When saying what my name is, which one should I use and why?
4 Answers
You should use меня зовут.
Literal translation:
меня зовут -> they call me
мои зовут -> my [who?] call - doesn't make sense here
There are some exceptions, but, as a rule, in absence of prepositions, when you translate "X foobars Y with Z", X is in nominative, Y is in accusative, Z is in instrumental.
In "they call me", "me" is Y, so you need accusative of "я", which is "меня".
"мои" is plural of "my" or "mine" and I don't understand why you think it applies here.
you should use Меня зовут when you are introducing yourself.
привет, меня зовут Аарон
Because меня зовут is the most common word that Russian recognize when they introducing themselves, even to foreigner who know Russian.
Меня зовут is directly translated like my name is. I.e. меня зовут Петр -> my name is Peter. In most cases you should use this construction.
Мои зовут is not a common and grammatically correct construction in Russian language. It can be used as a slang phrase like my [friends] are calling me. Cant find a proper example in English.
P.S. Of course there are so many cases where you can hear these phrases in a different meanings, but these two are the most common and correct IMO.
-
5
Мои зовутis quite correct in Russian: omission is a commonplace thing. For example:У нас с Васей совсем непохожие родители. Мои † зовут меня дома по-просту Петькой, а Васины † его ‡ — сухо, Василием.Here, † and ‡ denote the omissions ofродителиизовут. In some cases,мои,твои,наши,вашиcan be used with no defined word without verbal context at all. It then typically (but not always) means kin, family, friends.Здорово, как там твои?— Hello, how's your family doing?– achOct 23, 2014 at 10:12