Russian English in the Written Discourse: Features and Characteristics

Abstract

The article is aimed at describing a number of certain recurrent features of Russian English in the academic, educational and literary domains of the written discourse in English created by the Russian speakers of English. The article argues that Russian culture, identity and academic traditions are verbalized through a range of translingual practices, starting with the transference of the Russian punctuation and sequence of presenting ideas, including lexical variety and Russian-English hybrids, and finishing with the “nativization and localization” [Platt, Weber and Ho, 1984: 2–3] of the common lexical units, terms, urbanonyms included, and even classic world literature, which is retranslated into Russian English from Russian (for instance, Andersen’s Thumbelina and Brothers Grimms’ Snow white). The combination of analyzed characteristic features invariably turns Russian English presented in the written discourse into a potent tool for the Russian identity construction recognizable both to the Russian and non-Russian speakers of English, specifically to those who are familiar with Russian culture and academic traditions. Yet, written discourse created via Russian English might mislead the speakers of other Englishes in case they have not been exposed to this particular variety on a regular basis.

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