Talk:это

But semantically it is more noun than verb! :-/ "Это" is never used as verb (example?). --Jaroslavleff 06:46, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I think you mean pronoun. But это very frequently functions as a verb (this is, that is, there are, those are):

Это студент. Это книга. Это солдаты. Это я. Это интересно. Это брат и сестра. Because это is functioning semantically as a verb, it does not agree with the gender of the noun, but remains unchanged. When it’s an adjective, it has to agree with the noun: эта книга, эти солдаты, этот студент. —Stephen 07:13, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

No, no!

Это (есть) студент (This is a student). Это (есть) книга. Это (суть) солдаты. Это (есть) я. Это (есть) интересно. Это (суть) брат и сестра. (Here суть is plural form 3rd person for "есть").

In modern Russian "есть" (to be) verb in sentences is omitted, but is implied. This is similar to: Молодой человек —студент. Предмет — книга, etc, where "—" (m-dash) is a replacement for verb "есть", but according to rules of Russian language when the word on the left of "есть" (i.e., on the left of dash) is a pronoun, there is no need for dash.

"Это" in your examples is not an action, "это" is used for substitution of any object, i.e. for substitution of a noun.

(Pronoun is "местоимение" in Russian, which means "вместо имени" - instead of name).

BTW, please look at Talk:нет. --Jaroslavleff 07:32, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I understand that that is how the Russians teach it to themselves, but when Russian is taught to foreigners, there is no implied есть, but the word это itself is considered an impersonal verb. You must remember that the English Wiktionary is for foreign students of the language, not for native speakers. Our Russian textbooks and dictionaries label это a special sort of verb. In one text that I am looking at, it says: "Это, this, it (the neuter form of the demonstrative pronoun этот), is often used as an impersonal verb, and also in a collective sense for all genders, meaning this is, that is, it is, there are, those are. In writing, a long hyphen is sometimes used after это in place of есть or суть".

In English, the impersonal verbs such as there are are not actions, they are copulas. They mean exactly это, and vice versa. —Stephen 08:35, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

It sounds too much like an "original research", which is strongly prohibited at least in Wikipedia (and I'm not that familiar with the rules of Wiktionary, but I guess it is the same. "Это" never means there are and only rarely means those. It is not a copula and not a verb. There are thousands of other nouns and pronouns which are used in the same way ("есть" is omitted), and they are not verbs, either. I strongly advise you to stop trusting this book you are referring to. Can you perhaps provide its author, title and ISBN here so that other people can avoid it too? --Spider 10:12, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

This is just one of many. The same thing was taught in my DLI courses and in the several universities I attended. —Stephen 10:19, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

As with Talk:нет, compare "Это (есть) студент." with "Это был студент." и "Это будет студент.", where "есть" is not omitted. --Jaroslavleff 12:47, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Were you told that it sounds like a verb in this particular construction or that it is a verb? Or were you told that "это" means "there are"? Seems like you somehow misunderstood it... Look, forget about "это" for a second; is "я" a verb when you say "я студент"? (="I am a student", "я"="I"). Is "дома" a verb when you say "дома тепло"? (="it is warm in the house", "дом"="house")? --Spider 13:29, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Stephen, you are utterly wrong.

"Это" (when used in the context discussed) is syntactically an expletive, just like English "there" or "it". It is followed by a copula 'to be' which in the present tense appears as a zero-form by default. If we turn the whole construction into past or future, the corresponding overt form would be used: "Это было хорошо" (It was good). This alone shows that "это" fails to qualify as a verb. Even if we suggest that "было" here is an auxiliary verb, we encounter two obstacles: first, no finite verb in Russian has an analytical past tense form; second, we will have to admit that auxiliary here follows the main verb by default - an option unattested elsewhere in Russian syntax.

For modern syntactic accounts of Russian "это", see Preslar, M. (1998). The subject position in Russian impersonal sentences. //Linguistic Analysis, 28:1-2, pp. 33-66, and Mezhevich, I. (2004) On Russian "Expletives": Èto and Post-Verbal Clauses. //Formal Approaches to Slavic Linguistics: The Ottawa Meeting 2003. Michigan Slavic Publications, Ann Arbor, MI., pp. 313-332. Have a nice reading. --Dmitry Gerasimov 12:57, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I know this conversation ended in 2006. But its a hope. Why there are это in the sentences like

Плакать - это плохо

What is это here. Using the hiding verb between pronoun and adjective okay

это - плохо

but I don't get why we need it in the sentence I mentioned. 144.122.4.195 18:22, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

WoW :)

Супер, пацаны! Давно так не смеялся. Это просто праздник какой-то ;) Вы не стесняйтесь, предлагайте и творите - глядишь новую ветвь русского языка изобретёте, с новыми глаголами и прилагательными! :D AzzarrA

P.S> не забудьте только, что в русском еще и "частицы речи" есть, вам ссылок накидать или сами в сети найдете? ;)

не

How is eto, or any other accusative, placed in negative form, as you would say ya nye panimayu, where would eto be placed? lol Mallerd 20:07, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Anywhere. Although the meaning would change, slightly or significantly, it depends. Я это не понимаю. Я не понимаю это. Этого я не понимаю. Я не это понимаю. Where is lol in it, btw? Dart evader 20:19, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, well there is lol in it since I and many more students were taught Dutch, of course, English, French, German, Spanish, Latin and Russian in school. I learned these languages with quite ease, but now most of them have faded away. That was half a year ago and now I only know English at the level I did at school. That I think is lol. Mallerd 13:51, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

ellipses

Why do you say "ellipses" when "ellipses" are compulsory while "not ellipses" are not allowed? Longbowman (talk) 22:13, 5 October 2019 (UTC)