16
votes
Accepted
Describe a Language Without the Noun for "Language"
Yes, it is quite common in conversational speech:
Он знает английский. = He knows English.
Она предпочитает русский. = She prefers Russian.
Note that language names or nationalities are not ...
- 15.4k
7
votes
Accepted
The suffix -говорящий
Немецкоязычных швейцарцев, знающих французский, больше, чем франкоязычных (швейцарцев), знающих немецкий.
It's possible to find in a modern 'synonyms' dictionary (e.g. Тришин, 2013) versions like: ...
- 11.8k
6
votes
Accepted
suffixes short comparatives
The question is great and rather complicated.
First of all, there are different ways to form a comparative only from qualitative adjectives. A compound form with более in front of the adjective and ...
- 20.7k
6
votes
Accepted
вернуть and вернуться
Вернуть is to return as in give something back. Вернуться is to return as in come back.
-ся (which becomes -сь after a vowel, except in adjectival participles) is simply the reflexive particle. ...
- 19.1k
6
votes
Accepted
Deriving “kamenite” from Russian камень + Greek -ίτης
When talking about groups of people that share some idea it's not easy to find a "true" russian suffix that suites the task. The only pre-cristian beleiver I can recall is волхв, ведун.
Other kinds ...
- 11.3k
5
votes
"Какая рогастая, глазатая, ушатая корова!" — or the morphological domains of "-ст-" vs. simply "-т-"
I want to add to the answer by Dmitry Alexandrov some information about the origins of the suffixes. The suffix -аст-, -ист- comes from Proto-Indo-European superlative suffix -isto- while -т- comes ...
- 14.2k
5
votes
What is the origin of the suffix -он?
Nope this has nothing to do with Internet slang, all the words you’ve listed existed at least since eighties.
In fact, you are asking very interesting question - indeed the etymology -он as postfix ...
- 37.5k
5
votes
Plural female gender of «Попутчик»
It's попутчица in single and попутчицы in plural. More general, -чик has correspondence -чица. Be warned however, that it's not always an equally used feminine form and there's ongoing discussion to ...
- 37.5k
5
votes
Суффиксы -и(с)т и -а(с)т
Потому что у этих суффиксов разные значения:
-ист- — прилагательные со значением:
похожий на что-то (серебристый, бархатистый);
обладающий чем-то в большом количестве (голосистый, ветвистый);
...
- 541
5
votes
Accepted
Equivalent of suffix -able
I don't think anyone has ever analysed correspondence or did a statistical analysis of translateability between the respective English adjectives and Russian present passive participles, but let's ...
- 19.6k
4
votes
Hypothetical Suffix
Игрок. Видеоигрок; Игрок в компьютерные игры, игрок в видеоигры. .
"would it be видеоиграник or видеоигранец?" - no, but it sounds funny :>
"видеоиграник" - as if video games ...
- 695
4
votes
Accepted
тупенькая meaning
It means thick (headed). Grammatically it is the word тупая with the suffix -еньк(ая) (-ая is ending)
-еньк (-оньк) is a suffix of adjectives, adverbs and nouns which imparts them diminutive ...
- 19.6k
4
votes
Accepted
Unexpected ending at prepositional case of "компания"
As Wiktionary tells us, the word "компания" splits into root -компани- and inflection -я:
Корень: -компани-; окончание: -я
In all cases, only inflection changes (same source):
падеж ед. ч. мн. ...
- 654
4
votes
Accepted
What is the difference between дыра and дырка?
In mathematics, neither дыра nor дырка are commonly used to denote an point/set that is excluded from another set.
However, the actual terminology is somewhat similar: If some set has the point A ...
- 186
3
votes
вернуть and вернуться
Consider "I return" (or "I'll be back") = "Я вернусь" vs "Return it to sender" = "Вернуть отправителю".
"-ся" is the reflexive particle much like one in German/Italian/Spanish etc. You may treat "...
- 15.2k
3
votes
Hypothetical Suffix
There are indeed multitudinous agent noun suffixes (суффиксы имён деятеля) in Russian, like -ец, -ик, -тель, -арь, -ун and many others.
They have some kind of rhyme and reason behind them, but it is ...
- 48.2k
2
votes
Hypothetical Suffix
but if "gamer" was translated to Russian, would it be видеоиграник or видеоигранец?
Since "game" is "игра", "gamer" should've been translated as "игрок&...
- 550
2
votes
Hypothetical Suffix
Actually "gamer" is translated to Russian as геймер. Most of Russian speakers understand that the meaning of the word is "videogames hobbyist" (любитель видеоигр). However if you ...
2
votes
Accepted
Can it be said that the verbs in -ить are more localized in space and time than in -еть?
According to the "Правила русской орфографии и пунктуации. Полный академический справочник" (под редакцией Лопатина):
Глаголы на −еть – непереходные 1-го спряжения – имеют значение ‘стать
каким ...
- 37.5k
2
votes
Equivalent of suffix -able
In addition to Баян Купи-ка's answer, some people use the English suffix -able directly with Russian verbs thus producing:
чита́бельный 'easy to read / worth reading'
игра́бельный 'easy to play / ...
- 15.4k
2
votes
вернуть and вернуться
Compare:
"Я должен вернуть долг. Скоро заканчивается его срок."
"Я хочу вернуть книгу."
"Она хотела вернуть любовь."
and:
"Я должен вернуться домой. Забыл ключи от гаража."
"Мы можем вернуться к ...
- 309
2
votes
Deriving “kamenite” from Russian камень + Greek -ίτης
ЕЦ is a diminutive suffix, used mostly in the Ukranian and Belorussian languages. In Russian, it was transformed in a suffix that forms names of nationalities.
So, "каменец" just means "a small stone"...
- 2,223
2
votes
Unexpected ending at prepositional case of "компания"
Yes, always like this. The ending is only one letter, so last but one letter remains as is. This is true not only for -ия but also for several other similar endings: -ие, -ея etc.
- 15.2k
1
vote
The suffix -говорящий
Just like it was already mentioned for франкоговорящие/франкоязычные there's relatively widely known and accepted франкофон. Actually there's less known and less used however existing term лузофон for ...
- 37.5k
1
vote
Unexpected ending at prepositional case of "компания"
В родительном и предложном падежах у имён существительных "компания", "мания", "талия", "версия" и т.п. окончание ии. Нет кого-чего? - компании, мании, талии, версии. Думаю о ком-о чём? - о компании, ...
- 2,115
1
vote
What is the difference between дыра and дырка?
It worth to mention that, aside from the fact that "дырка" is definitely more colloquial, "дыра" has one very widely recognized and used meaning which "дырка" completely lacks.
"Дыра" stands for a ...
- 37.5k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible