Thread: Who's afraid of Russian Nouns...? [me!] Русские существительные........

Hanna - here's more of the "program" from earlier. Does this help?


If number ends in 1 (except for 11) then
___No change to the word
______Example: У меня есть один дом.
______Example: У меня есть один словарь.
______Example: У меня есть один музей.
______Example: У меня есть одна газета.
______Example: У меня есть одна неделя.
______Example: У меня есть одна тетрадь.
______Example: У меня есть одно окно.
______Example: У меня есть одно здание.
___Goto Done

If number ends in 2, 3 or 4 (except for 12, 13, 14) then
___If Noun is in Genitive Singular Masculine - noun ends -а (hard stem) or -я (soft stem –й –я -ь)
______Example: У меня есть два дома
______Example: У меня есть два словаря
___Goto Done

___If Noun is in Genitive Singular Feminine - noun ends -ы (hard stem -а) or -и (soft stem –я -ь)
______Example: У меня есть две газеты.
______Example: У меня есть две недели.
___Goto Done

___If Noun is in Genitive Singular Neuter - noun ends -а (hard stem -о) or -я (soft stem -е)
______Example: У меня есть два окна.
______Example: У меня есть два здания.
___Goto Done

If number ends in all other numbers
___If Noun is in Genitive Plural Masculine –If ends in "ж,ч,ш,щ,ь" then add "ей"
If ends in "й, ц" (stressed) add "ев"
All other masuline nouns end in "ов" ***
______Example: У меня есть пять домов.
______Example: У меня есть пять музеев .
______Example: У меня есть пять словарей .
___Goto Done

___If Noun is in Genitive Plural Feminine (good luck) – (if ends –аthen drop –a / If ends –я(consonant) then changes into -ь/ If ends -я(vowel) then changes into –й/ If ends -ьthen changes into –ей) - Note: If a feminine word ends in a double consonant it is quite common for a vowel (о, е) to be inserted for easy pronunciation. (марка - марок, англичанка - англичанок, девушка - девушек) ***
______Example: У меня есть пять газет.
______Example: У меня есть пять недель.
______Example: У меня есть пять историй.
______Example: У меня есть пять тетрадей.
___Goto Done

___If Noun is in Genitive Plural Neuter – (If ends in "о" then drop "о" (no ending)
If ends in "е" becomes "ей"
If ends in "ие" becomes "ий") ***
______Example: У меня есть пять окон.
______Example: У меня есть пять зданий.
___Goto Done

Done

***from Russian Grammar - Nouns: Genitive Case
MasterRussian explanation of Genitive case: Genitive Case of Russian Nouns




If this helps more details to come.


Scott

Scott, that was super helpful ! Thanks a lot.
It's still complicated to remember, but it's easier to understand it in that format!

[Can't find the smiley with the flower! ]

) actually it is simplier than it may appear. After you said a digit "один" at the end of number 1/21/101/1001 (один/двадцать один/сто один/тысяча один) you have to use singular Nom. But number 11 (одиннадцать) doesn't have "один" at the end. Like English eleven doesn't have "one" but "twenty one" and onwards have. The same thing with other numbers for example 2/22/102... (два/двадцать два/сто два) but "двенадцать" (analogically English "twelve") and so on. With "два"/"три"/"четыре" you should use Sing. Gen. If there is no word "один"/"два"/"три"/"четыре" at the end of a number you must use pl. genitive.

I will do some exercises for this, until I get it right.
You are probably wondering "how can she speak with people if she does not know this?"
Well, since I don't know it, I have to speak "pidgin" style with incorrect grammar.
But my "conversations" are quite simple most of the time.

I had been hoping that I'd be better at Russian for this trip but unfortunately the winter ended up being a super busy time for me and I did not have the time or energy to study.

My dream of speaking fluent Russian is VERY far away and I am not sure how realistic it actually is. There is not the same driving force of necessity that spurred me on with English. It won't destroy my career prospects or anything like that if I can't speak Russian... but I WANT to!

Originally Posted by Hanna

I will do some exercises for this, until I get it right.
You are probably wondering "how can she speak with people if she does not know this?"
Well, since I don't know it, I have to speak "pidgin" style with incorrect grammar.
But my "conversations" are quite simple most of the time.

I had been hoping that I'd be better at Russian for this trip but unfortunately the winter ended up being a super busy time for me and I did not have the time or energy to study.

My dream of speaking fluent Russian is VERY far away and I am not sure how realistic it actually is. There is not the same driving force of necessity that spurred me on with English. It won't destroy my career prospects or anything like that if I can't speak Russian... but I WANT to!

Hanna, I was really glad to hear you say all this.

I have the same problem with nouns and the declensions of cases.. I've been studying Russian three years, and everytime I think I've got cases understood, I stumble across an exception and feel I have to start out back at Square 1 to understand things right.

It reminds me of when I was 12 years old, trying to learn QBASIC through trial and error *(there was no "internet" to ask, hehe)* .....

Please don't let frustration bother you in this. And don't give up. We may learn best (and more comfortably) through rote memorization, through committing these patterns to memory. But when that fails (as it often has me), a different kind of learning can pick up in its place. ... Have you seen a movie called Memento? Its theme is amnesia and it mentions a lot about this second sort of learning - I think about it a lot when I consider my rocky road in learning Russian. =)

Scott and KidK, thanks both of you...
Yes... it's tough isn't it. Numbers apart, can you believe that the whole thing works differently depending on the gender of the word... !
I guess it's a matter of "slowly does it" and "every little helps".

But I don't know in which end to approach the kasus-es.

-It's impossible to simply memorize all of it.
-And it's so complicated that you couldn't (as an adult) learn it simply by listening or reading (or do you think it's possible?)
-And in addition to the very complicated rules, there are large numbers of exceptions.

It's very overwhelming...

For what it's worth I find the prepositional case to be the easiest. Maybe start there??? My teacher when I took Russian in college started the cases with the prepositional then added genitive (I find to be one of the harder cases) then added accusative but always adding more rules from the genitive case. I still don't have the cases down but every day it seems to be falling more into place.

Scott

Originally Posted by Hanna

Scott and KidK, thanks both of you...
Yes... it's tough isn't it. Numbers apart, can you believe that the whole thing works differently depending on the gender of the word... !
I guess it's a matter of "slowly does it" and "every little helps".

But I don't know in which end to approach the kasus-es.

-It's impossible to simply memorize all of it.
-And it's so complicated that you couldn't (as an adult) learn it simply by listening or reading (or do you think it's possible?)
-And in addition to the very complicated rules, there are large numbers of exceptions.

It's very overwhelming...

"Jazz chants," or rhythmic singing, are a time-tested method recommended by ESL teachers to help students learn and remember new material.

For example, I just made up these simple rhyming chants to help people learn the singular endings for "type 1 feminine" nouns (those that have -а/-я in the nominative singular), and also to help you remember the typical functions of each case:

"Nom-nom-nom!" said the девушка, as she ate up all the baklava!
Gay men generally flee from a девушки!
Commander Data gave the tray to the девушке!
I accuse you, wicked девушку!
The ol' cowboy with his девушкой played an instrumental version of "Ode to Joy!"
I heard a rumor today about the preppy девушке!

(Nominative: subject of "said" and "ate up")
(Genitive: shows movement away from)
(Dative: indirect object, giving X to Y)
(Accusative: direct object of the verb "to accuse")
(Instrumental: shows "with" or togetherness)
(Prepositional: when speaking "about" something.)

Of course, the genitive case has other functions besides "separation or movement away"! However, the point of this chant is to trigger your memory with an example of how to use the genitive, but not to explain every possible use of the genitive.

And needless to say, it doesn't have to be great poetry (or great jazz). Just find some rhymes that help you associate the sound of the case endings (such as -ой, fem. sing. instrumental) with the meaning/function of the cases ("the boy was with her").

I used statistics. Masc hard are most common, followed by hard feminine and i-declension. (neutrals are so like masc that no extra effort needed) And I made up ridiculous mnemonics. Example омstrойmюntal - instrumental. This puts the principle m, f, i-dec singular endings on my tongue ом, ой, ю for instrumental. Also one for dative, same concept. Dative => dуtеvи => у е и put russian vowel endings into english word. I made up a few others, but the nom acc and gen forms were no probs. Will post if anyone wants. From these the soft nouns are usually a spelling rule eg o => e. Most of nine out of ten basic noun declensions are easy to get this way, so that most of the singular forms come from simple one word mnemonics. The plurals are a different animal, and for those I put the whole column into a simple mnemonic. After simple noun ending memorization, I went to the combination adjective + noun endings and set them in mnemonics a different way. The points about animate and inanimate are easy to fit in. The soft nouns are usually easy to get by spelling rules. Then I fit in things like фотография. So I learned them by layers.

Originally Posted by Seraph

And I made up ridiculous mnemonics. Example омstrойmюntal - instrumental. This puts the principle m, f, i-dec singular endings on my tongue ом, ой, ю for instrumental.

Not just excellent, but sex-cellent!

P.S. And here's one that I used in college to help me remember the "special plurals" for the names of baby animals -- obviously spoofing the Gershwin song that goes "po-TAY-to, po-TAH-to, to-MAY-to, to-MAH-to..."

"Слонёнок, слонЯта!
Слонёнка, слонЯт!
Let's call the whole thing off!"

This shows the nom. sing., nom. pl., gen. sing., and gen. pl. for "baby elephant". There was really no point in continuing with the other cases, because by the time I had to learn the special forms for baby animals, I already knew the general declension paradigm for masculine animate nouns. So learning just the nominative and genitive in the singular and plural is really enough.

Another thing: The "jazz chants" can be much simpler than the examples I gave above.

К примеру, suppose you want to memorize the endings for singular masculine nouns.

Whether you love Lady Gaga, hate her, or really really hate her, I assume that most people have seen the video for "Bad Romance", in which she marches around in "armadillo shoes" (aka "lobster-claw shoes") and chants:

Walk, walk, fashion, baby,
Work it, move that bitch ca-razy!

Notice that "walk, walk, fa-shion, ba-by" has шесть слогов (six syllables). And, conveniently, there are six noun cases in modern Russian: nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, instrumental, prepositional.

So, we can take a Russian noun like волк (wolf) -- an example that I chose because it's masculine and animate, and also happens to sound rather similar to the English word "walk." The singular declension is:

волк (Nom)
волка (Gen)
волку (Dat)
волка (Acc)
волком (Inst)
волке (Prep)

And then we can imagine Lady Gaga in her armadillo shoes, with a wolf on a leash, singing:

"Walk, walk, fa-shion ba-by
Work it, move that bitch, cah-razy!
Волк! -а! -у! -а! -ОМ! -е!
Russian grammar makes me come, hey!
Волк! -а! -у! -а! -ОМ! -е!
Russian grammar makes me come, hey!
Волк! -а! -у! -а! -ОМ! -е!
I'm a free bitch, baby!"

Or, alternatively, you can imagine the волк catching Little Red Gaga Hood ("Красная Гагочка"?) and gobbling her up (because she can't run in those ridiculous shoes), and then she sings this from inside the wolf's tummy...

This example doesn't help you to remember how the different cases function in sentences -- but if you're already familiar with the difference between "dative" and "accusative," and assuming you've learned them in the order N-G-D-A-I-P, then the Lady Gaga example can help you remember the case endings in order for a noun like волк.

Originally Posted by Throbert McGee

волк (Nom)
волка (Gen)
волку (Dat)
волка (Acc)
волком (Inst)
волке (Prep)

When I was starting to learn the case declensions for singular nouns, I started out with this, what I call vertical method. And immediately found that it doesn't answer the question that is actually upper most in mind. What are the endings for the particular case I want right now? That is, a horizontal method needed, not vertical. In other words the starting point is, we know what case we want, so go right to the endings for that case. Thus the mnemonic for a single case, with order hard m, hard f, i. To get the soft nouns, just an easy spelling change. And neutrals are usually as for masc. Genitive => jаnыtиv, this way I get the ending instantly. Instrumental and dative in a previous post: омstrойmюntal - instrumental, dative => dуtеvи. likewise, ones for Accus, prepositional, easy. And the animate/inanimate point is straightforword.
The vertical method is simply a slower search method, since you have to call up a gender type, then trot through the cases till you get the one you want. It works perfectly, but is less rapid than horizontal method. This horizontal way is like a faster algo.

Originally Posted by Seraph

This horizontal way is like a faster algo.

I totally agree that your horizontal method is beautifully fast and efficient, Seraph. It would've worked perfectly for me when I was first studying Russian in college -- I had taken four years of Latin in high school, so I already had a very clear understanding of how noun declensional paradigms work. (Latin is very "gendered," like Russian, and even has four of the same cases as Russian: Nom, Gen, Dat, Acc.) Since I already knew what the "genitive case" means, and already knew that nouns can have different genders with different case endings, your example of "Genitive => jаnыtиv" immediately makes sense.

On the other hand, if I not studied Latin and therefore had come to Russian as a typical English speaker with no concept of noun inflection and gender categories, then "омstrойmюntal" might have seemed much too abstract for me.

In that case, I would've needed something less compact/efficient but with more detailed information, like my example above of The ol' cowboy with his девушкой played an instrumental version of "Ode to Joy" This rhyme doesn't give you any help for the masc. and i-dec endings, but if you're a beginning student, it does give you the name of the case (instrumental), an example of how the case is used ("with the girl"), and the case ending for a "hard feminine" noun ("-ой").

So, the point is that you can use different approaches to "mnemonic devices" as you progress in Russian -- you may find that in the beginning you benefit from the slow approach of chanting the rhymes, but later you may outgrow this method and find that the quick, efficient algorithm will be most helpful.

It is still easier than English articles or modal verbs.

To get the soft nouns, just an easy spelling change

The pronunciation also changes, not only spelling.

Originally Posted by Marcus

The pronunciation also changes, not only spelling.

Yes, of course. This is simply the first iteration for people who are at the first stage "I need the case endings" And so one can get the answer from the name of the case itself, by substituting the vowels. Pronunciation changes also occur with various examples, going from singular to plural. This approach is just to get the bare bones down rapidly.

And Throbert, I agree completely, different approaches are very useful and it's good to look at them all. This topic of mnemonics is large, and it is useful to look at all the approaches, to see the special useful characteristics of them all.

Thanks for the tip about the "musical" appoach!
I am not very musical but I think I'll have to try every possible approach to see which one works.

Could it be as simple as just ploughing throw book after book of exercises until it just goes in by itself?
Luckily I have no exam or particular time pressure, but on the other hand it's taken a lot longer to get to a basic beginner level than I had ever imagined... And I'd like to be able to have a proper conversation in Russian this side of the millenium...

Originally Posted by Hanna

Thanks for the tip about the "musical" appoach!
I am not very musical but I think I'll have to try every possible approach to see which one works.

Could it be as simple as just ploughing throw book after book of exercises until it just goes in by itself?
Luckily I have no exam or particular time pressure, but on the other hand it's taken a lot longer to get to a basic beginner level than I had ever imagined... And I'd like to be able to have a proper conversation in Russian this side of the millenium...

Hanna, let me give you a bit of advice.
I don't think that trying to learn the grammar book by heart will do you any good. Well, not much anyway. Learning takes time, no doubt, but learning the formalized rules will make your mind carefully and thoroughly analyze everything you hear or see then it would look through your 'grammar database' in your memory, and then it would try to put all of that together at the same time being afraid that you might have forgotten something. Being afraid is a part of any failure in any task, by the way. Trying to do this consciously is very tedious and you'll yawn all the way to the point you'd abandon the whole thing.
Instead, let your mind learn the way it likes more - like accumulation of experience. I mean reading. Just master some basic vocabulary (some 500-1000 words) then take any book and Russian and start reading. Don't even bother to look for the unfamiliar words in a dictionary if the general sense is clear to you. Use the dictionary only if you don't understand completely what the sentence is about. After seeing that particular unfamiliar words in, say, 100 or 200 different contexts you'll know its meaning intuitively and that's when you need to look it up in a dictionary.
It would also be nice to get some audio-books (with printed originals) and read as well as you listen to it. I repeat - the key is to expose yourself to hundreds of different combinations of the same words. I know I learned English this way. I sometimes use words in English I learned intuitively without knowing the exact Russian meaning of it, because I never looked it up in a dictionary. As long the meaning of the phrase is clear to you - don't bother with some words - their meaning will come to you later.

I'm not saying that grammar rules are unnecessary I only say that if you have encountered a few hundreds of examples (your eyes would remember them at least) in a text, some of the grammar rules will be obvious to you.
Try it. Perhaps you'll find learning a bit more entertaining and efficient.

Who's afraid of Russian Nouns...? [me!]

You see, Hanna, cases of English pronouns are not very simple either. If you had given the full answer to this question, you would have said: "I'm afraid of Russian nouns", and short answer is "Me", so a subject form was replaced by an object one without any reason.

or do you think it's possible?

It is possible, of course. If you hear one hundred times "два рубля", but "пять рублей", it will become natural for you. But first you need to study the rule. Then you will (and you do it now) hear the confirmation of this rule every day.
I can give you one more exaple from English.
I can give it to you.
In the two sentences above the presense of the preposition "to" depends on whether the direct object is a noun or a pronoun, the word order changes too. ("I can give you it" is ungrammatical). In Russian in both cases "мне" will be used with many possible word orders.
Can it be mastered by listening and reading? Was it overwhelming for you?