Thread: Russian Verbal pauses/transition words

They're used a lot in English (and to a smaller extent in Swedish) and I'd imagine that they exist in Russian too. Are there words in Russian that correspond roughly to informal English words such as "like," "whatever," "nevermind," "sort of," etc.? It'd be hard for me to imagine making a sentence in English without saying "like" or "ummm..." or some other form of stop. Sometimes in English they obscure the meaning of a sentence so much that it's nearly impossible to comprehend!
BTW, if you're an English Nazi, please excuse me if "verbal pause" was the wrong term to use.

Originally Posted by nebomoreoblaka

It'd be hard for me to imagine making a sentence in English without saying "like" or "ummm..." or some other form of stop. Sometimes in English they obscure the meaning of a sentence so much that it's nearly impossible to comprehend!

so you, like uhh, wanna sound, uhh, like a valley girl in Russian?

Originally Posted by nebomoreoblaka

It'd be hard for me to imagine making a sentence in English without saying "like" or "ummm..." or some other form of stop.

Are you serious? Do you realize how stupid that sounds? Do you know that people have to work twice as hard to understand what you're saying when you throw in noise words? If you're going to pause, just pause.

Originally Posted by nebomoreoblaka

BTW, if you're an English Nazi, please excuse me if "verbal pause" was the wrong term to use.

I find great humor in the fact that the name for the term is the part you think "English Nazis" will get caught up on.

Firstly, the thing I said about English was sarcasm - secondly, I asked a simple and legitimate question that in no way warranted you calling me stupid. If you don't feel like answering a question (especially on an internet forum where there are thousands of topics from which you can choose), simply don't answer it and no one gets harmed - I'm sorry that you're having such an unpleasant day and for your sake I hope it improves.
Thanks.

edit:// Also - for the record - I didn't ask this question because I want to sound like a "valley girl" in Russian or anything of the sort. Don't you think that wanting to understanding a bit of colloquial language is a valid way to try to improve fluency?

It's o.k. to ask any questions on this board including those that sound stupid or very stupid.

P.s. I did not notice anything wrong or stupid with your question nebomoreobkara.

Originally Posted by nebomoreoblaka

Firstly, the thing I said about English was sarcasm - secondly, I asked a simple and legitimate question that in no way warranted you calling me stupid. If you don't feel like answering a question (especially on an internet forum where there are thousands of topics from which you can choose), simply don't answer it and no one gets harmed - I'm sorry that you're having such an unpleasant day and for your sake I hope it improves.
Thanks.

edit:// Also - for the record - I didn't ask this question because I want to sound like a "valley girl" in Russian or anything of the sort. Don't you think that wanting to understanding a bit of colloquial language is a valid way to try to improve fluency?

Wow, somebody's a little defensive today! I wasn't saying that asking that question makes you stupid. I was saying that people who talk like that sound stupid. And I stand by that opinion -- I'm not just having a bad day.

Seriously. How many people whose job it is to speak do you see talking like that? Do you ever see a news anchor say "um, like, this really important thing happened today, in this, like, other part of the world"? Do you ever hear a DJ on the radio saying "so the next, um, song we're going to, like, play on the, like, radio is by... um... Britney Spears"? No. And yet I can't watch a football game without seeing some thuggish running-back being interviewed after the game, and saying "well, you know, it was, like, i was running, know-what-i'm-saying, and then this guy, like, um, tackled me, know-what-i'm-saying, and then we had just done made the play that, um, the coach had designed, and..." and I'm already lost -- he's wasted two minutes talking and hasn't said a thing.

So... is that who you want to be? And in other languages, too?

Originally Posted by randem

Wow, somebody's a little defensive today! ...

Wow, somebody's a little too aggressive today and... off topic.

Originally Posted by nebomoreoblaka

They're used a lot in English (and to a smaller extent in Swedish) and I'd imagine that they exist in Russian too. Are there words in Russian that correspond roughly to informal English words such as "like," "whatever," "nevermind," "sort of," etc.? It'd be hard for me to imagine making a sentence in English without saying "like" or "ummm..." or some other form of stop. Sometimes in English they obscure the meaning of a sentence so much that it's nearly impossible to comprehend!
BTW, if you're an English Nazi, please excuse me if "verbal pause" was the wrong term to use.

Here are articles about so called "words - parasites" in Russian:
http://rus.1september.ru/2004/15/1.htm
http://virtual.cie.ru/mod/resource/view.php?id=37