Vocabulary: Continents

Vocabulary: Continents

Understanding Continents in Russian

• A solid understanding of the names of the continents in Russian is essential.
• The word for continent is континент (kontinent).
• Ensure to practice the pronunciation as well as the spelling.

The Seven Continents

• Африка (Afrika) - Africa
• Антарктида (Antarktida) - Antarctica
• Азия (Aziya) - Asia
• Австралия (Avstraliya) - Australia
• Европа (Evropa) - Europe
• Северная Америка (Severnaya Amerika) - North America
• Южная Америка (Yuzhnaya Amerika) - South America

Describing Continents

• To speak about a specific continent in a sentence, you can use phrases like “Я из…” (Ya iz…) meaning “I am from…”.
• Similarly, to express someone else’s origins you can say “он из…” (on iz…) or “она из…” (ona iz…) meaning “he is from…” or “she is from…”.

Incorporating Other Vocabulary

• When discussing the continents, it may be at times necessary to include additional geographical terms like country (страна, strana) or city (город, gorod).
• An excellent way to reinforce your learning is by incorporating these terms, for example, “Москва — город в Европе.” (Moskva - gorod v Evrope. - Moscow is a city in Europe).

Formation of Plurals

• Just like in English, the plural form of “continent” implies more than one. In Russian, the plural is “континенты” (kontinenty).
• This can be used in sentences like “У нас есть студенты со всего мира, с разных континентов” - We have students from all over the world, from different continents.

Grammar Usage

• Pay attention to the gender and case of words when incorporating them into sentences. For example “Я живу в Африке” (I live in Africa) uses the prepositional form because of the preposition в (v - in).
• When talking about moving towards a continent, use the accusative form with в (v), as in “Я еду в Африку” (I’m going to Africa).