question about slang

[Josh Wilson]

There is the Russian "chuvak" which is close in meaning with the English
"dude." However, "brat," and "dvoyorodnyi brat" have no shortened versions
that I'm aware of or can even imagine. 

"Cool" Russians sometimes use "prived," a corruption of "privet" - as in the
ever more popular "prived medved." This is perhaps not a bad translation in
terms of cultural use - though it doesn't have the same inferences of
kinship or connection to the clan. To get that, I think you would need
"tovarish" - but I'm not sure how comfortable your kids would be calling
each other "comrade." Plus, "tovarish" is used by pretty much all
generations of Russians, so it's not quite as cool as "chuvak."

Really cool Russians will actually use "Yo" - in fact the one variant that
comes to mind for translating your phrase into modern Russian is "Iyo -
Chuvak!" (pronounced relishing each vowel)

Maybe the native speakers here will have additional ideas. 

Disclaimer: Students should be carefully taught that this type of slang can
be considered outright rude if used with older Russians or strangers. Also,
the way the question is phrased seems to assume that Russian slang has taken
all the same cultural channels as English, which, of course, it most
certainly hasn't. Briefing the kids on how radically different histories and
cultures can produce radically different languages might be in order as
well.


Josh Wilson
Asst. Director
The School of Russian and Asian Studies
Editor-in-Chief
Vestnik, The Journal of Russian and Asian Studies
www.sras.org
jwilson at sras.org


-----Original Message-----
From: SEELANGS: Slavic & East European Languages and Literatures list
[mailto:SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu] On Behalf Of Janey Haynes
Sent: Friday, March 14, 2008 12:50 AM
To: SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu
Subject: [SEELANGS] question about slang

Nashville, here, with a specific word question.  My first year (high school)
Russian students are getting ready to perform a skit about going shopping,
buying clothes for a function, etc.  They stumped me today with "Ioanna
Bobyevna, how do you say 'Cuz'--not 'Cousin', just Cuz?"  That was followed
by "And how do you say 'Bro' or 'Bra', like "Yo, Bra!' "  I had to confess I
had no idea. So, you brilliant minds out there, especially those who've been
around Russians recently, I'd love to know!

Janey Haynes
Nashville, TN

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