Russian is the national language of Russia. It is geographically the most widespread language in all of Europe and Asia. More than 280 million people in Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and other countries that were formerly part of the Soviet Union as well as large immigrant communities in countries such as Israel, the United States and Canada speak Russian either as a first or a second language. The Russian language is widely used for coding and knowledge storage by the scientific community. It also enjoys the status of being one of the official languages of the United Nations.
For those looking to learn the Russian language, learning the alphabet of this language is the first step in the right direction. Maybe your company has started a new business in Russia, which requires you to go on a business trip to Russia, or you have planned a small vacation in the country, or you are simply fascinated by the language and would love to add it to the list of languages that you are fluent in.
Even if you are not planning to master the Russian language, learning the basic letters can make your stay in Russia so much more comfortable, since you will be able to do simple tasks such as read street signs and advertisements. The Russian alphabet is made up of a total of 33 letters; 20 of these are consonants, while 11 are vowels. In addition to the consonants and vowels, there are 2 special letters which do not have any sound associated with them. Instead, these letters are meant to make the word harder or softer when it comes to pronunciation. There is an individual capital and small letter form to each of these letters. Another important point to remember is that written Russian and printed Russian are two distinct forms and are not the same.
There are lots of websites on the Internet today that are dedicated to teaching the Russian language to various kinds of learners at different stages of learning. Here is a site that specializes in teaching the Russian alphabet online. This site clearly specifies all the letters of the Russian language in both the capital and small forms. Each letter has an audio link attached to it, which when clicked on provides the audio recording of the proper pronunciation of the corresponding letter. It also has a downloadable audio file which has the audio recording of all of the letters of the Russian language, uttered one after the other.
At languagehelpers.com/TheRussian Alphabet is a similar site that aims at teaching Russian online. It gives a small introduction to the Russian alphabet; all the letters of the Russian language are displayed in both the printed, written, small and capital forms. By clicking on each of the letters, one can listen to the audio guide with the correct pronunciation of the letter. For the learner who would like to go a bit further, this site also teaches the commonly used words and phrases in the Russian language. They also have software to allow you to use your keyboard to write in Russian.
Learning the Russian letters online is the easiest and quickest way to get a firm grip on the 33 letters of the Cyrillic alphabet.
