Is it a bad idea to learn Russian because of everything?
from blackwitch@lemmings.world to nostupidquestions@lemmy.world on 15 Dec 00:59
https://lemmings.world/post/38360002
from blackwitch@lemmings.world to nostupidquestions@lemmy.world on 15 Dec 00:59
https://lemmings.world/post/38360002
This is a genuine question. I’ve always had an interest in learning languages and I have a list I want to learn. I am already somewhat decent in Spanish, so I’m picking up that, practicing my Portuguese, going to learn French and Italian, maybe German, learning Polish, and possibly Russian.
I already canceled the idea of living in Russia due to obvious reasons, but will I have any need to learn the language? Will it be useful? Will that be offensive? Many people HATE Russia and the language.
#nostupidquestions
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Learn Ukrainian first maybe, and then learn Russian? It may be easier to learn if you already know Ukrainian, too.
Of course, if you already know Ukrainian, why not learn Russian too?
Of course not. If we blamed the language for the bad actions of the people who spoke it during, there would be virtually no language left in a pristine enough condition to learn.
That being said, tempers can boil over. So maybe don’t shout your Duolingo answers at a full Starbucks. I mean, that’s good advice regardless of the language but you know what I mean.
I’m of the general opinion that learning new things is never a bad idea, but let’s break down your sub question regarding usefulness.
At the very least a basic understanding is certainly useful. I make a point to at least learn alphabets and their sounds so I have a fighting chance putting what I hear into a translation engine. Similarly, Russian isn’t the only language that uses Cyrillic.
Paet that though? In my lifetime it was first unthinkable that I could ever visit Russia, then became possible and even a tourist destination (see: Trans-Siberian rail), and back to basically unthinkable to me.
It’ll most likely swing again.
There’s never really any downsides to learning another language, provided you have the commitment and resources.
IMO it depends on if you are interested in the language or culture, or if you plan to be in contact with Russia or Russians. For example, do you plan to translate Russian? Do you plan to read Russian-language literature?
Bigots deserve to be offended.
Not your problem if people are prejudiced against Russians for the actions of the government that lords over them. If you want to learn the language, go for it.
I just plan to be a writer or teach English :)
Learning Russian could be useful in certain geographical areas near Russia, in the military, or translator position. It’s also possible that when hostilities end (or escalate) more position openings could occur. But to learn for personal life the use will be limited.
I don’t personally see how learning a language could be offensive, it’s knowledge not a lifestyle or way of supporting current hostilities. The hate people have is mainly towards the Russian government and policies, anyone who extends that to a language likely also have a lot of other issues they lump together and are being small minded.
The only person who can determine the need to learn the language is yourself. I doubt the world will be overrun by Russian speaking soldiers any time soon, Mandarin is more likely in that kind of a situation.
Yup!
I think you’re Russian to conclusions.
Your puns are Putin this community to shame
You guys need to Finnish with these puns.
No way! I’m Hungary for more puns!
You need to Polish your joke a little
Next guy to add a pun joke to this chain…Europe!
Norway we’re gonna stop!
I’ll chime in to add that Russian grammar is fairly complex! As long as you’re willing to spend the time on it, I don’t personally see any downsides. As others have pointed out, Russian can help with other Slavic languages, and can also be useful for other countries in that area.
Learn Mandarin, Spanish, and maybe Hindi, if you’re planning for the future.
If you’re OK with being a slav sympathizer go for it. Hopefully it will eventually be a dead language.
Is Polish ok then?
ok for what? talking to poles who don’t speak english? definitely. talking to anyone else? no.
What the fuck is “slav sympathizer” supposed to mean?
A casual reminder that Slavs are a diverse group of people not united by the same ideas and political agenda.
If your worry is association with Russia specifically, several Slavic countries are actively anti-Russia and are parts of NATO.
Ukraine is Slavic, too.
OK Adolph…?
I learned Russian when I was in school - after having family who left during the pograms. Learning the Russian language, or any language, should not be about politics. You don't learn the language to embrace government policies, you do it in order to better understand the artists and the art they created. I don't have my Russian keyboard, so you'll forgive me - but there are works which work best when untranslated and understanding some context. "We" by Zamyatin, "Master & Margarita" by Bulgakov, a bunch of Tolstoy's works, "Diary of a Madman" by Gogol, "Roadside Picnic" by the Strugatsky brothers, and movies like Solaris and Stalker. Not to mention the poetry.
Learn the language for the art. If it does make you political at all, it'll make you even more opposed to the Chekist in charge.
I mean, actual Russians are native Russian speakers and majority sees through Chekist bullshit, so this checks out!
I’m going OG and learning Latin.
I'm Canadian so I wouldn't know firsthand, but is there any remaining bad blood in Europe about the Romans conquering so much of it? Might want to be careful busting out the Latin in some neighbourhoods, just in case someone's great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather got killed by Roman soldiers or sold into slavery or something and they're still sore about that.
Well, we have People’s Front of Judea.
Well, the Celts got distracted by the influx of Germanic tribes and as such had more immediate things to worry about and hate than the Romans, but I figure if the Franks, Saxons, Vikings, et. al. decided to stay home, the modern Britons would still grumble about the Romans occasionally.
I mean, the Germanic invasions started over a millennium ago and dislike of that's still on a low boil, so I figure two millennia isn't out of the question.
On the other hand, the Romans did go home. The Saxons, not so much.
I believe learning languages is generally a net good. But to answer your question, it would help to know: why do you want to learn Russian?
If you just find the idea of the language interesting, then yes! Start leaning it. If you have motivation, that will help.
Is there specific media you’re looking to consume in its original language, Russian? Then yes, absolutely :).
Are you just trying to learn “any Slavic language”, to extend the language families you have knowledge of? You already have some Polish, so what is it about Russian that attracts you? Is there another language that might have more resonance or utility for you?
As far as I am aware, mostly sue to Soviet influence, Russian is probably the most-widely-understood Slavic language, so this does offer some advantages. I have spoken with Ukranians and Georgians who now don’t like speaking Russian, for obvious reasons, though I don’t know how widespread this feeling really is. And at least here in Germany, I feel like Croatian, Czech, or Slovakian would be a more useful day-to-day or holiday language, but itball depends on your goals.
And, as a dentist once told me in regards to dental floss, but it applies here too: The best language to learn is the one that you will actually learn. If there’s a language you’ll actually stick with, that’s good.
The only use I could see for learning the language is if you use a lot of Russian torrent sites, and are too lazy to switch the language back to English when installing games from them.
People should be able to understand what is going on there, so I say go for it.
This would also open the door to other Slavic languages, many not even written in cyrillic.
Shout out to Interslavic! This is a language that is comprised of common words and roots from all Slavic languages, all united under consistent rules.
Learning it will enable you to understand all Slavs to a good degree, and they will in turn understand you very well.
Knowing 2 Slavic languages (3 if we count basic Czech), I can confirm it works.
Russian culture spans way beyond whatever Putin’s currently doing, and has given the world an immense cultural, scientific, historic heritage.
Trying to cancel and destroy Russian culture is akin to destroying German culture and heritage just because one German dude with a weird moustache decided to start Holocaust.
Would be a tragedy to lose either.
As a German, “German culture” is really not worth preserving.
German culture and heritage was destroyed by the world wars. What remains is not what was there pre-WWII.
And I’m not cancelling or destroying anything. I’m just prioritizing cultures worth preserving over those that have been poisoned by a century of dictatorship, misinformation, and hate.
Name me one major culture that was not poisoned by dictatorship, misinformation, and hate.
They all are. Our duty is to take the best of each.
I don’t have to, I just have to name one better than Russian. Learn Ukrainian, Polish, German, French Finnish, Hungarian, Czech, Slovakian, Romanian, etc then consider Russian.
About half of these countries were militaristic authoritarianist shitholes, some even not that long ago by historical measures. All of them had some shameful moments in history.
Yet, all these cultures have proliferated, and you consider them worthy of studying. Same idea here. Give it time.
It’s not the same idea, as I didn’t advocated s studying them when they were authoritarian shitholes who were actively slaughtering their neighbours.
You were telling about cultures worth preserving - and by your definition, most of the cultures you list were not worth preserving and should have become extinct. Good thing that they were preserved even through the worst of times.
Fair enough, I am just being overly angry and hateful.
I mean, I get it.
I used to hate Mandarin a lot because of my government, kinda hated Cantonese too because of my parents and their conservative culture
But I realized they don’t own the language, fuck governments, language is a weapon, and I can wield it to advance my goals.
Make anti-government content using the very language they use as an official language, wield the language as a sword. Use it to attack the corrupt governments.
Learning the language is not a political statement, and you’ll outlive Putin. Besides we’re not solving anything by refusing to communicate with each other. If you want to learn Russian, learn Russian. Just be careful not to fall for the propaganda.
I think the main thing holding me back in my attempts to learn languages is not having anyone to talk to. I’ve tried to learn Spanish, Mandarin, German, French, and Japanese. Never got that far in any of them, but I did best with Spanish and French. The former when I worked with Mexicans who don’t speak much English, and the latter when I vacationed in France and didn’t want to seem like one of those Americans, and studied like crazy ahead of time.
I can’t think of many Russians I’d want to talk to. Maybe if I was in contact with dissidents I’d be able to put in the effort.
30 years ago we had a saying that optimists start to learn Russian now. Pessimists Chinese.
(Sub text for the ones who need explanation: because it’s going to be the language of the next world rulers)
Learning Russian would be handy for when you meet them on counter strike and they start raging at you, but otherwise probably not.
The only solid worst-case reason is to learn “please dont kill me ive got a family” and thats not actually going to get you anywhere so whatever.
As a Russian myself, it depends.
Do you want to explore classic Russian literature without translation losses? Explore the cultural ties of Russians and how language and culture affects history and politics? Figure out what Russian politicians are saying? Hang out with Russians somewhere? Are a proud pirate looking for Russian resources? Finally figure out how to write the word “лишишься” in cursive?
If at least one answer is “yes”, go ahead! It’s not easy, but quite rewarding. If you just want to dip your toes a little, however, and feel like you grasp something, there are better options.
Writing in cursive is easy, just write a bunch of “u” next to each other and you’re bound to write one of the characters that look like bunch of “u”.
True lol
But figuring out just how much “u” you need to write, or how many are there, is a bit tedious without the language experience.
True, but there’s a high chance you’ll accidentally write something that’s correct than in latin script. When I was learning Russian in high school I spent more time than I should trying to come up with a word that has the most “u” shapes. Sadly I don’t remember what I settled on, but it was quite a bit long.
The classic ones are “шиншилла” and “лишишься”, although the latter could be extended to “лишившийся”. 11 of the same strokes for the latter, if my calcultations are correct.
It is never a bad idea to know the language of your enemy.
Which reminds me: I heard of a story about a Chinese American helping South Korea’s side during the Korean war and like yelling “别开枪，自己人” (“don’t shoot, friendly”) in Mandarin and confusing the PLA, it was such an intriguing story.
Of course, if you look up that story in Baidu search, dude’s branded as a race traitor.
It’s never a bad idea to learn another language.
It’s never a bad idea to learn. period…full stop.
The act of learning anything wires our brains in a thousand different ways; increases our critical thinking skills. Increases our verbosity and our ability to communicate our own ideas more effectively. It increases problem solving skills, etc…
The very act of learning is something that should be practiced every day with something, whether that’s a new language, or a hobby, or being a history buff…it doesn’t matter. What matters is the learning itself.
So if Russian is what is giving you that interest right now, do it. At the very least, chicks dig polyglots.
Hey, I’m trying to be more proficient in my Russian.
I think that the more letters a language has, the more words it has, and the more ways you have of getting you message across. The Russian language has so much depth to it due to the many ways of saying the same thing. This can be heard through Russian music or read through Russian literature. The more words a language has, the better you can describe what you are feeling. Maybe there is a better language for translating the complexity of our minds into primal/basic words that we have created.
Now, I might me a bit further in my learning that you are, but if anyone is interested
I have just started a Russian Learning Community that I hope to grow in the coming months.
Beginners, intermediate or advanced / fluent speakers of the Russian language
All are welcome! Не стесняйтесь ребята!
Feel free to join and create discussions and posts.
Share insights, resources and lessons
Participate in comments
Spark conversations by adding questions at the end of your post
We have a rule of trying not to use translators, only dictionaries and being fine with posting a post that is grammatically incorrect and having others point out your current flaws and room for improvement.
It can be found at: RushB@lemmy.zip (pun intended)
Найти нашу группу можно по етой ссылке: RushB@lemmy.zip
or here lemmy.zip/c/RushB
When joining, please introduce yourself in the welcoming post
EVERYONE IS WELCOME!
Приглашаю Всех!
It is currently very dry, so consider yourself an OG and use that title when it gets more popular.
Ime people hate russia, not it’s people or the language
I play online games for almost 30 years on european servers, and the amount of russians i met that i would call not assholes are staggeringly low. So i would say they have a people problem. And all the events now going on seem to support that theory.
I wouldn’t call people playing competetive online games a good representational cross section tbh
A lot of people do hate Russians, especially if you ask their neighbors.
<img alt="" src="https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/6b13d20b-e12a-4647-88d4-f62b156b5722.jpeg">
Sorry, am of lazy. Prefer shootings Ruski over learning his gibberish.
While it’s true a language is tightly linked to the culture of its speakers by definition, a language’s speakers aren’t just their leaders. Russian represents centuries of cultural wealth, not just the misadventures of the last hundred or so years. It’s not the language’s fault that Putin invaded Ukraine. If you love learning languages for their own sake, do it. I made the same choice when attempting to learn Mandarin during the Hong Kong protests.
Learning Mandarin is very useful to say:
Guāngfú Xiānggâng, Shídaì Gémìng (Free Hongkong, Revolution of our times!)
xD
Attempted is the key word. The characters eventually got too detailed for me to distinguish. As I mentioned in another thread I tried finding braille resources for L2 learners but there don’t seem to be any. Ironically if everything was in Pinyin I could probably do it, but moving to a new writing system when you already have one that you’ve used for millennia is a nearly impossible ask. Plenty of people have tried with English.
I agree with the person who said it’s not a bad idea to learn the language of your enemy. And Russian culture is fascinating and worthy of study, even if the country is currently being run by a fascist dictator bent on world domination, at the expense and destruction of his own people. But then, that has been a trend in Russian history.
If this bothers you enough to ask about it, have you considered learning Ukrainian instead? You’ll get many of the benefits of learning Russian, and my understanding is that the two languages are mutually intelligible with some difficulty despite the differences.
Find a culture you like and language you think is interesting and learn. No need to make it a chore, turn it into something positive and maybe go visit. You can find someone to talk to in their native language and even better someone who wants to learn yours!
Lots of Ukrainian refugees are native Russian speaker. I wouldn’t overthink things if I were you