# -изовать and -изировать



## pimlicodude

There are numerous words formed with these suffixes. 

A difficulty is working out whether it is -изовать or -изировать. There seems to be no rule or pattern. Eg стерилизовать (not стерилизировать). Today I read in Two Hundred Years Together секуляризОванном, and the audiobook read it out as секуляризИрованном, and it seems both forms exist. Looking on Wiktionary, both национализовать and национализировать exist.

Is there a tendency over time for all such words to gravitate towards -изировать?


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## nizzebro

pimlicodude said:


> Is there at tendency over time for all such words to gravitate towards -изировать?


To some degree it is, even though I'd say that -овать probably appears where the action itself is more common, or adopted, has practical application - something like that, while -ировать feels more special and formal. So, roughly speaking, men who are involved in everyday nationalizing/socializing of property, would likely use национализовать - this is how I see it personally.

P.S. There are anyway many other factors. Often the form just cannot be reduced in such way because the reduced form is closer to native patterns: e.g. -лировать (компилировать, коррелировать) cannot be -ловать, it should keep the soft sound and therefore should be transformed to -левать - but in such case it sounds too native, so to speak - still, this is a profane wording of mine, and the subject needs some more investigation - but at least I somehow outlined the issue.


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## GCRaistlin

В некотором смысле да. Влияние оказывает, полагаю, употребимость соответствующего отглагольного существительного: чем оно шире употребляется, тем больше желание образовать глагол с _-изировать,_ а не с _-овать._ Дело, возможно, в том, что в _овать_-глаголах ударение падает на последний слог _(национализова́ть)_, а не на слог после корня, как в существительном _(национализа́ция)_ и в _изировать-_глаголах _(национализи́ровать)_, и поэтому _овать_-глагол воспринимается как "более отличающийся" от существительного, чем _изировать_-глагол; оперировать наряду с отглагольным существительным _овать-_глаголом для мозга труднее, чем _изировать_-глаголом.


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## MIDAV

It's actually annoying, to me at least. The -изировать verbs have like 3 verb attributes, which looks totally redundant to me. Also, I've seen people (native speakers) who had problems conjugating –ировать verbs in general. They would say things like _они дозировают_. My point is why can't we just make it more simple? Why not say _национализирать_ or _национализить _for example?

 And yes, I know it's not quite on topic but it's been on my mind for too long


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## nizzebro

MIDAV said:


> Why not say _национализирать_ for example?


But what are finite forms supposed to look like in this case (specifically the 3sg pres.)?


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## pimlicodude

nizzebro said:


> But what are finite forms supposed to look like in this case (specifically the 3sg pres.)?


I think MIDAV means национализирает.


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## MIDAV

nizzebro said:


> But what are finite forms supposed to look like in this case (specifically the 3sg pres.)?


Sorry I edited my post after you replied (I swear your response was not there yet). 
Anyway, what would be wrong with _национализирает_?


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## nizzebro

Why not _национализирует? _It is easier to pronounce in an unstressed position - /a/ needs some emphasis anyway. For this very reason, '-aет' tends to be stressed when it is far away from the initial root syllable. We don't have a concept of "just some general shwa sound there" - if we had, we would need to change the entire system.
But once there is such variation, these vowels fall into some patterns; -_ует _needs -_овать _and so we end up with the OP issue.


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## MIDAV

nizzebro said:


> Why not _национализирует? _It is easier to pronounce in an unstressed position - /a/ needs some emphasis anyway. For this very reason, '-aет' tends to be stressed when it is far away from the initial root syllable. We don't have a concept of "just some general shwa sound there" - if we had, we would need to change the entire system.
> But once there is such variation, these vowels fall into some patterns; -_ует _needs -_овать _and so we end up with the OP issue.


I'm not sure I understand what you mean but it's not just about _национализирает _vs _национализирует_. You would also have _национализирали _instead of _национализировали_, _национализиранный _instead of _национализированный _etc, which (the former) look certainly preferable to me. It could also be _национализирить _with all the respective forms etc. My point is almost anything would be preferable to the current default verb ending of _–изировать_. The bigger question is why are we (Russian speakers) essentially unable to use most or the options available in our language.


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## nizzebro

MIDAV said:


> I'm not sure I understand what you mean but it's not just about _национализирает _vs _национализирует_. You would also have _национализирали _instead of _национализировали_, _национализиранный _instead of _национализированный _etc, which (the former) look certainly preferable to me. It could also be _национализирить _with all the respective forms etc. My point is almost anything would be preferable to the current default verb ending of _–изировать_. The bigger question is why are we (Russian speakers) essentially unable to use most or the options available in our language.


There are conjugation patterns, and there is the matrix of verb aspects. Your view is like "-ва" is something extra, while it is the actual basis and "-ир-" is something additional - that only facilitates productivity of forms for such derived terms.

In our native verb paradigm, we start with a basic homogeneous imperfective process - есть, писать, курить. Perfectives denote transitions, which are implemented (mostly) by adding prefixes, and further secondary imperfectives are needed to make the transition "cycled", that is, again imperfective - this is the main function of "-ва-", to produce an imperfective for something of a complex structure.

These derived notions are typically about some complex activity that cannot get laid into a narrow pattern, so I guess they are fine with "-ва-". If we use the -ира- for this purpose, we make a duplicate for the same function; there is no need for that, not speaking of that each particular sound has a deep association with some semantics.

Intermediate vowels are also not just random phonetic variations. Say, a programmer could use a slang form 'компилить' instead of 'компилировать'. For some reason, they do not shorten it as '*компилирать' but directly proceed to 'root+ить'. But, the verb gets a more causative sense. If one would replace 'прогрессировать' with '*прогрессить', I feel like the latter is either transitive, as a single application of progress to some object, or, it is reflexive, but about strong dynamics of a separately taken  progress that is "in progress".

And finally, "*прогрессирать" - and all other verbs with root ending in "c", would have a strong connotation with "-сирать/срать"; "*апробировать" would resemble "брать", and so on. So let'em stay as they are. I'm sure that in Bulgarian, this pattern is not that versatile exactly for this reason of ambiguity.


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## MIDAV

My view is that both _стерилизовать _and _стерилизировать _(as in the original post) are inferior verb forms, sub specie aeternitatis. Any other potential form would be better, including (but not limited to) _стерилить, стерилизить, стерилайзить, стерилизирать, стерилизирить _etc. And for whatever reason, I fail to see what is fundamentally wrong with the –ирать option.

 And when I say better I mean it on the personal level, as in I like it better.


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## nizzebro

MIDAV said:


> My view is that both _стерилизовать _and _стерилизировать _(as in the original post) are inferior verb forms, sub specie aeternitatis. Any other potential form would be better, including (but not limited to) _стерилить, стерилизить, стерилайзить, стерилизирать, стерилизирить _etc. And for whatever reason, I fail to see what is fundamentally wrong with the –ирать option.


I'm not quite sure about the meaning of inferior, but anyway, the first three of the listed forms show some specificity in respect to the temporal structure of the action (_стерилизовать, стерилизировать, стерилить_) - and, would anyone use _стерилять -_ it would also have an aspectual projection; _стерилизить, стерилайзить _are slangish approaches of the same kind as _стерилить, _but they retain -из- as a way to keep the link to the original verb - because there is the adjective _стерильный _that makes the semantics broader and so the meaning of _стерилить _vague.

I frankly do not understand what is the point of  "making the language simpler". Just use English or Esperanto  .


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## MIDAV

nizzebro said:


> I frankly do not understand what is the point of "making the language simpler". Just use English or Esperanto



Do you ever talk to kids? Did you notice there are certain words you just cannot make them say? They would try to avoid those words at all costs. The same would be true for older people, too, or for the mentally challenged, or just for the lazy.

So, to answer your concern about inferiority – in my very own definition, a word is inferior if the above speakers do not want to use it. It's not about simplicity per se. I mean all these forms should coexist – so you would be able to continue using whatever fancy form you prefer along with them using whatever they like.


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## MIDAV

And heck, you are talking to someone who did loads and loads of technical translation. I know for a fact, from my professional experience, that in the end, complicated word forms make your translation harder to do, harder to understand, and ultimately harder to use for the end user.


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## pimlicodude

MIDAV said:


> And when I say better I mean it on the personal level, as in I like it better.


But then you're not talking about the actual Russian language, which exists and is an object of study....


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## pimlicodude

MIDAV said:


> And heck, you are talking to someone who did loads and loads of technical translation. I know for a fact, from my professional experience, that in the end, complicated word forms make your translation harder to do, harder to understand, and ultimately harder to use for the end user.


I don't like any of the words in изировать or any of those with ический or any of those ending in инг (тренинг, тюнинг, итд)


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