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Proverbial Language And Its Role In Acquiring A Second Language And Culture, Natalya Vanyushkina

Russian Language Journal

Researchers in the domain of Russian as a foreign and a second language have paid relatively little attention to proverbs as units of linguistic and cultural expression. Due to this neglect and the overall scarcity of statistical data on current Russian proverbial language, many Russian textbooks and dictionaries offer at best some outdated proverbs that have fallen into disuse in contemporary Russia and at worst, disregard proverbial language altogether. However, this expressive language deserves much more serious consideration from both researchers and teachers of Russian. Russian native speakers take it for granted that their interlocutors share the assumptions behind proverbs, …