Thread: Seeking help with two reflexive verbs.

We are just beginning a new section about Возвратные глаголы in my Russian course, and I came across two different verbs and I do not understand the difference between them:

Постригаться and Стричься

Any help would be greatly appreciated, thanks.

There are three similar verbs: постригаться, стричься and подстригаться.

Стричься and подстригаться are basically interchangable. They mean to cut or to trim your hair, to have a haircut (there's also an expression "делать стрижку").

Постригаться means to take monastic vows or the veil (afaik, this ritual includes cutting some hair, hence the name).

Some confusion can stem from the fact that:
а) стричься and постригаться have the same perfective form "постричься", though the actual meaning is usually clear from the context.
b) стричься (imperfective) can be sometimes used instead of "постригатьcя" in an expression "cтричься в монахи", which is likely a mistake.

In other words, if you talk about cutting someone's hair for secular reasons (fashion, convenience, etc.), you should use pairs (impref./perf.) стричься/постричься and/or подстригаться/подстричься.

If you talk about a religious ritual of becoming a monk/nun it's "постригаться/постричься в монахи/монашки (монахини)"