Episode discussion post: "Urban Transport Planning"

[jae]

Aired:
11 April 2018 in the U.S. and Canada

This is a discussion post for episode 603 of The Americans, intended for viewers who are watching the show on the U.S./Canadian schedule. (Feel free to dive in to the discussion even if you're coming in late--and you should also feel free to start a new thread if it seems too daunting to read through what's already been posted first. If you're reading this at a point where you've already seen subsequent episodes, though, please take care to keep comments spoiler-free of anything that comes after season six, episode three.)

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Comments

Re: Paige's Russia lessons

[sistermagpie]

Agreed.

This is just a topic that's always been interesting to me since I took a language in high school and they'd always give you a version of your name that was in the target language. Because while I understood why that would be a good idea in the classroom (especially if the language changed noun endings) I always thought it was weird to suggest that your name would change in another language.

That is, even if there is a Russian version of the name, if it doesn't sound like the name pronounced with a Russian accent, it's a new name. Like to me changing Elizabeth to something like "Elizaveta" would be the same name. Likewise Genry and Henry seem pretty close.

But, for instance, in English people would hear Michael and Mikhail as different names. So in some ways even if they had names with a Russian equivalent, it might still sound like a new name.

Of course, we're not even dealing with the fact that they would have a completely different last name and also have Mikhailovich/Mikhailovna!

Re: Paige's Russia lessons

[quantumreality]

Interesting fact is that Elizabeth goes all the way back to a Greek variant of a Hebrew name, and in transliterated Koine(ish) Greek it's Elisabet.

From that form, it's been borrowed almost unchanged in many languages, including Russian.

I'm pretty sure Philip could render as Filip, but I really don't know how Russified that is.

Re: Paige's Russia lessons

[sistermagpie]

I could swear I read a book where there was a character whose patronymic was "Philipovna" and that made me think it was maybe a Russian name. It probably wouldn't be a problem to say it, at least.