavs]], speaking a closely related group of dialects. The political unification of this region into [[Kievan Rus']], from which both modern Russia and Ukraine trace their origins, was soon followed by the adoption of [[Christianity]] in 988-9 and the establishment of [[Old Church Slavonic]] as the liturgical and literary language. Borrowings and calques from Byzantine [[Greek language|Greek]] began to enter the vernacular at this time, and simultaneously the literary language began to be modified in its turn to become more nearly Eastern Slavic.
 
Dialectal differentiation accelerated after the breakup of Kievan Rus' in approximately 1100, and the Mongol conquest of the thirteenth century. After the disestablishment of the "Tartar yoke" in the late fourteenth century, both the political centre and the predominant dialect in European Russia came to be based in [[Moscow]]. There is some consensus that Russian and Ukrainian can be considered distinct languages from this period ''at the latest''. The official language remained a kind of Church Slavonic until the close of the seventeenth century, but, despite attempts at standardization, as by [[Meletius Smotrytsky]] c.&nbsp;1620, its purity was by then strongly compromised by an incipient secular literature.
 
The political reforms of [[Peter I of Russia|Peter the Great]] were accompanied by a reform of the alphabet, and achieved their goal of secularization and Westernization. Blocks of specialized vocabulary were adopted from the languages of Western Europe. By 1800, a significant portion of the gentry spoke [[French language|French]], less often [[German language|German]], on an everyday basis. The modern literary language is usually considered to date from the time of [[Aleksandr Pushkin]] in the first third of the nineteenth century.
 
<!--{{Listen|filename=Ru-Zimniy vecher.ogg|title=Winter Evening|description=Reading of excerpt of Pushkin's "Winter Evening" (Зимний вечер), 1825.|format=[[Ogg]]}}-->
 
The political upheavals of the early twentieth century and the wholesale changes of political ideology gave written Russian its modern appearance after the spelling reform of 1918. Political circumstances and Soviet accomplishments in military, scientific, and technological matters (especially cosmonautics), gave Russian a world-wide if occasionally grudging prestige, especially during the middle third of the twentieth century.
 
Since the collapse of 1990-91, fashion for ways and things Western, economic uncertainties and difficulties within the educational system have made for inevitable rapid change in the language. Russian today is a tongue in great flux.
 
==References==
<references />
 
The following serve as references for both this article and the related articles listed below that describe the Russian language:
 
===In English===
* {{cite book|title= Introduction to the Phonological History of the Slavic Languages|author=Carleton, T.R.|year=1991|publisher=Slavica Press|location= Columbus, Ohio |}}
* {{cite book|author=Comrie, B., G. Stone, M. Polinsky|title=The Russian Language in the Twentieth Century|edition=2nd ed.|location=Oxford|publisher=Clarendon Press|year=1996|}}
* {{cite book|author=Cubberley, P.|title=Russian: A Linguistic Introduction|edition=1st ed.|location=Cambridge|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=2002|}}
*{{cite book|title= The Sounds of the World's Languages|author= [[Peter Ladefoged|Ladefoged, Peter]] and [[Ian Maddieson|Maddieson, Ian]]|year=1996|publisher= Blackwell Publishers |}}
* {{cite book|author=Matthews, W.K.|title=Russian Historical Grammar|location=London|publisher=University of London, Athlone Press|year=1960}}
* {{cite book|author=Stender-Petersen, A.|title=Anthology of old Russian literature|location=New York|publisher=Columbia University Press|year=1954|}}
 
===In Russian===
* Востриков О.В., Финно-угорский субстрат в русском языке: Учебное пособие по спецкурсу.- Свердловск, 1990. – 99c. – В надзаг.: Уральский гос. ун-т им. А. М. Горького.
* Жуковская Л.П., отв. ред. Древнерусский литературный язык и его отношение к старославянскому. М., «Наука», 1987.
* Иванов В.В. Историческая грамматика русского языка. М., «Просвещение», 1990.
* Михельсон Т.Н. Рассказы русских летописей XV&ndash;XVII веков. М., 1978.?
* Новиков Л.А. Современный русский язык: для высшей школе.- Москва: Лань, 2003.
* Филин Ф. П., [http://www.philology.ru/linguistics2/filin-82.htm О словарном составе языка Великорусского народа]; Вопросы языкознания. - М., 1982, № 5. - С. 18-28
* Цыганенко Г.П. Этимологический словарь русского языка, Киев, 1970.
* Шанский Н.М., Иванов В.В., Шанская Т.В. Краткий этимологический словарь русского языка. М. 1961.
* Шицгал А., Русский гражданский шрифт, М., «Исскуство», 1958, 2-e изд. 1983.
 
==See also==
=== Language description ===
* [[Russian alphabet]]
* [[Russian grammar]]
* [[Russian orthography]]
* [[Russian phonology]]
* [[History of the Russian language]]
* [[List of Russian language topics]]
 
=== Related languages ===
* [[East Slavic languages]]
* [[Church Slavonic language]]
* [[Great Russian language]]
* [[Old Church Slavonic]]
* [[Old Russian language]]
 
===Other===
*[[List of English words of Russian origin]]
*[[Russian literature]]
*[[Russian humour]]
*[[Russian proverbs]]
*[[Reforms of Russian orthography]]
*[[Romanization of Russian]]
*[[Volapuk encoding]]
*[[Non-native pronunciations of English#Russian|Non-native pronunciations of English]]
*[[List of commonly confused homonyms#Russian|List of commonly confused homonyms in Russian]]
*[[List of common phrases in various languages]]
*[[Runglish]]
*[[Russian Swadesh list]]
 
==External links==
 
=== Dictionaries ===
* [http://www.russki-mat.net/ Multilingual Russian slang dictionaries]
* [http://www.russianlessons.net/dictionary/dictionary.php English to Russian Dictionary]
* [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/Russian-english/  Russian-English Dictionary] from [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org Webster's Dictionary]
* [http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/query.cgi?root=/usr/local/share/starling/morpho&morpho=1&basename=\usr\local\share\starling\morpho\vasmer\vasmer Vasmer's Etymological Dictionary of Russian language]
 
=== Sites in Russian ===
*  [http://speakrus.narod.ru/dict-mirror/ Free downloadable vocabularies of the Russian language]
*  [http://www.gramota.ru "Грамота"]. An educational/reference site on the Russian language.
 
=== Other Resources ===
* [http://www.latkey.com Free Russian transliteration for Microsoft Office and keyboard layouts ]
* [http://www.orlandorussians.com/ Russian Language Groups in America]
* [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=rus SIL Ethnologue Report for Russian]
* [http://dmoz.org/Science/Social_Sciences/Linguistics/Languages/Natural/Indo-European/Slavic/Russian/ ODP Russian Language category]
* [http://www.russiandatabase.supanet.com/ Site about different Russian language topics]
* [http://www.masterrussian.com/ Beginning to Advanced Russian]
* [http://www.russianuk.co.uk/index.php?option=static&page_id=1187&pname=Russian%20Societies/  Russian Societies and Russian books in the UK]

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Russian (in its own language: русский язык, russkiy yazyk ['ruskʲɪj jɪ'zɨk]) is the most widely-used language across Eurasia. It is one of the Slavic languages, written in the Cyrillic alphabet.

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