10 steps to get a kick-ass Russian accent

Russia Beyond ^ | 01/08/2018 | Tommy O'Callaghan

[Telepathic Intruder]

You only call them chips when you eat them with fish. Duh. Again, learn to speak American people!

[Keyhopper]

Cartoon of moose and squirrel, just!

[Jamestown1630]

Those ‘chips’ are actually ‘pommes frites’.

(Learn to speak French, People!)

[Telepathic Intruder]

"Learn to speak French, People!"

French was likely invented by the French, am I right? I like their cologne and use of nuclear reactors, but their language sounds like there's something wrong with their mouth. Like a toothache maybe. Let's see, what else do I like about the French? They stood up to Hitler for about a week I think, and lost almost 100,000 ground troops. Damn. I like French fries too.

[Be Careful]

Firstly, there IS an “I” sound in the Russian language.

Secondly, there IS an “I” sound in the Russian language....as in “Eye”

For example...Ya Nye Zn-Eye-Yoo....ie: “ I don’t know”

OR! Eg Mik-EYE-al.....as in Mikhail Baryshnikov

[Jamestown1630]

Oh, Gosh.

Things I like about the French:

If you get out of the big cities, they are very nice, warm people.

They have a stunning sense of Style; and many great visual artists have come from France.

They know how to COOK! - (something dear to my heart.)

They’ve given us some great philosophers - not to mention literary artists.

And French is possibly the most complex of the Romance languages, and the hardest to truly master.

Bonne nuit!

[NorseViking]

The trick of Russian language is you don’t need grammar at all to be understood. Just learn the words and compile as you please and use intonation to compensate the lack of proper grammar. USSR was a Babylon with about a thousand native groups who had own language each. Most of them had their own ideas on how to speak Russian for communication with other groups based on the grammar of their languages and the rest learnt to live with it. There are no grammar Nazis in Russia.

[sockmonkey]

My friend in BiH always told me to speak Croatian with an American accent “because when you speak Croatian you sound like a demented Russian.”

I wonder if I spoke Russian in Russia, I would be told I sound like a demented Croatian.

[Squeako]

Cool Russian accent tips.

[Telepathic Intruder]

I’ll have to take your word for it. My favorite thing about France... Joan of Arc. I don’t know how to say that in French.

[Jamestown1630]

Jeanne d’Arc.

(Pronounced sort of like ‘zhawn dark’.)

[Telepathic Intruder]

Nice to know. I always admired her.

[hanamizu]

There are no grammar Nazis in Russia.

---

There were two Russian teachers at my university. One was an American and one was an actual Russian (rather rare in the mid-60s). My teacher, the American had the attitude that since he learned Russian perfectly, by God, we’d learn it perfectly too. The Russian teacher’s approach was “I know how hard it was for me to learn English, so I know it must be hard for you to learn Russian.” He’d actually help you on your final exam. My Russian teacher was a grammar Nazi.

[Telepathic Intruder]

Nice use of zh by the way. Very phonetic.

[Jamestown1630]

I’ve never been able to decide whether she was enlightened, or simply nutsy.

But I guess on a certain level, we’re all just here for our own subjective ‘ride’.

If we can do some wider good with it, maybe that’s a plus.

[Telepathic Intruder]

She was a saint. I’ve heard God’s voice. She has heard voices from other saints. Am I crazy? God will say.

[beethovenfan]

Boris Badinov!

[airplaneguy]

Except that French fries were invented in Belgium.

[Telepathic Intruder]

And potatoes in America.

[Georgia Girl 2]

Plus speak of yourself in third person. “Yuri like you bery much”