1:06

Alphabet and Pronunciation - Vowels and Consonants

Time to finally learn the Russian alphabet! However, this is not just any old alphabet video - the letters here are not in order but paired up by similarity. For example, notice how Я is just an А with an Y sound added at the front, and П is just a voiceless Б! But what's an alphabet without a few oddities? For example, the letters Ь and Ъ are neither consonants nor vowels but instead modify the pronunciation of other letters.

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0:37

Alphabet and Pronunciation - Letters in Combination 1

If you've learned the Russian alphabet, now it's time to find out what happens to letters when they combine into words! The first thing you need to remember is that in Russian we use far less articulation than we would in English - think of it as "the rule of least effort." For example, unstressed О turns into А, and unstressed Е turns into И. See if you can hear the difference in the pairs of words presented in this audio! You will also find examples of words beginning with the letters Е, Ё, Ю and Я, which are pronounced with a Y sound at the front (think of "yes" or "yoke").

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0:32

Alphabet and Pronunciation - Letters in Combination 2

Russian letters are not always what they pretend to be! In this audio, each pair of words features a voiced consonant: Б, В, Г, Д, Ж, and З. However, in the second word of each pair, you will actually hear П, Ф, К, Т, Ш, and С respectively! This is because consonants in Russian lose their "voiced" component whenever they occur at the end of a word or before a voiceless consonant. Why, you ask? It's simply easier to pronounce П than Б, and Russian pronunciation is all about reducing effort. In fact, once you get the hang of it, you might notice that you barely need to open your mouth when speaking Russian!

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0:42

Alphabet and Pronunciation - Letters in Combination 3

As you might have noticed, in Russian we distinguish between "hard" and "soft" consonants. Most consonants, the way they appear in the alphabet, are "hard" by default. When any such consonant is followed by Я, Е, Ё, Ю, И, or by the "soft sign" Ь, it becomes "soft" (palatalized). This means that we pronounce the consonant as if we were going to add the sound Y (as in "yes") after. The word pairs in this audio demonstrate this difference - take a listen!

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0:45

Pronouns - People

Time to start speaking in full sentences! Luckily, in Russian, basic sentence structure is much simpler than in English. For one thing, you rarely need the verb "to be" when talking about the present. That means that in order to say something like "I am a person", you don't need to rack your brain looking for the right form of быть. In fact, you only need to know two words - "I" and "person" - seeing as Russian doesn't have any articles either!

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0:50

Pronouns - Polite Use of Pronouns and Names

In Russian, there's a special way to politely address someone you don't know well. First of all, you will want to use Вы (the plural "you") instead of ты (the singular "you"). Then, instead of using an address form like "Mr." and the person's surname, you need to combine their first name and their отчество (patronymic). Patronymic is a kind of a middle name that is based on the first name of the person's father. Just like the surname, it has the grammar of an adjective, and therefore needs to be adjusted depending on the person's gender. In this audio, you will hear two of the most common patronymics you'll encounter in their masculine and feminine versions.

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0:45

Pronouns - Familiar Use of Pronouns and Names

Russian first names are fairly standard, and almost all of them have typical nickname versions - think "Jimmy" for "James" or "Trish" for "Patricia". The difference from English is that it's fairly unheard of to have the nickname version as your official first name. But it's the nickname that you will want to use most often with people you address as ты (the singular "you"). In fact, it can sound outright weird if you call your good buddy Владимир instead of Вова - even if he's Владимир in all his documents. On the other hand, the full first name can be used alone in a pinch when you have to address someone as Вы (the plural "you") but don't happen to know their patronymic. This audio features examples of the singular and plural "you" being used, as well some of the most common names and their nickname versions.

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1:27

Pronouns - Objects

All Russian nouns have a gender, which can be masculine, feminine, or neuter. Even nouns referring to inanimate objects can often be masculine or feminine, which means that you have to use the pronouns "he" and "she" to refer to them, instead of "it." Luckily, you can usually tell the word's gender just by looking at it: feminine nouns end in -а or -я, neuter nouns end in -о or -е, and masculine nouns end in a consonant. Of course there are special cases and exceptions that you'll need to remember, but you don't need to worry about them right now! Check out this audio for examples of objects being referred to by their correct pronoun in a simple question: "Where is it?"

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1:28

Pronouns - Animals

What might take some getting used to is that in Russian you have to refer to animals as "he" and "she" - not "it." For animals that we humans deal a lot with, like cats and dogs, Russian has even come up with different words for male and female. Those are featured in the first half of this audio. Most other animals have a "default" gender - for example a зебра (zebra) is feminine and will be referred to as "she," while a тигр (tiger) is masculine and will be referred to as "he." (There are ways of working around this if you have to talk about a male zebra or a female tiger, but you don't need them right now!) Like with all Russian nouns, you can usually guess the gender just by looking at the word's ending.

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1:13

Pronouns - Demonstrative Pronouns

Even though Russian has words for both "this" and "that," "this" gets used much more often. "That" only comes up when you are talking about something really remote (in space or time). These demonstrative pronouns always have the same gender and number as the object they describe (the number part should be familiar to you from the English contrast between "this" and "these").

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1:12

Pronouns - Possessive Pronouns (First Person)

Time to learn how to lay claim to things that are yours! Russian possessive pronouns are relatively straightforward. They behave like adjectives, which means they need to have the same gender and number as the object they describe. This leads to quite a number of forms to get through, which is why this video only covers the first-person ones!

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1:04

Pronouns - Possessive Pronouns (Second Person)

The second-person possessives are very similar to their first-person counterparts - just replace the sounds at the beginning! Note: if you address someone as Вы, don't forget to use the corresponding pronoun in the possessive as well!

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1:10

Pronouns - Possessive Pronouns (Third Person)

Third-person possessive pronouns (his, her, their) are an exception: they only have one form, regardless of gender or number. Finally something that's easy to remember!

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0:46

Numbers 1-10

In terms of grammar, Russian numbers function exactly like the English ones: numbers one through nineteen have their own special names, while everything above that is essentially about combining words like "twenty" and "two" to get a double digit number. In this video, learn the first 10 building blocks that you will need to be able to count in Russian!

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0:29

Numbers 11-19

The numbers 11 through 19 can seem like a mouthful - this is because each of them used to be three separate words! However, in day-to-day life, most Russian speakers don't carefully pronounce all four syllables of, say, четырнадцать - it's a mouthful for them too! What's more, the д before ц is not pronounced even in the most formal of settings.

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0:42

Numbers 20-100

Like the previous batch, almost all numbers featured in this video used to be several separate words. While they are slightly less of a mouthful than the teens, they too are often shortened in casual speech - because, let's face it, who has time for all those consonants?

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1:24

Numbers - Time

In Russian, you can use both the 12-hour clock and the 24-hour one - people will understand you either way! And if you want to specify the time of day, you just need to add the word for morning/afternoon/evening/night in the genitive case!

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0:51

Numbers - Dates, Days

To name a date in Russian, you need an ordinal number (such as "second" or "tenth") and the name of the month. This video focuses on the first part: the ordinals. The easy bit is that the ordinal number in a Russian date will always be neuter, so you never have to worry about remembering the right gender!

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0:53

Numbers - Dates, Months

The names of the months in this video are not in their dictionary forms - instead, they are all in the Genitive case. Why, you ask? It's because these are the forms used in Russian dates! The genitive case roughly corresponds to when we use the preposition "of" in English, and is a very widely used case in general. Luckily, all the month names are masculine and quite similar-sounding, so their genitive forms will be easy enough to remember!

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0:49

Essential Expressions - Greetings

Reserve the use of привет, пока and до завтра for people you address as ты. The other options are more formal but you can still use them in informal situations, so when in doubt, it's best to choose the more formal variant. As usual, the bulkier words, like здравствуйте, may lose a couple of their syllables in fluent speech.

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0:56

Essential Expressions - Let Me Introduce Myself

Learn how to tell someone your name and age, as well as where you are from and what you do! By the way, the Russian version of "my name is Jack" actually literally means "they call me Jack."

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0:54

Essential Expressions - I Want to Know More About You

Sometimes Russians can be a little reserved. Luckily, with these simple questions you'll be able to break the ice in no time! Learn how to ask somebody what their name is, how old they are and where they are from.

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0:58

Essential Expressions - How Is It Going

Now that you've learned how to introduce yourself to strangers, it's time to learn how to make friends! A good first step is to ask someone how they are doing. When asking this question in Russian, we use the word дела, which is a truly versatile word! It can mean anything from "business" to "errands" to, in this case, just general "life situation." So the question is really: "How is your life situation?"

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0:29

Essential Expressions - Apologies

Intercultural communication is hard! Sometimes you just have to say "I'm sorry" to smooth things over. Luckily it's not that hard to do in Russian! By the way, both verbs featured in this audio can also be used when you want to attract someone's attention with an "excuse me"!

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0:30

Essential Expressions - Requests and Thanks

It always pays to be polite, which is why you should use this audio to learn how to say "please" and "thank you"! By the way, the Russian word for "please" is super versatile: apart from requests, you can also use it to say "here you go" and "you are welcome"!

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0:51

Adjectives - These Things Are Big

Russian adjectives have to have the same gender and number as the objects they describe. Luckily, they are all pretty much regular, which means you won't have to learn a bunch of exceptions to the rules! This video features the different forms of the most basic adjective there is: "big."

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0:47

Adjectives - These Things Are Small

Now that you know "big," it's time to learn "small"! Pronunciation tip: notice the difference between the "soft" (palatalized) к in the masculine and plural forms of маленький, and the "hard" (non-palatalized) к in the feminine and neuter forms.

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1:38

Adjectives - State Your Opinion!

Now that you know how to inflect adjectives, your Russian can become much more opinionated! And while Russian inflection is quite complicated, other parts of its grammar can be very simple. In fact, you only need to change your intonation to turn a statement into a question - see for yourself in this audio!

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0:56

Adjectives - It's Cold!

Time to learn some nuance! This audio shows you how to use qualifiers such as "very" and "too," which you can add to almost any adjective! The audio also features examples of "short" neuter adjectives, which are often used to describe conditions such as weather or mood.

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0:49

How Much Is This?

Whatever else you do in a Russian-speaking country, you will probably have to pay for things. But before you hand over your credit card, it would be wise to find out the amount first!

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1:03

I'm Looking For ...

A foreign country can be disorienting, so you need to know how to ask for directions. You can always go for the direct где (where is) option, but saying that you're looking for something instead will make your request sound less abrupt!

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1:00

Following Directions

There's little point asking for directions if you can't understand them! Learn what keywords to listen for in the response you receive.

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0:55

Can I?

Russian requests can be quite a bit shorter than their English counterparts while still remaining polite. You can ask for things by combining the word можно (can; may) with the object or activity you need. If you are ordering food in a restaurant or buying something in a store, you can also just name the object, followed by a пожалуйста (please) instead!

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1:08

I Have

While Russian does technically have a verb that means "to have," we don't often use it when we want to say "I have something." Instead, we say something like "in my possession there is" - but don't worry, the expression is actually really, really short!

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1:23

I Have an Important Thing Here!

When you want to emphasize something about the thing you have (as opposed to the mere fact of possession), you can drop the last word from "I have" construction. For example, if you want to say that you have a house, use у меня есть, but if you want to emphasize that your house is new, use у меня instead.

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0:44

I Don't Have

To say that you don't have something you simply need to add a нет (no) to the expression for "I have"! Don't forget to use the genitive case afterwards. This audio features some really commonplace examples of where this structure may come up in real life.

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0:50

I Feel

In Russian we use the dative form "to me" for a whole bunch of things — including expressing how we feel! If you think about it, it's somewhat similar to the English expression "it's all the same to me" — except in Russian you can also say, "it's cold to me" or "it's unwell to me"!

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0:50

I Need

Don't be shy, express your needs! To do that, you will need the expression featured in this audio — just make sure to use the right number and gender!

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1:00

Do You Speak My Language?

Before you strike up a conversation with someone new, first you might want to make sure that you two speak the same language. In this audio you will find out how to ask and answer simple questions about your language skills!

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1:18

How Do You Say ... ?

No doubt you will feel much more confident in your Russian skills if you know how to ask for help! With this audio, learn such essential vocab as "dictionary" and "translate" and practice inquiring about a specific word!

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1:03

First and Second-Person

Answering yes-or-no questions works a little different in Russian, and you will find some examples of that in this audio! You will also get to practice the various forms of the verb "to want," which is possibly the most important word in any language!

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0:52

Third-Person

Verbs in the present tense have just two third-person forms: singular and plural. That means that, for once, you don't need to think about the gender of the subject!

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1:15

Using "I Want" to Express States

In Russian, when we want to express such basic needs as hunger or thirst, instead of saying "I'm thirsty" we say "I want to drink." In fact, Russian doesn't even really have a word for "thirsty"!

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1:16

Expressing Ability (Possibility)

Russian has two main ways of expressing that you can do something. The first one, featured in this audio, is used when you are in a position to do something — regardless of skill.

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1:05

Expressing Ability (Skill)

When we talk about a skill someone has, such as writing or dancing, we use the verb уметь. It means that someone can do something in the sense of "knowing how" to do something.

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1:16

Expressing Knowledge and Acquaintance

Some languages make a distinction between "knowing things" and "knowing people." Luckily, Russian isn't one of them! Even better, знать is an entirely regular verb, which is rare for such an extremely common word in a language!

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1:22

Third Person and Negation

As you already know, third-person present-tense forms are pretty easy. That's why we are adding an extra element here: negation. To negate a verb, simply put a не in front of it. You don't need to add anything else - much simpler than in English!

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1:44

Double Negatives

It ain't no joke: Russian is full of double negatives! In essence, whenever you use a negative word such as "nothing," you still need to negate the verb. In fact, it's not uncommon for a Russian sentence to contain a triple or even a quadruple negative!

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