Learn how to use the nominative and accusative cases
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| Привет Всем. С Вами Светлана. Hi everybody! I’m Svetlana. |
| Welcome to RussianPod101.com’s Русский язык за три минуты. The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Russian. |
| In this lesson we are going to begin learning the basic grammar rules for all Russian nouns. Yes, this is probably the most challenging part of our series but it is as important as the word order in english sentences. I will try to keep it simple and fun for you, so you will see how easy it is. If elementary school students can do it, you can do it too! So let’s get it started! |
| There are 6 noun cases in Russian: nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, instrumental, and prepositional. Remember I mentioned the last one in Lesson 12 when we were talking about the location? The case and noun relationship is crucial. The case not only puts the noun in the correct grammatical form but it pretty much defines its place in the sentence. You will see how it works. ;) |
| If you open up a Russian dictionary, you will find all nouns put in nominative case. Why is it nominative? Because it names (or nominates) the subject of the sentence. Do we wanna know Who or What makes the action? Of course we do!!! So let’s put the subject at the beginning of the sentence then. |
| Here is an example: |
| Мама готовит. Mother is cooking. Who is cooking? Mother! The word Mother is put at the beginning of the sentence because it is a subject in nominative case. |
| Let’s take an inanimate noun: |
| Телефон звонит. The phone is ringing. What makes the noise? The phone! Very Easy! |
| The next case I want to take a look at is the accusative. Why do we need it? Because we wanna know what mother is cooking. It indicates the direct object, the receiver of the action and is usually placed right after the verb. So let`s say “Mother is cooking borsch” |
| Мама готовит борщ. |
| or let’s say We learn Russian. |
| Мы учим Русский язык. What are we studying? what is the reason for you to watch this video? of course, the Russian language. Because: |
| Мы учим Русский язык. |
| Sometimes the nouns in nominative and accusative cases look exactly the same. But most likely it will be changing according to gender and number. Let’s take a look at how to modify the noun from nominative, dictionary form to accusative. |
| The good news is that all inanimate neuter and masculine nouns will stay the same. |
| For example: |
| I am putting on a coat. Я одеваю пальто. Coat is the neuter inanimate noun so it stays in its dictionary form. |
| I am watching TV. Я смотрю телевизор. TV is the masculine noun. No changes |
| The rest of the nouns will change their endings in accusative case. The animate masculine noun which ends in a consonant need to add the vowel “A”. If it ends with soft letter “Ь” or hard letter “Й” we add “Я” |
| For example: We are waiting for professor. |
| Мы ждем профессора. Professor is the masculine noun ends with consonant. |
| I see the teacher. Я вижу учителя. |
| It is much easier with feminine nouns. If it ends with “A” we change it to “У” and if it ends with “Я” we replace it with “Ю”. Do you wanna see an example? Here you go. |
| Папа читате газету. Father is reading a newspaper. Newspaper is Газета in Russian which ends with “A” vowel. |
| Great!!! We’re done with this case. I know it is a bit confusing but it is worth knowing. |
| Accusative case is very challenging and interesting at the same time. In our next lesson we will consider some other situations where we can apply the accusative case. tuned for it. See you in our next Русский язык за три минуты lesson. Пока Пока! |
Comments
HideЗдравствуйте, Dora!
Спасибо for your questions and for studying Russian with us! ❤️❤️❤️
Please find complete rules and answers to your questions in the lesson:
https://www.russianpod101.com/learningcenter/lessons/717
There is no word in Russian ending in ъ. 😇
Please feel free to let us know if you have any questions!
Kind Regards,
Evgeniia
Team RussianPod101.com
Should i replace "A" with "y" or "A" with "Ы"?
For feminine nouns, what if the ending is other vowels? What should I add in order to change it into accusative form?
I'm thinking, if the soft sign "Ь" is replaced by "Я" in the accusative case, what about the hard sign "ъ", what if a word ends in the hard sign, what should I do to change it into the accusative form?
Hello, Can any other vowels be at the end of a word, if so then what should we change the last letter to?
Hello, How do i know when to add Й or Я?
Hello Daemon,
thank you for your question!
Кошка ждёт кошку.
Кошку is the accusative case (it answers the question "whom?").
Kind Regards,
Evgeniia
Team RussianPod101.com
is the sentence Koshka zhdet koshky not actually Koshki? Feminine genitive for the verb Zhdatb?
Sorry no Cyrillic keyboard. bit lame !😮
Hello Jason Wojcik,
All your sentences are correct. 👍
Elena
Team RussianPod101.com
I studied Latin with its cases and this shouldn't be difficult. I must be over thinking this!
Would you say:
кошка ждет кошку
A cat is waiting for a cat
or
собака ждет собаку
A dog is waiting for a dog.
I know that people don't talk like that. But does it just take practice to pick up the different endings since you "could" say
кошку ждет кошка (Yoda says: For a cat, a cat is waiting)?
Or am I just really thinking too much?
Спасибо!!
Hello Chloe,
1. You understood correctly.
bear медведь --> медведя
But!
служащий has another rule. Basically, this word originally was an adjective and still you can use it as an adjective in the meaning "working". So, conjugation will be the same as adjectives have - служащего.
Another example of such a noun is - нищий (poor) - нищего.
2. Regarding "chicken" . In both cases it will be animate noun.
Please let us know if you have other questions.
Elena
Hi, I have two questions:
1. With animate masculine nouns that end with soft letter Ь or hard letter Й, just confirming that we drop the Ь / Й and replace them with Я?
employee служащий --> служащия
bear медведь --> медведя
2. And regarding animate vs inanimate nouns, would chicken be considered animate if I'm referring to a live chicken, and inanimate if I'm referring to it as food?
Sorry the whole gender / noun case / animate vs inanimate is all new to me!
Thanks!
Hello Imsure1200q,
That's right! 😄
Elena
Team RussianPod101.com
Hello gerritdt1997,
Yes, there are some animate neuter nouns.
For example - животное (animal), существо (creature), насикомое (insect) , дитя (child). The list of such nouns is really small.
In singular they remain the same.
For example - Я вижу животное (I see an animal)
In plural they change their endings as for Genitive plural (Я вижу животных - I see animals).
Elena
Team RussianPod101.com
Greetings RussianPod101.com,
I have some questions:
1. In this lesson I've learned how to write inanimate neuter nouns in accusative case, but what happens with the animate neuter nouns?
2. Are there any animate neuter nouns?
3. What's the difference between animate and inanimate neuter nouns?
Can you help me answer these questions please?
Greetings!
gerritdt1997
Hello Amin,
Thank you for posting! Wish you good luck!
Elena
Team RussianPod101.com
yeahhhh
lets go learn russian
Hello Колтон,
Buying a dictionary is a good idea! :thumbsup:
Elena
Team RussianPod101.com
I was curious because I want to learn Russian in 2 or 3 years do you suggest I buy a Dictionary?
Hello Ryan,
You are correct! :thumbsup:
Elena
Team RussianPod101.com