Russian language

Russian (ру́сский язы́к, russkiy yazyk, pronounced [ˈruskʲɪj jɪˈzɨk]) is an East Slavic language and an official language in Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and many unrecognised territories. It is an unofficial but widely-spoken language in Ukraine, Latvia, Estonia, and to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics of the Soviet Union and former participants of the Eastern Bloc. Russian belongs to the family of Indo-European languages and is one of the three living members of the East Slavic languages. Written examples of Old East Slavonic are attested from the 10th century onwards.

It is the most geographically-widespread language of Eurasia and the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages. It is also the largest native language in Europe, with 144 million native speakers in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Russian is the eighth most spoken language in the world by number of native speakers and the seventh by total number of speakers. The language is one of the six official languages of the United Nations.

Russian

Russian refers to anything related to Russia, including:

Russian may also refer to:

See also

Ira Glass

Ira Jeffrey Glass (/ˈaɪrə/, born March 3, 1959) is an American public radio personality and the host and producer of the radio and television show This American Life.

Early life

Glass was born in Baltimore, Maryland, United States, to Jewish parents Barry Glass, an accountant, and Shirley Glass, a psychologist, infidelity researcher, and author whom the New York Times called "the godmother of infidelity research."

He is the first cousin once removed of composer Philip Glass, who has appeared on Glass' show and whose music can often be heard on the program.

Education

Glass attended Milford Mill High School in Baltimore County where he was active in student theater, student government, and yearbook; he was also the co-editor of the student literary magazine. He played the part of Captain George Brackett in Milford's 1975 production of South Pacific, Lowe in their 1976 production of Damn Yankees, and Bud Frump in their 1977 production of How To Succeed in Business Without Really Trying; along with his involvement on stage, he was a member of the Thespian Society. Glass was involved in student government during his junior and senior years, as a member of the executive board. His involvement in yearbook started in tenth grade and continued until his graduation in 1977. A rather popular and outgoing student, Glass also was involved with the morning announcements, as well as being a member of the Milford Mill Honor Society in 1977. While in high school, he wrote jokes for Baltimore radio personality Johnny Walker.

Russian alphabet

The Russian alphabet (Russian: русский алфавит, tr. rússkij alfavít; IPA: [ˈruskʲɪj ɐlfɐˈvʲit]) uses letters from the Cyrillic script. The modern Russian alphabet consists of 33 letters.

Alphabet

The Russian alphabet is as follows:

The consonant letters represent both as "soft" (palatalized, represented in the IPA with a ⟨ʲ⟩) and "hard" consonant phonemes. If a consonant letter is followed by a vowel letter, then the soft/hard quality of the consonant depends on whether the vowel is meant to follow "hard" consonants ⟨а, о, э, у, ы⟩ or "soft" ones ⟨я, ё, е, ю, и⟩; see below. A handful of consonant phonemes do not have phonemically distinct "soft" and "hard" variants. See Russian phonology for details.

Frequency

The frequency of characters in a corpus of written Russian was found to be as follows:

Non-vocalized letters

Kazimir Malevich

Kazimir Severinovich Malevich (February 23, 1878 – May 15, 1935) was a Russian painter and art theoretician. He was a pioneer of geometric abstract art and the originator of the avant-garde Suprematist movement.

Early life

Kazimir Malevich was born Kazimierz Malewicz to a Polish family, who settled near Kiev in the Kiev Governorate of the Russian Empire during the partitions of Poland. His parents, Ludwika and Seweryn Malewicz, were Roman Catholic like most ethnic Poles. They both had fled from the former eastern territories of the Commonwealth (present-day Kopyl Region of Belarus) to Kiev in the aftermath of the failed Polish January Uprising of 1863 against the tsarist army. His native languages were Polish and Russian.

Kazimir's father managed a sugar factory. Kazimir was the first of fourteen children, only nine of whom survived into adulthood. His family moved often and he spent most of his childhood in the villages of Ukraine, amidst sugar-beet plantations, far from centers of culture. Until age twelve he knew nothing of professional artists, although art had surrounded him in childhood. He delighted in peasant embroidery, and in decorated walls and stoves. He was able to paint in the peasant style. He studied drawing in Kiev from 1895 to 1896.