Russian is spoken by approximately 255 million people and is one of the six official languages of the United Nations. The FSI classifies Russian as Category III, estimating approximately 1,100 hours to professional proficiency.

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The Cyrillic Alphabet

Russian uses 33 letters. Many look familiar but some make different sounds.

Letters that look and sound like English

А (a), К (k), М (m), О (o), Т (t)

False friends

Looks like ----------- "B" "H" "P" "C" "Y"

Most learners memorize all 33 letters in one week.

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Pronunciation

Vowel reduction: Unstressed vowels change sound. О when stressed sounds like "o", when unstressed becomes "a". Palatalization: Consonants can be "hard" or "soft". The soft sign (Ь) indicates softness.

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The Case System

Russian has six grammatical cases:

Function | ----------| Subject | Possession, absence | Indirect object | Direct object | "By means of" | Location, about | Learning strategy: Learn one case at a time. Start with Nominative, then Accusative, then Prepositional.

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Essential Phrases

Romanization ------------- Zdravstvuyte Privet Spasibo Da / Nyet Kak vas zovut? Ya ne ponimayu
Letter
Actually sounds like
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В
"v" in "very"
Н
"n" in "no"
Р
Rolled "r"
С
"s" in "sun"
У
"oo" in "moon"
Case
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Nominative
Genitive
Dative
Accusative
Instrumental
Prepositional
Russian
English
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Здравствуйте
Hello (formal)
Привет
Hi (informal)
Спасибо
Thank you
Да / Нет
Yes / No
Как вас зовут?
What is your name?
Я не понимаю
I don't understand

At Targumi, our native Russian tutors will help you through the Cyrillic alphabet, cases, and pronunciation with real conversation practice.