Main » 2010 » September » 25 » Знай наших - What's Yours is not Ours! - or Nashi's
09:55
Знай наших - What's Yours is not Ours! - or Nashi's
What's Yours Is Not Ours - Or Nashi's Знай наших!: See how great we are! We're really something!
"Yours, mine and ours" is a useful expression, especially in today's world of serial marriages with kids from previous and current unions. Happily, you can easily say this in Russian: твои, мои и наши. But these simple possessive pronouns in Russian have some linguistic traps, mostly because Russians tend to omit the nouns, leaving you wondering what is yours and who is his. Take the simple mine and yours, familiar form. In the plural, they can refer to members of the person's family. Мои живут в Киеве. (My family lives in Kiev.) Как поживают твои на даче? (How is your family doing at the dacha?) In the singular, they usually refer to one's spouse. So when you're at a crowded party and a woman asks, "Ты моего не видела? - the мой she's talking about is her hubby. (Have you seen my husband anywhere?) When used in the neuter - моё, твоё - it can mean "something or anything of mine/yours." Мне твоего не нужно. (I don't want anything of yours.) It can also mean "not to my/your taste." Да, я видел новый фильм этого режиссёра. Не моё. (Yes, I saw the director's new film. It wasn't to my taste at all.) Or it can refer to something that is a person's in the larger sense. Я проработал месяц и понял: это моё. (I worked for a month and realized that this is my calling.) Possessives like мой can also be used as a stand-in for меня in comparisons, though this is a bit rustic and not heard much. Он же работает куда больше моего. (He works a whole lot more than me.) Also folksy are the words нашенский (ours) and ихний (instead of их, theirs). This isn't too tough. But then there are expressions where Russians go and leave out all the important words. The expression Наша взяла! (literally "ours took it") has left out the noun сила (forces) or сторона (side). The expression means "We won!" or "We did it!"Наше вам (literally "ours to you") has the important word почтение (regards, compliments) left out. And then there's по-моему (твоему, нашему, вашему), which we all know can be used to express an opinion: По-моему, эта картина лучше. (I think this picture's better.) It can also refer to anything that is characteristic of or belongs to a person, including a way of doing something. Мы решили сделать это по-вашему. (We decided to do it your way.) So far this doesn't cause too many problems for translators. But when по-нашему goes cosmic, it's tricky to translate. For example, take the phrase, Это - по-нашему! Basically it means that whatever is being discussed is somehow characteristic of "us," which could be any group, from the people around the table to all one's fellow citizens. If you are using the phrase in reference to your family's trick of cleaning the house three minutes before guests arrive, you might say in English, "Typical!" or "Isn't that always the way!" When it's said about something characteristic of the country, it means something like, "That's how we do things" or "That's how we like it." Знай наших! (literally "know ours") has the sense of "know what stuff we're made of."Команда россиян победила. Знай наших! (Our team won. See how great we are!) In conversations between a Russian and a foreigner, наши refers to "one's compatriots" and ваши to "your compatriots." The youth movement Наши (probably best translated as Us) refers, ostensibly, to "our fellow Russians," but if you spend three hours reading the chat on their site, you begin to wonder if it could be better understood as "people like us, with the same political beliefs and values." And you wonder who, in their opinion, is ваши.
Знай наших! Or would I rather say'You'll remember us forever!'?
