Anna Fischer's Russian translation resources

Anna Fischer, an American translator, compiled a list of Russian language online resources, bilingual and Russian only. It includes specialised resources like slang, phraseology, new coinages and etymology and cultural references.

The list is published in The Russian Literary Translators Group on Facebook and is open to new additions.

It is also downloadable as standalone document (link here).

Thanks, Anna!

Ksenia Turkova and Alexei Mikheev. Russian language resources.

I'd like to recommend two resources on modern Russian language.

The first is the Russian linguist Alexei Mikheev's (Алексей Михеев) website "Словари XXI века. Клуб ценителей русского языка" (Dictionaries of the 21st Century, the Russian language appreciation club). The website aggregates news items, commentary and analysis on new trends, usage and cultural references in modern Russian.

Mikheev also runs an active Facebook group "Словарь года" (Dictionary of the Year) where he and other members pick new words, phrases and usages from current news. Discussions are lively, members post links and references. Both the site and the Facebook group are usually up to the point and free from hysterical shouting that infects many forums these days. Based on posts and discussions Mikheev compiles monthly and yearly 'dictionaries' of new words and usages in Russian. Great fun and very informative.

A current discussion focuses on "двушечка", literally 'a little two', or two-kopeck coin. President Putin used the word in relation to the two-year prison sentence for the three members of Pussy Riot, the feminist punk-rock group.

As with other FB groups you need to ask to be accepted as a member.

The second resource is a Moscow News ("Московские новости") regular column on language by Ksenia Turkova (Ксения Туркова). Like Mikheev, Turkova also focuses on new usages and phrases appearing in current news. Her analysis is apt and based on sound linguistic background.

Turkova's columns are widely read and have active commentary threads. Discussions there rarely deteriorate to abuse and threats.

The latest column looks at "двушечка" as an example of cognitive dissonance that has become one of Putin's hallmarks.  

Poiskslov.

Knigochei

I'd like to recommend to linguists and students of Russian a simple and fun resource 

poiskslov.com 

It does what is says – poisk slov – word search. It looks like it was originally developed for lovers of crossword puzzles and Scrabble. Yes, there is a Scrabble in Russian! Same grid, same rules, but the letters are Cyrillic. Pioskslov links to definitions from major Russian dictionaries.  

Where linguists, professional and amateurs, may find it useful is in its omitted letters function. Type * sign or ? question mark instead of a sequence of letters and get a selection of words with the same sequence.

Each word found links to definitions in major Russian dictionaries.

What prompted me to go to poiskslov was an interesting – as they always are – discussion on Languagehat about the word книгочей – lover of books, bookworm. 

Vasmer's etymological dicitonary lists it as of Turkic origin, while for most Russians today it sounds perfectly home-grown: kniga (book) plus chei, a variation on чтей - чтец - читатель (big reader). 

Vasmer's analysis is very convincing, especially considering the rarity of the -chei ending in Russian and the comparison with казначей - kaznachei, practically identical to Turkic kaznacy. 

But there is also an odd one out – ручей – stream, brook, creek.  The first thing that comes to mind is рука - ручки - рученьки. Аnd the word рукав - sleeve has an additional meaning of branch, tributary, channel. Compare French la Manche – sleeve and the Channel. But again, Vasmer gives a completely different etymological background...

Picture: 'The Bookworm', Carl Spitzweg, c.1850, o/c, 49.5 × 26.8 cm (19.5 × 10.6 in), Museum Georg Shäfer, from here.

Google, but Yandex too: a one-stop language resource

Link to Yandex Dictionary home page

Google has dominated the English part of the internet for such a long time now, that  Western linguists often overlook tools and resources provided by search engines locally.

In Russian, one excellent language tool is on the long established search engine Yandex.ru (Яндекс). Among the many google-type service categories there is one called Словари (dictionaries). The search window there spans around a hundred general and topical on-line dictionaries and encyclopedias.

Students of Russian and linguists would find particularly useful dictionaries of Russian stresses (a source of numerous wailings!), etymology and synonyms. A side panel on the dictionary page gives instant translation of the word you are looking for into five main European languages plus Ukrainian and Latin. And there is an automated translation option too.

Users of online dictionaries, I am told, sometimes test the completeness and modernity of a given dictionary by checking if it includes 'unprintable expletives'. I am a bit old-fashioned myself and never use them, except for linguistic purposes.  But since the 90-s they are allowed on the internet and often in print. So, I made a search on Yandex dictionaries for the three top Russian unprintables - х.. (the male c word), п....(the female c word) and е/ё....(the f word). None is included anywhere in the listed dictionaries! Luckily, for old hats like myself, the dictionary world is still dominated by 'prudes and prejudice'.

Another test of modernity is to check if anglo-barbarisms that sprung off the internet are there. With a sigh of relief I watched the search bringing 'no results' for the four social networking  words widely used by Russian users of LiveJournal (Лижет or ЖЖ,  as it is referred to by "юзеры"), the most popular blog platform in the country.

френд - friend. No results, with verb forms зафрендить, пофрендиться - to include in the list of friends, разфрендить, отфрендить - drop from the list of friends. It is interesting that the Russian word друг (drug as in Clockwork Orange) has managed to resist being adopted for internet usage, perhaps because of its stronger than in English connotation of closeness, or because of its (also strong) masculine gender assignment.

кат - cut (as in the cutout of a long internet text) only brought the archaic meaning of  палач (executioner)

скрин - screen (as in screening of comments etc., also already verbalised as расскринить - unscreen, заскринить - put behind screen) brought back only a regional listing from Dahl's (Даль) dictionary - South Russian/Ukrainian короб, ларец (box, small trunk).

бан - ban (as in blocking someone from seeing or following your blog) only provided a list of Chinese and other Asian historical figures.

It is possible, that some resources are not listed there. I could not find a frequency resource for example, nor a dictionary where words are grouped by their endings. But the convenience of having a one-stop shop for words and reference is very attractive.