Russian nicknames for siblings, family friends, parental figures, and one's children

[may_a_chance]

I'm writing a modern story taking place in Eastern Canada, but it's set around two siblings discovering who they are as people and learning more about their Russian heritage. Both brothers (Stepan and Yakov) are eighteen, and have just been drafted into the NHL. For context, Stepan and Yakov were both orphaned at a young age and raised in the

Comments

[anonymous]

Hi, I am Russian and you’ve got it right, Stepka would be one of the possible nicknames, Stepa can be used as well. Yashka or Yasha. Nikolai Alekseevich first, then Dyadya (means uncle) Kolya then.

[familyfoo]

Second this.

Nikolai would probably call Stepan 'Stepenka' or 'Stenka' and Yakov 'Yashenka' if: a) brothers were little kids; b) Nikolai was much more older than brothers, like a grandfather to them; c) Nikolai was not only old, but also had a very old-fashioned manner of speech.

[ext_3948950]

Not "Stepenka", definitely. "Styoponka" or even "Styopushka". Also, not exactly "Stepka", but "Styopka" (those are spelled almost the same in Russian - «Степка» vs «Стёпка», and there is an annoying tradition to omit those dots in writing, letting the reader guess).

[rusquen]

Russian living in Canada here

[bychoice]

I'm an American living in Russia, and I can say that for older family friends, you definitely get the aunt/uncle thing. A friend of mine has an older friend (I think they met when he was 15), who he refers to as his aunt. Nicknames can change with the situation, using progressively cuter forms depending on the level of emotion. For speaking to older people, it is common to use first name and patronymic. However, as an American, I'm not really expected to do that (when speaking to a teacher, for example), but I do still use the formal pronoun. On the flip side, it can come across as very formal. For example, in my tai chi class, the teacher asked one of the students his name. He is an older guy and responded with his first name and patronymic. It was clear that we were supposed to address him this way, but everyone thought it was kind of funny, since everyone else was going by first names. He said something like, "Well, I'm older than all of you." I hope that helps a little.

[old_radist]

That's quite correct.

Another thing is, the all three persons are NHL players, so the older one is possibly 30 or 35? If they train and fight together on ice, no patronymic is possible, I guess...

[brune_hilda]

If they play for the same team, then Kolya, Kolyan for Nikolai. But it is if we are talking about nicknames based on name. Because it is possible to use nicknames based on father name or family name . In this caseNikolaj can be Lexeich, for example, or even Stepanych or Stepan :D