Thread: Emphasis on a word, corresponding with English "does" or "did"

Originally Posted by cepo

For example:
"She doesn't speak English but she speaks Russian." vs.
"She doesn't speak English but she does speak Russian."

They have slightly different connotations in English, and I'm curious how that translates to Russian.

There are many ways. Most natural is to put the predicate to the end of the sentence.

"Она не говорит по-английски, но она говорит по-русски." vs.
"Она не говорит по-английски, но по-русски она говорит."

provides more or less the same change in connotation. Russian has more free word order than English, but the last word in the sentence is normally felt like emphasized.