Try Biting Your Tongue While You Say It: The Russian Language of The Americans

[PinkRibbons]

If I understand correctly, for the show, the writers write the actors' lines in English and then the actors themselves translate them, I think with the help of an on-set consultant. This can lead to some discrepancies between the subtitles and the spoken words, although they're never factual, they're just occasionally differently phrased. My mother commented that Nina's Russian was a little stiff in season 1, making me think that after that, as they brought on more scenes in Russian the actors felt they had a little more room to maneuver.

 

I always have to second-guess my Russian as it's my passive language and I always double-check with one of my parents, but there a few things that stick out to me. This one's on my mind most of all right now: I think the actors are quietly sanitizing their language in the translation. Maybe it's because I grew up with a father who swears like a sailor (although his naval training was for being an land-based officer), but I feel like watching this show is the longest I've ever heard Russian spoken without someone bringing out an invective. Even my well-educated, classy grandmother doesn't get through a conversation without at least one vulgar turn of phrase. Russian is a really great language to be crude in because the possibilities of cursing are just so expansive.

 

I realize that most of the scenes on the show take place in a work environment when people aren't apt to swear, but there are occasions that feel just plain weird to me. Oleg and Tatiana, having their friendly exchanges (like when they talk about what Reagan was thinking when he visited the Rezidentura, or the BEEEEEEP conversation) never once drop in a word of gutter talk. One scene that stands out very strongly to me, is actually one of my very favorite scenes in the series: in the season 1 finale, when Arkady is down in the Rezidentura garage painting cars with the emergency abort signal, his coworker asks what the Americans watching the embassy will think when they see the cars. Arkady's response is translated as "Who cares?"

 

This sticks out for two reasons. First of all, what Arkady says is "A chorts'nim" which translates literally into "Let them go to the devil." The second reason is a little shakier, but I'll defend it. There's a far more vulgar phrase (I can't write it so that it can be pronounceable in English, but it means literally, "Let them go to the penis" with the most offensive word for penis there is) that's in the exact same form, and I think in this situation, any other Russian-speaker would use that version. It's like changing "fuck 'em" to "screw 'em" in English, except "fuck 'em" in this case is the far more likely phrase.

 

(For what it's worth my Mother says I'm being ridiculous and I've just spent too much time around my father which has warped my mind. She forgets my coworker who also swears that way, and the fact that, the second they think a lady isn't in ear's reach, almost every Russian man I know will converse with their fellow men using the bawdiest language possible. In a completely friendly way, let me be clear.)

 

I wouldn't necessarily have brought up this thought of mine about the possible language sanitization, but it really bugged me again with the season 4 premiere. You see, the very first word we hear, though it is not translated on screen, is "kazyol". The boys chasing Misha are calling him a goat. Don't get me wrong, that's an insult. But among post-war thugs rushing to beat down another kid? That is waaaaay too clean an insult. I have a whole list of words of varying degrees of offense that would have made more sense to me than that one. My mother classifies words by whether they're "printable", and this show has never once strayed from the path of the cleanest language. Even if they wanted to avoid the equivalent of an f-bomb, there's plenty of Russian out there that stays on the level of "shit", which they've used on this show in English.

 

My theory is the actors get too self-conscious about it. Russians in my experience tend to swear freely until someone calls attention to it, like a group of men hushing up as soon as a woman walks into the room, or if a child starts imitating them (guilty). Years ago when I was a teenage volunteer at an organization for older Russians, a (female) coworker once rushed into the office and let fly with what my father says when someone cuts him off on the freeway. Then she caught sight of me, turned white and apologized profusely. Luckily for her my mother was there to explain that I hadn't even looked up because I'd heard it before. I literally only heard about the scene after we went home and my mother started laughing about it.

 

As a final thought to this very rambling post, I just wanna say: if you go on youtube and watch those hilarious dashboard cam videos from Russia, almost every single driver, when startled, says the same word that my mother considers unprintable. Even if they're not that startled.

[Umbelina]

That is so interesting!

 

I only (used to) have "school" Russian, 3 years of high school, and one horrible semester "accelerated class" with a complete nightmare of a professor at the university, an older Ukrainian who wanted to flunk all of us lazy Americans, and spoke with a pronounced Ukrainian accent which made his Russian hard for me to understand.  I kept up with it for a long time, but now have lost almost all of it because it's very hard to find Russian speaking people here.  He wanted to flunk us all because he couldn't comprehend it was impossible for us to handle the amount of homework he gave, and still take our other classes, and, in some cases, including mine, hold a job to pay for college.

 

My last true Russian friend told me my accent was perfect (this was 15 years post college and I'd lost a ton by then) but my grammar and words were stupid, that I could get by in Russia better than he got by here when he first arrived, but that as perfect as my accent was, aside from my horrid grammar, I didn't ever swear.  He promptly taught me a variety of swear words.  Ha.  Of course, I've forgotten those as well.

 

I wonder who is "fixing" the dialogue now!

Edited March 19, 2016 by Umbelina

[sistermagpie]

I recently saw a talk with Joel Fields where he said what they do now is they write the dialogue in English, then give it to their translator here who's a native speaker, then it goes to their consultant in Russia who takes another pass at it. All this leads to it about an 80% approval rate amongst native speakers. ;-)

 

Also I think when they audition Russian-speaking parts they always have a native speaker in the room to catch fakers. LOL!

 

Re: the swearing, it's funny you said that because I totally filled in that scene with swear words--not actual Russian swear words I know (because I pretty much don't) but I prefer to imagine everybody swearing when they would swear--especially when, like you said, you're talking about adolescent boys beating somebody up. I just assume they're working under the same basic cable constrictions as everybody else so they swear very sparingly. Look at the English speakers, after all. Henry has said bullshit out loud, but at the end of this ep Stan slammed Philip against the wall and then told him "Screw you." When you've reached the wall slamming stage you've definitely moved past "screw" territory. Of course Stan would have said fuck--he'd probably use fuck at work a lot too.

 

But it does make you wonder in a scene like that when the dialogue is I assume dubbed anyway because we don't see the kids onscreen. Somebody chose that insult and they maybe had some guidelines. Since it's not translated it's not like they wrote out something G-rated in English and the translator struggled for an equivalent even though the kids would have sworn in English also. I feel like if I was the J's I'd want the translator to say what the kids would really say, vulgar or not, because I wouldn't assume I'd have to keep it clean for the small portion of the audience that speaks Russian. I'd think I could have far more leeway with swearing in unsubtitled Russian than I did in spoken English. It sort of makes skews scenes like that a bit more like Dickens and less like the Wire, if that makes sense.

 

Btw, I really hope you make more posts on this thread!!

[dr pepper]

I've noticed that when the people address each other in russian, they usually use the first and last name, rather than just the first, or a title and the last name. is this a russian cultural practice or a soviet protocol?

[Inquisitionist]

It's not the last name they are using:  see here.

[PinkRibbons]

I've noticed that when the people address each other in russian, they usually use the first and last name, rather than just the first, or a title and the last name. is this a russian cultural practice or a soviet protocol?

 

In formal settings like work, Russians refer to each other by full first name and patronymic, which is their father's name modified by the gender of the person using it. The surname is almost never used. And it is Russian cultural; several former Soviet States like Ukraine have reverted back to their original state language and use things equivalent to "Mr." and "Ms.".

[Umbelina]

I have a question.  In school I was obviously taught to say "I" as in:  Я хочу говорить на русском языке.  However, my friend told me my biggest mistake was using Я too much, since it was understood with the verb.  On the show I hear Я all the time before the verbs, so?

 

Is it just more common to omit that, and if so, does the show do that at times, but not at other times? 

 

For you non-Russian speakers/readers out there, Я is I.

[chocolatine]

You usually omit the Я when responding to a question in which you have already been established as the subject, but less often in declarative sentences. It still happens, but sounds "lazy" and is not usually done in formal/professional situations. That's my experience at least, and I and most of the other Russian speakers I interact with are from Moldova or Ukraine. There could be regional differences.

[Umbelina]

Well, he was from the Ukraine, so it would be the same.

 

Thank you.  He said my accent was so good but I ruined it by always using pronouns, well that, and my forgotten and thus terrible grammar.

 

ETA

Whenever I hear "Moldova" I think of the ending of RED.  I love that silly movie.  Ha.

Edited April 7, 2016 by Umbelina

[chocolatine]

ETA

Whenever I hear "Moldova" I think of the ending of RED.  I love that silly movie.  Ha.

 

I'll check it out - it's so rare to hear Moldova referenced in the US. When people here ask me where I'm from, I just say the former Soviet Union.

[Umbelina]

I'll check it out - it's so rare to hear Moldova referenced in the US. When people here ask me where I'm from, I just say the former Soviet Union.

BUY it, because the commentary is fantastic,  Robert Baer former CIA guy, who was station chief all over, and knew several KGB guys personally, as friends and enemies really, and was also in Russia quite a few times.  So it's worth it for the movie AND for the commentary.  His stories about how it really was between the KGB and CIA are fascinating, and pretty unexpected.  That's also where he mentions that he knew several who spoke with perfect Indiana accents, and he also said the B & E guys for vaults were all bald because they used something radioactive to break in, etc. 

 

http://www.amazon.com/Red-Special-Bruce-Willis/dp/B003Q6D2B4/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1460009964&sr=8-1&keywords=RED+dvd

 

It's only $5.  RED 2 wasn't nearly as good, and Baer doesn't comment, but the first one was lots of fun.  Don't get too many hopes up for the Moldova reference, but yes it's in there.

Edited April 7, 2016 by Umbelina

[GreenScreenFX]

deleted for off topic and wrong thread

Edited April 7, 2016 by GreenScreenFX

[sistermagpie]

However, my friend told me my biggest mistake was using Я too much, since it was understood with the verb.  On the show I hear Я all the time before the verbs, so?

 

 

I have been told that a lot too. I asked one person who was Ukrainian and they actually had a funny answer. He said it's considered a bit rude--that there's a saying that "Я is the last letter of the alphabet" -- like saying "I" is not something to be used so much because it's pushy. Almost like "There's no "I" in team" (to which many Americans respond "But there's a "me.")

 

Anyway, he said that it was actually connected to Communism and the idea that the individual should not be emphasized. He said this isn't something that most people are ever consciously thinking, it's just that it became a social convention to use it as little as possible then. He said he now tended to go back through his Facebook posts etc. and add in more of them in defiance of this convention because he did it automatically but now always wanted to make a statement that there was nothing conceited about it.

[chocolatine]

Anyway, he said that it was actually connected to Communism and the idea that the individual should not be emphasized. He said this isn't something that most people are ever consciously thinking, it's just that it became a social convention to use it as little as possible then. He said he now tended to go back through his Facebook posts etc. and add in more of them in defiance of this convention because he did it automatically but now always wanted to make a statement that there was nothing conceited about it.

 

I'm not sure that that's a valid hypothesis, since the Russian language far predates communism. To my ears, the "I" isn't omitted any more frequently in Russian than in Spanish or Italian, or any other language that has unambiguous verb conjugations.

[sistermagpie]

I'm not sure that that's a valid hypothesis, since the Russian language far predates communism. To my ears, the "I" isn't omitted any more frequently in Russian than in Spanish or Italian, or any other language that has unambiguous verb conjugations.

 

 

Keeping in mind that I can't actually defend the theory one way or the other, the impression I got from what he was saying wasn't that it was necessarily omitted more than any other language where you could omit it but that if you used it too much it didn't just sound unnecessary, but too forward-sounding. So he was saying that presumably it was always omitted when it wasn't needed, but that during Soviet times it became a thing that it was rude to use it if you didn't have to. So it wasn't that the grammar changed, it just developed this social quirk too.

 

But like I said, I can't speak with any authority on it. I can't say for sure if in Tsarist times people also thought it sounded narcissistic to use it too often.

[queenanne]

I recently saw a talk with Joel Fields where he said what they do now is they write the dialogue in English, then give it to their translator here who's a native speaker, then it goes to their consultant in Russia who takes another pass at it. All this leads to it about an 80% approval rate amongst native speakers. ;-)

 

Also I think when they audition Russian-speaking parts they always have a native speaker in the room to catch fakers. LOL!

 

Re: the swearing, it's funny you said that because I totally filled in that scene with swear words--not actual Russian swear words I know (because I pretty much don't) but I prefer to imagine everybody swearing when they would swear--especially when, like you said, you're talking about adolescent boys beating somebody up. I just assume they're working under the same basic cable constrictions as everybody else so they swear very sparingly. Look at the English speakers, after all. Henry has said bullshit out loud, but at the end of this ep Stan slammed Philip against the wall and then told him "Screw you." When you've reached the wall slamming stage you've definitely moved past "screw" territory. Of course Stan would have said fuck--he'd probably use fuck at work a lot too.

 

But it does make you wonder in a scene like that when the dialogue is I assume dubbed anyway because we don't see the kids onscreen. Somebody chose that insult and they maybe had some guidelines. Since it's not translated it's not like they wrote out something G-rated in English and the translator struggled for an equivalent even though the kids would have sworn in English also. I feel like if I was the J's I'd want the translator to say what the kids would really say, vulgar or not, because I wouldn't assume I'd have to keep it clean for the small portion of the audience that speaks Russian. I'd think I could have far more leeway with swearing in unsubtitled Russian than I did in spoken English. It sort of makes skews scenes like that a bit more like Dickens and less like the Wire, if that makes sense.

 

Btw, I really hope you make more posts on this thread!!

 

I'm calling this one for Standards & Practices, frankly. It would not surprise me one iota if the ruling was "you can't swear, not in any language, because someone out there *understands* that language, and they're going to get full-on swears."

[PinkRibbons]

Okay, it's basically official, they are sanitizing their language. What translated as "bastards" in the subtitles is what my mother called me as a child when I was cheeky. The country going to "shit" is changed to "going to the devil(s)", and once again, that is not where most Russians would have sent the country. In fact when the Soviet Union was falling my grandmother's coworker declared that if Ukraine left the nation, "pizdets empire", which as close as I can translate means "the empire's going straight into the lady parts" with the strongest word for lady parts in Russian. And it doesn't mean that in a good way, in this context it's the complete and utter end to everything. We don't have an equivalent in English. Not one that conjugates, anyway.

 

(My God the conversation I just had with my mother trying to translate pizdets.)

 

When I showed Mama the scene with Igor and Oleg she said, "Well, there were people who made it a point not to swear, although a war veteran..."

 

Other catch in the episode -- the woman that tells Oleg she's sorry about his brother actually says, "Oleg, what a horror."

[sistermagpie]

LOL! Now this is really a mystery. Why are they sanitizing the translations that much? Even more than the subtitles? It's got to be down to the translator, right? It's not like the showrunners would know. 

 

Also I love it when Oleg hugs that woman because he's so very tall and she's quite small. It's adorable.

Edited April 14, 2016 by sistermagpie

[Umbelina]

I don't remember the link (maybe it's in this thread?) but there was an answer to this.  Standards and Practices applies to foreign languages as well, even if only a small number of people speak that language.

 

Love your posts about this and the rest though, pink ribbons.

 

Now I'm curious, can you go to google translate and see how THEY translate that word?  Or spell it in Russian and I will.  ha!

[sistermagpie]

I don't remember the link (maybe it's in this thread?) but there was an answer to this.  Standards and Practices applies to foreign languages as well, even if only a small number of people speak that language.

 

 

But I think the thing here is that they're censoring it even more than they are the English subtitles. So it's an interesting choice. It's not like Stan saying "Screw you, Philip" when he'd really be saying Fuck. It's Stan saying "shit" and the subtitles saying "poop."

[JennyMominFL]

I'll check it out - it's so rare to hear Moldova referenced in the US. When people here ask me where I'm from, I just say the former Soviet Union.

Hope this isn't too off topic, but one of my History professors was an MP in Moldova. He specialized in Moldovan history and politics along with various Holocaust  and Cold War Topics. He is the first person I ever met from .

 Is there an OT thread in this forum? Maybe some of you smart people can help  me come up with a topic for my honors thesis. 

Edited April 14, 2016 by JennyMominFL

[BW Manilowe]

Hope this isn't too off topic, but one of my History professors was an MP in Moldova. He specialized in Moldovan history and politics along with various Holocaust and Cold War Topics. He is the first person I ever met from .

Is there an OT thread in this forum? Maybe some of you smart people can help me come up with a topic for my honors thesis.

There's a Small Talk thread on the second page of the forum. I'm pretty sure that's where all the OT type stuff goes.

[albaniantv]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/wp/2016/03/29/is-there-anything-you-cant-say-on-tv-anymore-its-complicated/

 

From above article centered on FX, looks to me as though PinkRibbons may be right: network is self-sanitizing. Maybe to avoid upsetting parents, new viewers or advertisers. As much as The Americans is lauded by the critics, its ratings are still unimpressive and FX decision makers must be trying out many way to expand the audience.

 

Perhaps FX is paring back offensive language so they can keep in the sex scenes? 

 

Tonight especially, I think both Gabriel and Philip would have been swearing and scatological  at each other in Russian while Martha would have been hurling some choice English vocabulary too. Oh well, maybe next week...

[dr pepper]

I'm calling this one for Standards & Practices, frankly. It would not surprise me one iota if the ruling was "you can't swear, not in any language, because someone out there *understands* that language, and they're going to get full-on swears."

 

I read that back in the silent era, some actors would deliberately use swears when mouthing dialog. But then deaf movie goers started complaining.

Edited April 26, 2016 by dr pepper

[queenanne]

I read that back in the silent era, some actors would deliberate use swears when mouthing dialog. But then deaf movie goers started complaining.

 

That is awesome trivia.  Now I'm gonna be on the lookout!

[sistermagpie]

That is awesome trivia.  Now I'm gonna be on the lookout!

 

 

There's a funny story about the making of The Ghost and Mrs. Muir where she's taking dictation from the ghost as he talks about his life. They have this argument over some word he wants to use that she thinks is bad and he wins. Apparently there was all this trouble from the studio - I forget what the deal was, but it was something about the studio feeling like the conversation itself was too risque or something. So they censored it.

 

But then you can see in the movie that when Mrs. Muir finally gives in and resentfully types the word he wants she deliberately types 1-2-3-4 letters. LOL!

[Umbelina]

That is awesome trivia.  Now I'm gonna be on the lookout!

I remember reading that there really wasn't any dialogue for the actors in silent films.  There was direction, "you are sad, you yell at him, you slap her, you walk carefully over to the chair, and burst into tears, etc.  But the actual things they said to one another in many scenes might be anything from "don't forget to pick up eggs and some beer on your way home" to "your breath stinks as usual, you had to have the garlic linguine for lunch AGAIN you asshole?" or "You have beautiful breasts, and I have a great bottle of champagne chilling...just sayin' sugar  tits."    (all in emotion correct for the scene though)

[PinkRibbons]

I had my mother look over the Russian parts in Persona Non Grata. She says the sets are perfect and the actors great, but more to the topic of this thread, she pointed out that Irina's father (Mischa's Ded, or Grandfather) has a slight Polish accent. Remember Irina posing as the child of Polish immigrants? The accent is faint enough that the actor seems to try to suppress it so I don't know if hiring a Polish actor for the part was intentional (or a Russian actor insanely good enough to play a Pole suppressing his own native accent), but if it was, that's kind of awesome.

Mischa Jr. is an American kid but one whose parents probably whooped him into speaking Russian at home. He has a slight American accent.

[sistermagpie]

1 hour ago, PinkRibbons said:

Mischa Jr. is an American kid but one whose parents probably whooped him into speaking Russian at home. He has a slight American accent.

Nope, he's from Tula but moved to Canada when he was 13.

[Nash]

For me the Russians actors make the show what it is. They don't steal any scene they are in so much as the episode, the show and any scenery that isn't nailed down.

[Nash]

Thank you for the likes.....not sure if this is the right thread but i'll use it.

I grew up on Cold War drama, films and news; some of which was more or less propaganda. In it, the Soviets really just picked up the mantle of the Nazis as the villain. As they were the Main Adversary, it was to a degree inevitable and someone had to be the villain. More recently the villain of choice became the Ultra-Nationalist with murky connections. 

These figures had a few of the following things in common, black leather jackets, AK47s, casual brutality, tattoos, sharp suits, makarov pistols, a tendency to swear and deeply incomprehensible accents.

What it did not do was show a more "real" portrayal of Russians who were not cut out cardboard villains and thugs. That's what this series has done; I very much doubt that Arkady was up to any kind of good as the Rezident - in fact he was certainly actively involved in planning missions aimed at NATO. Our men in Moscow were doing the same in reverse. This was a cold but ugly war.

I think what Americans does is finally give us not Cold War Soviet villains, but Cold War Russian characters. 

[vavera4ka]

On ‎6‎/‎9‎/‎2016 at 5:25 PM, PinkRibbons said:

I had my mother look over the Russian parts in Persona Non Grata. She says the sets are perfect and the actors great, but more to the topic of this thread, she pointed out that Irina's father (Mischa's Ded, or Grandfather) has a slight Polish accent. Remember Irina posing as the child of Polish immigrants? The accent is faint enough that the actor seems to try to suppress it so I don't know if hiring a Polish actor for the part was intentional (or a Russian actor insanely good enough to play a Pole suppressing his own native accent), but if it was, that's kind of awesome.

Mischa Jr. is an American kid but one whose parents probably whooped him into speaking Russian at home. He has a slight American accent.

 

On ‎6‎/‎9‎/‎2016 at 6:46 PM, sistermagpie said:

Nope, he's from Tula but moved to Canada when he was 13.

Actually a lot of Russian actors are either immigrants or kids of immigrants. And most of them have slight English accents, which is actually quite brilliant casting, as, even if you came to a foreign country at an age, when you already were fluent and established in your mother tongue, by living in a foreign environment, listening to native speakers, adopting American (in this case) way of speaking, you acquire that slight accent and/or melody of your new language and subconsciously transfer it onto your native language.

I came to US at 17. My (Belarusian "tinted") Russian was my main language. Just 2-3 years later, when I went back to Belarus to visit family and friends everyone kept commenting on how I have an accent after such a short time. Now, almost two decades later I catch myself saying some Russian words with quite heavy English accent, when  I speak too fast and get too excited lol I also notice how my Russian sentence building is effected by English grammar. I'd say something and immediately think: what language was that? lol

[sistermagpie]

37 minutes ago, vavera4ka said:

 

Actually a lot of Russian actors are either immigrants or kids of immigrants. And most of them have slight English accents, which is actually quite brilliant casting, as, even if you came to a foreign country at an age, when you already were fluent and established in your mother tongue, by living in a foreign environment, listening to native speakers, adopting American (in this case) way of speaking, you acquire that slight accent and/or melody of your new language and subconsciously transfer it onto your native language.

I came to US at 17. My (Belarusian "tinted") Russian was my main language. Just 2-3 years later, when I went back to Belarus to visit family and friends everyone kept commenting on how I have an accent after such a short time. Now, almost two decades later I catch myself saying some Russian words with quite heavy English accent, when  I speak too fast and get too excited lol I also notice how my Russian sentence building is effected by English grammar. I'd say something and immediately think: what language was that? lol

It's funny this came up just now because just last night I was talking about a manuscript where the author suggested a character had a French accent because he grew up speaking French at home in the US and I immediately said no way, there's no reason a child of French Canadian immigrants born in the US would have a French accent when he spoke English just because he spoke it at home. If anything it would be the opposite--he'd have some kind of English accent when speaking French!

Btw, there's a guy on YouTube who's an accent coach and does some analysis of actors doing different accents. It's really interesting. Jennifer Lawrence did not do a good Russian accent in Red Sparrow! (The stuff about Gus Fring on Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul's particularly cool.)

[vavera4ka]

oh gosh, don't get me started on Red Sparrow, I was afraid i'm gonna do permanent damage to my eyes from the amount of eye rolling that was happening lol

Especially during the scene:

CIA officer: dfks'gdghr'hgis'kghf'foig

JLaw's character: your Russian is perfect.

I'm like wow really?! My Russian then sucks lol

 

but that's OT.

What I do like about this show is that they hire Russian actors and have everyone at the embassy actually speak Russian most of the time. IDK how it's for a non-Russian speaking ear, but I love this back and forth switch.

Obviously they needed English speaking actors to play "illegals" so I give them a pass on "Russian" that is attempted by P&E. Though what bugs me is that Phillip's name is Misha, while Elizabeth's is Nadezhda....

Russian names are not like English, where Bob and Robert, though technically the same name, are different legal names

Nadezhda is Nadia. Mikhail is Misha. In familiar settings short names will be used, in unfamiliar or professional, long names. And back then, when someone introduced themselves they'd use long name. Even if it would be introducing yourself to a friend of a friend. Later it will slip into familiar versions of names most likely. Unless you're a kid and introduce yourself to an adult. Then you'll most likely use short name,

These days it's a bit more Western. In professional settings you still introduce yourself by full name, but if it's friends of friends, or just people hanging out together, they might say "I'm Misha"

[sistermagpie]

1 hour ago, vavera4ka said:

Nadezhda is Nadia. Mikhail is Misha. In familiar settings short names will be used, in unfamiliar or professional, long names. And back then, when someone introduced themselves they'd use long name. Even if it would be introducing yourself to a friend of a friend. Later it will slip into familiar versions of names most likely. Unless you're a kid and introduce yourself to an adult. Then you'll most likely use short name,

This is something that I always wondered about on that show. Often there was a character reason you could come up with for why they were using different names. Like when Paige asks their names Elizabeth chooses her full name even though it's hard for Paige to pronounce while Philip goes for the friendlier, short version.

But the weirdest was in the last episode when Father Andre randomly says that he only knows their Russian names and uses those same forms. Why wouldn't he use the same forms for both? He even knows Elizabeth better since he's been meeting with her over the years and married them by their full names. It was such a strange choice that surely had to be deliberate but it's completely not instinctual.

[CherithCutestory]

The names thing is something that makes sense in a very abstract way for the characters. Elizabeth is the kind of person who goes by Elizabeth not Liz or Beth or Betsy (my name is Elizabeth and even if you go by the full version it's almost impossible to stop people from shortening it.) So, she must be the kind of person who goes by Nadezhda, right? (No...)

But makes absolutely zero sense as far as Russian culture, language, or naming norms. As inclusive as the writers were to Russian language speakers and actors and getting consultants they still think like Americans.

Her mother did call her Nadenka though.

Edited December 21, 2018 by CherithCutestory

[sistermagpie]

4 hours ago, CherithCutestory said:

But makes absolutely zero sense as far as Russian culture, language, or naming norms. As inclusive as the writers were to Russian language speakers and actors and getting consultants they still think like Americans.

Her mother did call her Nadenka though.

Yeah, it seems weird the Russian actors or translators didn't get a chance to correct it when they did that.