Regional Expressions in Russian Far East Frequently have Chinese Roots

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 18 – Vkontakte and Gramota.ru have examined more than 1000 regional terms from various parts of the Russian Federation and compiled a list of the most frequently mentioned. Perhaps the most intriguing are regionalisms from the Russian Far East, many of which are borrowed from the Chinese.

            According to Gramota.ru, among the words Russians in that region often use but which are meaningless to outsiders are kuksa which refers to instant noodles and chifanka which refers to a small Chinese café or restaurant, “a term derived from the Chinese expression chi fan, meaning to eat or have a meal” (nazaccent.ru/content/45485-nazvany-samye-populyarnye-regionalizmy-rossii/).

            Neither the diversity of regional dialects nor Chinese influence is surprising given the size of the Russian Federation, but discussions of dialects within Russian remains a politically sensitive matter given that the Kremlin increasingly seeks to impose the language spoken in Moscow on everyone else.

            Consequently, Russian speakers in regions beyond the ring road are at least implicitly engaging in a kind of political protest when they use words they themselves have developed either because these have local roots or because they reflect the impact of other neighboring language communities.

            For background on Russian regionalisms, their spread and official opposition, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/06/russian-increasingly-divided-by-ever.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/04/russians-from-provinces-need-to-speak.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/11/regionalization-of-russian-language-now.html.