Thread: Does the sound of the letter "i", have a Russian e

Let's say I want a russian person (who doesn't know English) to duplicate the sounds of the words: "Bill Clinton" ... Is there a Russian alphabet letter which can duplicate the sounds of the "i" in "Bill" and "Clinton"???

It seems like there are 2 letters that are close: и and ы , but the и sounds like "EE", so this wouldn't be correct as it would sound like "Beel Cleenton" and ы doen't seem to translate exactly to the way the "i" sounds in English!?!

So, would you say there is NO WAY for a Russian person, to say "Bill Clinton", based on writing down Russian letters? Asked another way ... without me saying out loud "Bill Clinton", can I show a russian person a bunch of russian letters (i.e. a word), where I can expect a Russian to say "Bill CLinton" exactly the way American's say "Bill Clinton", or is it that there is no exact "i" equivalent in the Russian alphabet?

Thanks,
-Dave

In this case Russians usually use "и": Билл Клинтон

I may be wrong, but in listening to Russian, I find that more often than not, a и really only makes an ee sound if it's accented, otherwise it is closer to an english i.

That's because there's no equilavent sound.

Most of the Russian's I know in Britain still pronounce i as и, even though they've been here for years.

Originally Posted by rusdave

Let's say I want a russian person (who doesn't know English) to duplicate the sounds of the words: "Bill Clinton" ... Is there a Russian alphabet letter which can duplicate the sounds of the "i" in "Bill" and "Clinton"???

It seems like there are 2 letters that are close: и and ы , but the и sounds like "EE", so this wouldn't be correct as it would sound like "Beel Cleenton" and ы doen't seem to translate exactly to the way the "i" sounds in English!?!

So, would you say there is NO WAY for a Russian person, to say "Bill Clinton", based on writing down Russian letters? Asked another way ... without me saying out loud "Bill Clinton", can I show a russian person a bunch of russian letters (i.e. a word), where I can expect a Russian to say "Bill CLinton" exactly the way American's say "Bill Clinton", or is it that there is no exact "i" equivalent in the Russian alphabet?

Thanks,
-Dave

Tell me, can you spell out the Russian word "сильный" in English? You know, your 's' isn't quite the 'с' in сильный, your 'l' isn't really our 'л', and what are you going to do about the ending 'ый' ? Are you telling me there is NO WAY for an English speaking person to write down сильный based on the English letters? Asked another way... without me saying out loud "сильный", can I show an English speaking person a bunch of English letters (i.e. a word), where I can expect that English speaking person to say "сильный" exactly the way Russians say "сильный"?

Think I'll log off, if I stick around a bit longer, I'll go ballistic.

rusdave, do you know why people have accents in foreign languages?

Originally Posted by rusdave

Let's say I want a russian person (who doesn't know English) to duplicate the sounds of the words: "Bill Clinton" ... Is there a Russian alphabet letter which can duplicate the sounds of the "i" in "Bill" and "Clinton"???

It seems like there are 2 letters that are close: и and ы , but the и sounds like "EE", so this wouldn't be correct as it would sound like "Beel Cleenton" and ы doen't seem to translate exactly to the way the "i" sounds in English!?!

So, would you say there is NO WAY for a Russian person, to say "Bill Clinton", based on writing down Russian letters? Asked another way ... without me saying out loud "Bill Clinton", can I show a russian person a bunch of russian letters (i.e. a word), where I can expect a Russian to say "Bill CLinton" exactly the way American's say "Bill Clinton", or is it that there is no exact "i" equivalent in the Russian alphabet?

Thanks,
-Dave

My last name has an English short i sound (I am an American with a German last name {German's have the short i in certain letter combos [usually before 2+ consonants]}) and when translated into Russian, it merely uses и. Good Luck!
Joe

The i in Putin is represented by и in Russian. The i in Putin also makes the same sound as the i in Clinton or Bill.