Russian
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Russian is the most geographically widespread language in Eurasia and the
largest native language in Europe. It most closely relates, as it is spoken, to
Ukrainian and Belarusian. Origins of modern Russian can be traced back to as early
as the 10th century based on written artifacts of that period.
Over 25% of the world’s scientific literature and between 60% and 70%1
of all world information is available published in Russian. Russian is one of the
official languages of the United Nations and the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Russian is written using a 33-letter version of the Cyrillic alphabet, which itself
is recognized as an official third alphabet of the European Union and is used in
five other Slavic national languages, as well as in numerous languages occurring
in former states of the Soviet Union, Russia, and the Newly Independent States.
In the United States, Russian ranks 10th of 322 languages being spoken, with 1 of
every 372 people age five and above using Russian in the home. Native speakers are
heavily concentrated in New York and California; in King County, New York (Brooklyn)
alone, nearly 20% of the nation’s Russian speakers reside.2
Russian is classified by the Defense Language Institute as a “category three” (out
of four) language in regards to difficulty of mastery by native English speakers3
, and requires learners to devote an estimated 780 hours to highly-concentrated
instruction to reach an intermediate fluency. On the Foreign Service Institute language
difficulty scale, Russian is classified as a ”category two” (out of three), language4
, with significant linguistic and cultural differences from English.
Russian is one of the ten NLSC Pilot Program Languages
Russian is designated as one of the ten pilot languages that the NLSC is recruiting
during its pilot year. The languages chosen were selected based upon the following:
- They meet short- and long-term requirements with emphasis on high-level expertise in languages critical to our national security.
- These languages generally meet the requirements for a pilot such as this based on the number of persons residing in the United States who are proficient in these languages.
- The list of languages includes some whose populations are difficult to locate and recruit.
- Each of these languages has multiple proficiency tests available.
Interesting Resources on Russian
- Moscow State University, Russian Language Center
- U.S. English Foundation Russian Data Sheet
