A question for those Russian Experts at the University Level
I'm enrolling in grad school in the fall, and I'm going to take one (or both, possibly) of these courses below. The only problem is I'm not a language/linguistics major, and my sucky college Russian courses were just "beginner, intermediate, advanced" as opposed to breaking it down into specialized courses -- so I really don't know what the difference is with these. Can someone explain it a bit more clearly, and let me know what they think would be the more beneficial of the courses? They both sound hideously boring, but I could use the exposure and practice, I know. It sounds like grammar is more applicable to daily situations, and structure is more theoretically involved?
They are:
Advanced Russian Grammar
A comprehensive review of Russian grammar on an advanced level, emphasizing reading and writing skills.
and
THE STRUCTURE OF MODERN RUSSIAN
Synchronic analysis of Contemporary Standard Russian phonology, morphology, and morphophonemics.
Re: A question for those Russian Experts at the University L
Quote:
Originally Posted by Barmaley
It sounds like grammar is more applicable to daily situations, and structure is more theoretically involved? .
Exactly
Take the first one.
A couple of years ago I attended university courses on the subject that sounded just like your second option. I can still recollect these horrible, tedious lectures devoted to morphology, phonology, and other herology sort of things, when I was hopelessly trying to overcome sleepiness :?
I came to realise some curious facts about my native language that you guys have to study before using (like sometimes before declining a noun you should think whether it is animated or not) and also learnt an original system of transcribing words and something about the sounds but other more complicated facts eluded my brain.
What I mean is it's kind of metaphysics that can be really hard to catch even when you're a native speaker and know what it all must be about.
And grammar itself is so innofensive, so perfectly nice. I really enjoy it studying grammars of different languages.
Re: A question for those Russian Experts at the University L
Quote:
Originally Posted by Barmaley
I'm enrolling in grad school in the fall, and I'm going to take one (or both, possibly) of these courses below. The only problem is I'm not a language/linguistics major, and my sucky college Russian courses were just "beginner, intermediate, advanced" as opposed to breaking it down into specialized courses -- so I really don't know what the difference is with these. Can someone explain it a bit more clearly, and let me know what they think would be the more beneficial of the courses? They both sound hideously boring, but I could use the exposure and practice, I know. It sounds like grammar is more applicable to daily situations, and structure is more theoretically involved?
They are:
Advanced Russian Grammar
A comprehensive review of Russian grammar on an advanced level, emphasizing reading and writing skills.
and
THE STRUCTURE OF MODERN RUSSIAN
Synchronic analysis of Contemporary Standard Russian phonology, morphology, and morphophonemics.
For you, it goes without saying, it is better to take ARG thing. You're just a person who wants to get toughened in Russian. I don't now neither your language skills level nor your ability to follow the destiny's path of linguistics, and in accordance to this I would recommend you to start with the grammar. In future, it will be clear what is of interest to you, and who knows, maybe it is something like phonology or something else. Personally, I think morphology can be easier and more interesting for non-specialists.