Thread: Здравствуйте!

Здравствуйте, руссофили и говорящие по-русски!

Меня зовут Лука, и я американец от Пенсильвании. Меня очень нравится говорить и учить по-русски!

I am very pleased to find a forum of fine folks like you! I was at first drawn to Russian for the rich sonority of the language — sounds upon sounds upon sounds overlapping yet distinct each one, full and powerful and expressive. I loved it immediatеly!

Last year, I intended to learn Russian. And my only chance to do that was to take summer classes before my final year in college. I had learned Latin, Italian, German, some Greek, Spanish, French, and others, and it felt like it was time for the richness of the русский язык. I also knew that Russian and Latin (up to this point my favorite language by far) shared a case system and other grammatically similar features, these features being some of my favorite of the Latin language.

For the first half of the summer, 2007, I went with my University's Geology Department (my major) out west to Wyoming and Idaho for Geology Field Camp. It was a truly great experience, but one I'll not expound upon here. This kept me from taking Russian 1 the first half of the summer, and I had already signed up for Russian 2 — I figured I could learn the first semester of Russian on my own, as I had for other languages, before the second summer session. I planned to do this during Geology Field Camp.

Well, surprise surprise, I didn't have much time to study Russian out there! So when I got back in the middle of the summer, I bought the textbooks, for both Russian 1 and 2, and had about four days to consume the textbook for Russian 1. Heh, I didn't sleep much. I prepared myself well enough before Russian 2, and although I did well in the class, I feel like I didn't have nearly enough time with the language — just a month and a half in the summer.

So now I've graduated, I'm teaching Latin and Spanish to middle schoolers, and in my free time I've elected to learn some more Russian.

I have quite a few interests in learning Russian. More than anything, I am attracted to the sound of the language itself. I have sought to immerse myself in Russian music, but I haven't found very much yet that meets my tastes (except for some of Валерий Меладзе). I'm especially interested in finding some Russian hard rock, or even heavy metal, as well as folk music; I also am deeply passionate about classical music and opera, and would greatly love to learn some bass-baritone arias in Russian. I'll probably start another thread about that later.

The way I learned Latin was the best experience I had in learning a language, even superior to the year I spent in Florence, Italy. The text I used (and use now with my own Latin students) is called LINGVA LATINA. This miraculous book is written every word по-латински — not a word of English, Spanish, Russian, you name it — just Latin.

Have a look at some of the sample pages:

The very first page is this map of the Roman Empire.
Then, almost anyone who reads the Roman alphabet can understand complete Latin sentences without the need for translation: page 2. It's like a children's book!

Rōma in Italiā est. Italia in Eurōpā est. And so on, with marginal notes and lots of illustrations, the reader learns Latin entirely in Latin, from the simplest sentences all the way through poetry.

Since having become fluent in the language courtesy of LINGVA LATINA, I have eagerly sought the chance to do the same with other languages — particularly with Russian.

Does such a textbook exsist for Russian? A reader that teaches mostly or entirely in the Russian language? Москва в России. Россия в Европе. Россия тоже в Азии. Россия в Европе и Азии. It would be a wonderful thing! I'd love to hear about any such possibilities from you folks.

Many thanks in advance! especially for reading this lengthy and verbose introduction! Пока и спасибо!

Wow! That is the greatest introduction ever written!
Nice to meet you here, Лука! And warm welcome to the forum (ha! I started to speak Latin).

LINGVA LATINA seems very interteining!

Hope you will find here lots of useful materials about Russian.
See you on boards.

Originally Posted by Лука

Здравствуйте, русофилы и носители русского языка!

Меня зовут Лука (Люк), и я американец из Пенсильвании. Мне очень нравится говорить и учить по-русски! ("учить по-русски" is wrong; you can say "говорить по-русски" and "учить русский")

Москва в России. Россия в Европе. Россия ещё и в Азии. Россия в Европе и Азии.

Welcome here. I had some Latin, too... But Italian is easier!

Hi and welcome! It’a a great story of yours. Many thanks for sharing it with us. Keep hanging around the forum, and you’ll learn much. As for books like "Lingua Latina", I can’t think of anything but буквари. These are the books little children begin reading first and learn basics.

Thanks for the welcome, Leof! Спасибо also to you, Rtyom; do you have any recommendations as far as буквари go?

Спасибо, Оля, за испавление! I greatly appreciate and welcome corrections from you and anyone else! It's the only way I'll learn.

Originally Posted by Лука

Спасибо, Оля, за исправления!

With my pleasure.

I greatly appreciate and welcome corrections from you and anyone else!

By the way, it's exactly what I all the time expect from English natives here. But it almost never happens...

Originally Posted by Оля

Здравствуйте, русофилы и носители русского языка!

"Говорящие по-русски" is perfectly ok too, and less formal than "носители русского языка".
Just one small correction:

по-латински

-> на латыни is much better
Latin is one of the few languages, that have their own name in Russian, not just an adjective from the country name:
Latin - латынь ("на латыни" is preferable to "по-латински", though the latter is also possible)
Hebrew - иврит (на иврите, not "по-ивритски" or "по-еврейски")
Yiddish - идиш (говрить на идише)
Swahili - суахили (на суахили)
etc.

I liked the idea of "LINGVA LATINA" very much, it reminds me somewhat of the French language course "French in action", where everything from the early beginning is in French and you gradually make your way through it due to the context. I like the sound of Latin, and the only thing that keeps me from studying it is that it's absolutely impractical (where would I use it?).

I've never seen anything like this for Russian learners, though. Буквари have another purpose - they teach kids (who are native speakers) to read, so there's no gradually increasing vocabulary or carefully chosen examples. Just short sentences and stories, that are fairly simple, but still are impossible to understand if you haven't been studying Russian before that (or at least if you haven't a dictionary).

Originally Posted by gRomoZeka

"Говорящие по-русски" is perfectly ok too

That's why I've marked it in green.

Just one small correction:
[quote:2y3kjrb2]по-латински

-> на латыни is much better[/quote:2y3kjrb2]
No, gRomoZeka, I do not agree. I had Latin with two different teachers, and they both used to say "по-латински" as well as "на латыни" (maybe even more often). "По-латински" is absolutely fine, not less preferable than "на латыни".

Originally Posted by Оля

By the way, it's exactly what I always expect from English natives here. But it almost never happens...

Originally Posted by Оля

No, gRomoZeka, I do not agree. I had Latin with two different teachers, and they both used to say "по-латински" as well as "на латыни" (maybe even more often).

You just like to argue, that's all.
I didn't say that "по-латински" is incorrect, it's a matter of preference indeed. In some contexts "по-латински" and "латинский" sound better (like in "учебник латинского языка"), but in others it has a silly ring to it (in my opinion ), like saying that Australians speak "по-австралийски".

Anyway... Luka, you've mentioned, that you teach Latin. Do you use LINGUA LATINA? If you do... Care to give us a couple of online lessons, or maybe an advice or two on how to approach that particular textbook? How are we supposed to know if we are going in the right direction, if there are no traslations and no answers? And what's about pronunciation?

Salve!!! Quid agis?? I've been taking Latin for 3 years now and I have to say I know it better than Russian.

[quote=Оля][quote="Лука":3o7lq6o0]Спасибо, Оля, за исп[color=red]р[/color]авлени[color=red]я[/color]![/quote]
[color=red]With pleasure.[/color]

[quote]I greatly appreciate and welcome corrections from you and anyone else![/quote]
By the way, [color=green]that's[/color] exactly what I [color=green]always[/color] expect from English natives here. But it almost never happens... [/quote:3o7lq6o0]

That's because Russian accents are so beautiful! Even in writing, they're excedingly charming. But I will be happy to return the favor, Оля.

Thank you, gRomoZeka, and also to you, Оля, for clarifying the usage of на латыни vs. по-латински. I also have used and still am using French in Action to perfect my French! It's a wonderful course. The Spanish course Destinos that's made just like French in Action is also very, very good. I use Destinos with my Spanish students.

Where would you use Latin? Why, speaking and writing with other people, of course! The online Latin community is filled with many hundreds of thousands of fluent speakers. Start with my own online radio show, [url=http://www.scorpiomartianus.com/]ScopioMartianus.com[/url]. For those learning Latin and Greek, there's [url=http://www.textkit.com]Textkit[/url]. Otherwise there's the Finland-based [url=http://www.yleradio1.fi/nuntii/]Nuntii Latini[/url], a weekly news radio programme all in Latin, with text and audio. Then we have the [url=http://chat.yle.fi/latini/index.php]Colloquia Latina forum[/url] based at that site.

And yes, I use LINGVA LATINA to teach, and I also learned Latin with it. You ask, how can one be sure if one is learning correctly? The text itself makes all grammatical forms, vocabulary, and syntax perfectly clear. Personally, I rewrote the entire book, typing it up, in order to master the syntax and to become fluent. When I was finished I wrote a letter in Latin to the author, thanking him for my new-found ability! And I've adapted the same method to my Spanish classes, with astonishingly positive results!

Otherwise, there is a supplementary book called LATINE DISCO ["I learn in Latin"], that explains each chapter's purpose in English. It emphasizes key points and is useful. However, it is far from necessary. I bought it in case I needed to make photocopies for my Latin students — I still haven't made any! heh.

For pronunciation — come to me! There is an audio CD that can be purchased with LINGVA LATINA — but the reader has a Danish accent in his Latin, which is less neutral and less Classical than the accent I prefer to train. You can always listen to my show or other sources (though Nuntii Latini has a strong Finnish accent in the Latin — not recommended! ). I personally trained my pronunciation with Viva Voce — some of the best recordings of Classical Latin poetry ever.

Salve, Fragulum! [Hello, little strawberry!] Me optime habeo, gratias! Quid agis tu? I highly recommend Textkit's forum, among the other links above, to enrich your Latin experience! As always, let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you, Luka!

[quote=Лука][quote="Оля":2k9t2opk][quote="Лука":2k9t2opk]Спасибо, Оля, за исп[color=red]р[/color]авлени[color=red]я[/color]![/quote]
[color=red]With pleasure.[/color]

[quote]I greatly appreciate and welcome corrections from you and anyone else![/quote]
By the way, [color=green]that's[/color] exactly what I [color=green]always[/color] expect from English natives here. But it almost never happens... [/quote:2k9t2opk]


Where would you use Latin? Why, speaking and writing with other people, of course! The online Latin community is filled with many hundreds of thousands of fluent speakers. Start with my own online radio show, [url=http://www.scorpiomartianus.com/]ScopioMartianus.com[/url]. For those learning Latin and Greek, there's [url=http://www.textkit.com]Textkit[/url]. Otherwise there's the Finland-based [url=http://www.yleradio1.fi/nuntii/]Nuntii Latini[/url], a weekly news radio programme all in Latin, with text and audio. Then we have the [url=http://chat.yle.fi/latini/index.php]Colloquia Latina forum[/url] based at that site.

And yes, I use LINGVA LATINA to teach, and I also learned Latin with it. You ask, how can one be sure if one is learning correctly? The text itself makes all grammatical forms, vocabulary, and syntax perfectly clear. Personally, I rewrote the entire book, typing it up, in order to master the syntax and to become fluent. When I was finished I wrote a letter in Latin to the author, thanking him for my new-found ability! And I've adapted the same method to my Spanish classes, with astonishingly positive results!

Otherwise, there is a supplementary book called LATINE DISCO ["I learn in Latin"], that explains each chapter's purpose in English. It emphasizes key points and is useful. However, it is far from necessary. I bought it in case I needed to make photocopies for my Latin students — I still haven't made any! heh.

For pronunciation — come to me! There is an audio CD that can be purchased with LINGVA LATINA — but the reader has a Danish accent in his Latin, which is less neutral and less Classical than the accent I prefer to train. You can always listen to my show or other sources (though Nuntii Latini has a strong Finnish accent in the Latin — not recommended! ). I personally trained my pronunciation with Viva Voce — some of the best recordings of Classical Latin poetry ever.

Salve, Fragulum! [Hello, little strawberry!] Me optime habeo, gratias! Quid agis tu? I highly recommend Textkit's forum, among the other links above, to enrich your Latin experience! As always, let me know if you have any questions.[/quote:2k9t2opk]

Laetissima sum! I reccomend using Cambridge Latin Course and following it up with the Cambridge Latin Anthology if you are teaching. I'm scared for next year when I start translating the Aenied. It's truly a scary endeavour...

Привет Лука, давай что-ли хоть с тобой пообщаемся. Я Виталя от Рыбинска.

Originally Posted by Vitalik100

Привет Лука, давай, что _ ли, хоть с тобой пообщаемся. Я Виталя из Рыбинска.

Виталик, зачем ты так пишешь ("от Рыбинска")? Не стоит забывать о том, что ты обращаешься к иностранцу, изучающему русский язык, и то, что ты пишешь, читают и другие иностранцы, занимающиеся тем же самым. Не надо сбивать их с толку, они могут не понять, что это шутка, они просто подумают, что если носитель так пишет, то это правильно. Я тоже не сразу поняла, что это такая шутка. В первый момент закралась мысль, что ты не из Рыбинска, и дуришь тут нам всем голову.

Я *** ОТ [a city name] is WRONG! We say "я ИЗ" in Russian!

The Prepositional Prankster strikes again!