Learn how to say "no" in Russian
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Intro |
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| Michael: How do I say "no" in Russian? |
| Saodat: And what is a double negative? |
| Michael: At RussianPod101.com, we hear these questions often. Imagine the following situation: Sasha Lee talks to her friend Albina Arndt about a party happening tonight. She asks her friend, |
| "Are you going to the party tonight?" |
| Ты сегодня идёшь на вечеринку? (Ty segodnya idyosh' na vecherinku?) |
| Dialogue |
| Sasha Lee: Ты сегодня идёшь на вечеринку? (Ty segodnya idyosh' na vecherinku?) |
| Albina Arndt: Нет, я устала. (Net, ya ustala.) |
| Michael: Once more with the English translation. |
| Sasha Lee: Ты сегодня идёшь на вечеринку? (Ty segodnya idyosh' na vecherinku?) |
| Michael: "Are you going to the party tonight?" |
| Albina Arndt: Нет, я устала. (Net, ya ustala.) |
| Michael: "No, I'm too tired." |
Lesson focus |
| Michael: In this lesson, you will learn how to say “no” in Russian and what a “double negative” is. First, let's review how to make a simple negative sentence. In Russian, you make a negative sentence with the use of the word |
| Saodat: не (ne) |
| Michael: which is the equivalent of the English “not.” You place this word between the noun and the verb in a sentence to form a negation. For instance, to say “I know” in Russian, you say |
| Saodat: Я знаю. (Ya znayu.) |
| Michael: To turn this into a negative sentence, you say |
| Saodat: Я не знаю. (Ya ne znayu.) |
| Michael: Let’s try that with another example: |
| Saodat: Я понимаю. (Ya ponimayu.) |
| Michael: “I understand.” Again, to negate a sentence in Russian, we simply place “not” between the noun and the verb. |
| Saodat: Я не понимаю. (Ya ne ponimayu.) |
| Michael: “I don’t understand.” There are more sophisticated ways to say “no” in Russian, of course. For instance, if you want to express that something doesn’t happen at all, you can use |
| Saodat: никогда не (nikogda ne) |
| Michael: or “never,” such as when you say |
| Saodat: Он никогда не забывает. (On nikogda ne zabyvayet.) |
| Michael: or “He never forgets.” |
| [Recall] |
| Michael: This time, let’s take a closer look at the dialogue. |
| Do you remember how Albina Arndt says "No, I'm too tired?" |
| Saodat: Нет, я устала. (Net, ya ustala.) |
| Michael: Here, we can observe another way of saying “no” in Russian, which is with the use of the word, |
| Saodat: нет (net) |
| Michael: This is the equivalent of the English word “no” and is the most straightforward way to give a negative response to a question or suggestion. It’s fine to use this one word when giving a negative response, but there are alternatives too. For instance, you can say |
| Saodat: Не похоже (Ne pokhozhe) |
| Michael: which means “It seems not.” Or, when you’re not too sure, you can say |
| Saodat: Не уверен (Ne uveren) |
| Michael: which means “Not sure.” |
| [Summary] |
| Michael: In this lesson, you learned how to make a negative sentence in Russian. To do so, we use the word |
| Saodat: не (ne) |
| Michael: or “not.” To review, we insert this negation between the noun and the verb in the sentence, such as in |
| Saodat: Я не понимаю. (Ya ne ponimayu.) |
| Michael: or “I do not understand.” Here, we inserted the word “not” between the noun, |
| Saodat: Я (Ya) |
| Michael: or “I,” and the verb |
| Saodat: понимаю (ponimayu) |
| Michael: or “understand.” You also learned that the direct equivalent of the word “no” in Russian is |
| Saodat: нет (net) |
| Michael: Just as in English, this word is the most direct way to give a negative response to a question or suggestion. |
| Expansion |
| Michael: If the use of a double negative in English is considered grammatically wrong, in Russian, double negatives are a normal occurrence. In Russian grammar, double negation is used with negative pronouns. Also, double negation in Russian doesn’t work in the same way that it does in English. In English, a double negative results in an affirmative sentence. This is not the case in Russian. For instance, if you want to say, “Nobody went home,” you can’t say, |
| Saodat: Никто пошёл домой. (Nikto poshyol domoy.) |
| Michael: This literally means “Nobody went home” and may sound correct in English. In Russian, however, the absence of an important particle renders this sentence incorrect or confusing. That particle is the word |
| Saodat: не (ne) |
| Michael: or “not.” That said, the correct sentence would be |
| Saodat: Никто не пошёл домой. (Nikto ne poshyol domoy.) |
| Michael: with the word “not” following the negative pronoun “nobody.” This literally translates to “Nobody did not go home” in English, but, in Russian, it is understood as “Nobody went home.” |
| Cultural Insight |
| Michael: Simply saying “no,” or |
| Saodat: нет (net) |
| Michael: when responding to someone may sound a bit too blunt or even rude for some people. If you want to sound more polite, all you need to do is add “Thank you” after “no.” In Russian, that would be |
| Saodat: Нет, спасибо. (Net, spasibo.) |
| Michael: or “No, thank you.” There is also a somewhat tricky way of saying “no” in Russian, and it consists of both the words “yes” and “no” in one sentence. The expression is |
| Saodat: да нет (da net) |
| Michael: which literally is “Yes no.” However, what it really means is “Well, no.” It’s like saying that you agree with something, but you really don’t. Okay, let’s do that one more time. It’s like you’re undecided about something, but you lean more toward responding with a negative. And, finally, there’s the famous Russian reply, |
| Saodat: Да нет, наверное (Da net, navernoye) |
| Michael: This means “Yes, no, maybe.” This is something you would say in Russian when you are not certain of your negative answer but might change your mind later, or maybe not, depending on how well the other person does or does not convince you. |
Outro |
| Michael: Do you have any more questions? We’re here to answer them! |
| Saodat: Пока! (Poka!) |
| Michael: See you soon! |
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