English-Russian language contacts

Abstract

The paper reveals the beginning and development of English-Russian language and culture contacts generated by social history. Nine stages of the contact development characterized by different intensity and depth (starting from the sixteenth century until present) have been overviewed. An overview of the history of cultural interactions between Russia and English-speaking countries shows that neither the Russian language nor the English language has been immune to this process. In the case of Russian, the impact of exposure to English culture on the language has gone through various phases. Until recently, English was never the preferred foreign language in Russia, but it has come into and gone out of fashion with the ebbs and flows of Russian (and Soviet) relations with English-speaking nations. At the high tides of cross-cultural contact, linguistic borrowing has occurred in every imaginable field, from literature and finance to science and pop culture. The low tides have never been so low as to completely eradicate the influence of English on the Russian language. In the following pages, we explore briefly the history of these contacts. The history of Russian and British contacts dates back to the mid-sixteenth century when the British ship Edward Bonaventure was anchored in the mouth of the Northern Dvina River on August 24, 1553 1 (Aristova, 1978: 14). Russian Czar Ivan IV (''Ivan the Terrible'') granted an audience to Richard Chancellor, the captain of the ship. Chancellor handed the czar a letter from King Edward VI. The objective of Chancellor's expedition was to open a new market for British merchandise. Both Russia and Great Britain were interested in trading with each other. Improved economic and cultural ties with Western countries would help Russia strengthen its internal and external credibility. Ivan IV supported Russian-British trade by awarding free entry and freedom of movement, as well as tax-free trade, to British merchants from the Moscow Company. This trading company was established in London in 1554. In Russia, British merchants found a vast market for sugar, paper, cloth, weapons, medicine, spices, jewelry, and other imports. Additionally, entree into Russia opened trade routes to the Near East, Central Asia, and India. British and Russian merchants brought the first English words to Russia. These were primarily words the Russian language lacked: mester (<Mister), lord, aldraman (<alderman), etc. The words were transcribed by means of Russian letters according to their sound in oral speech. Thus,many words had a number of graphicand phonetic variants:ser,sar,sor (<sir); erl, erl', ell', er (<earl). Although few Russians visited Britain in the sixteenth century, many British people came to Russia. The Russian government encouraged British professionals - doctors,