Animate and inanimate nouns.
Animacy in Russian. Russian grammar --> Animacy in Russian

In Russian, animacy is a characteristic of nouns which indicates that the meaning of the word correlates to a living being. Based on this characteristic, all Russian nouns are divided into two classes: animate nouns that have human or animal referents and inanimate nouns that refer to nonliving objects and abstract things.

Besides nouns denoting people and animals, words that denote some mythic characters, like кентавр centaur, дракон dragon etc, the court-cards (туз ace, король king, дама queen, валет jack ) in card games, anthropomorphic creatures or mechanisms (робот robot, киборг cyborg) and words мертвец dead person, покойник the deceased, кукла doll, марионетка marionette are also considered to be animate nouns. Some words may be used both as inanimate and animate nouns: микроб microbe (which is more often used as animate noun), бактерия bacterium, личинка larva, куколка chrysalis. Nouns denoting plants, groups of people (армия army, народ people) or a group of animals (стадо herd) are inanimate.

The above-mentioned information about animate and inanimate nouns is sufficient for those who start learning Russian. However, if you are already familiar with Russian cases forms or just interested in further details about category of animacy, you may find it useful to take a look of the following facts related to the animacy in the Russian language.

In Russian grammar, it may be very important to know whether the phrase concerns animate or inanimate referents. Specifically, the accusative form for some groups of nouns, adjectives, pronouns and numerals has two possible forms depending on the animacy of the referent.

Before we examine the groups of words in which animacy is grammatically relevant and give several examples, we should mention the general rule that will apply to accusative forms in these groups:

- For animate referents, the accusative forms are identical to the genitive forms (Acc=Gen).

- For inanimate referents, the accusative forms are identical to the nominative forms (Acc=Nom).

This principle is relevant for the following groups of words:

1. Masculine singular nouns ending with a consonant in the nominative form (the first declension):

Cases Animate referent Inanimate referent
Nom Это студент.
This is a student (masc sing).
 Это диалог.
This is a dialogue (masc sing).
Gen Это журнал студента.
This is the magazine of the student.
 Это текст диалога.
This is the text of the dialogue.
Acc Я вижу студента.
I see the student.
 Я читаю диалог.
I'm reading a dialogue.
  Acc=Gen Acc=Nom

2. Plural nouns (with no gender distinction).

Cases Animate referent Inanimate referent
Nom Это студентки.
These are students (fem pl).
 Это диалоги.
These are dialogues (masc pl).
Gen Это журнал студенток.
This is the magazine of the students.
 Это текст диалогов.
This is the text of the dialogues.
Acc Я вижу студенток.
I see the students.
 Я читаю диалоги.
I'm reading the dialogues.
  Acc=Gen Acc=Nom

3. Adjectives and words which behave as adjectives (pronouns - possessives, demonstrative etc., the numeral один "one", ordinal numerals, verb participles) related to a masculine noun in singular:

Cases Animate referent Inanimate referent
Nom Это новый студент.
This is a new student (masc sing).
 Это новый диалог.
This is a new dialogue (masc sing).
Gen Это журнал нового студента.
This is the magazine of the new student.
 Это текст нового диалога.
This is the text of the new dialogue.
Acc Я вижу нового студента.
I see the new student.
 Я читаю новый диалог.
I'm reading the new dialogue.
  Acc=Gen Acc=Nom

4. Adjectives and words which behave as adjectives (pronouns - possessives, demonstrative etc., ordinal numerals, verb participles) related to a noun in plural, with no gender distinction:

Cases Animate referent Inanimate referent
Nom Это новые студенты.
These are new student (masc pl).
 Это новые диалоги.
These are new dialogues (masc pl).
Gen Это журнал новых студентов.
This is the magazine of the new students.
 Это текст новых диалогов.
This is the text of the new dialogues.
Acc Я вижу новых студентов.
I see the new students.
 Я читаю новые диалоги.
I'm reading the new dialogues.
  Acc=Gen Acc=Nom

5. Cardinal numerals два "one", три "two", четыре "four":

Cases Animate referent Inanimate referent
Nom Это три студента.
These are three students.
 Это два диалога.
These are two dialogues.
Gen Это журнал трёх студентов.
This is the magazine of the three students.
 Это текст двух диалогов.
This is the text of the two dialogues.
Acc Я вижу трёх студентов.
I see the three students.
 Я читаю два диалога.
I'm reading the two dialogues.
  Acc=Gen Acc=Nom

Summary:

  • Russian nouns are divided into two classes: animate nouns which usually denote people and animals, and inanimate nouns which refer to nonliving objects.
  • Animacy may be an important factor for building accusative forms of masculine nouns, adjectives and adjective-like words in singular, and nouns adjectives and adjective-like words in plural, with no gender distinction. In these cases, accusative forms will be identical to genitive forms for animate referents, and accusative forms will be identical to nominative forms for inanimate referents.