Fwd: [SEELANGS] cow

[Elena Ostrovskaya]

2011/2/28 Svetlana Grenier <greniers at georgetown.edu>:
>  Could Konstantin's version have been developed as an expediency for when
> you cannot use "ty"?

It might. Looks / sounds a funny hybrid. The whole situation it refers
to is a country neighbor-to-neighbor conversation. Nobody uses 'vy'
there. When used as a proverb, it presupposes very informal kind of
relationship with suggested superiority on the part of the speaker.
Very little space for 'vasha' again. And an ideal hybrid to be used by
Putin as one of his famous transgressing remarks. The device is the
same of course: take something on / beyond the verge of rudeness and
put it into a formal context. A marker of a formal context like 'Vy'
is very much in place then.
As for the majority of those who use the expression, though, they
never have a chance to decide on the number as very few of them
actually say the second part.
I would be curious to find out who or where actually  says it with the
plural pronoun.

Elena Ostrovskaya

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