Cyrillic writing

The Cyrillic script was created in the 9th century and adopted in Kievan Rus' in the late 10th century. The 1918 reform removed obsolete letters, and the modern 33-letter Russian alphabet was officially standardized in 1942. It is used today: А, Б, В, Г, Д, Е, Ё, Ж, З, И, Й, К, Л, М, Н, О, П, Р, С, Т, У, Ф, Х, Ц, Ч, Ш, Щ, Ъ, Ы, Ь, Э, Ю, Я.

Key Components:

• Vowels: There are 10 vowel letters. However, there are only 5 (or 6) actual vowel sounds (/a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, /u/, and /ɨ/). The 10 vowel letters exist primarily as an orthographic tool to indicate whether the preceding consonant is 'hard' (а, э, ы, о, у) or 'soft' (я, е, и, ё, ю). A helpful tip is that the letter ё is almost always stressed in Russian words, with rare exceptions in certain compound words like 'трёхэтажный'.
• Vowel Reduction: Russian word stress is unpredictable, not fixed to a specific syllable, and can shift when words change form, so it must be memorized for each new word. In Russian, vowels change sound when unstressed. Unstressed 'о' and 'а' reduce to a short [ɐ] sound immediately before the stressed syllable and at the absolute beginning of a word (e.g., 'окно', 'автомобиль'), but to a shorter schwa sound [ə] elsewhere (e.g., 'молоко' is pronounced [мəлɐˈко]). Additionally, unstressed 'е' and 'я' are reduced to a sound similar to 'и' in the syllable immediately before the stress (e.g., 'язык' sounds like 'изык', 'мясной' sounds like 'мисной'). However, at the absolute end of a word, unstressed 'я' reduces to a schwa [ə] (e.g., 'время', 'тётя'). After the always-hard consonants (ж, ш, ц), unstressed 'е' reduces to an 'ы' sound in the syllable immediately before the stress (e.g., 'жена' sounds like 'жына'), but to a schwa [ə] in other unstressed positions, such as the end of a word (e.g., 'тоже', 'солнце').
• Consonants: There are 21 consonant letters (which includes the semi-vowel 'й', or short I). Note that these letters represent 36 distinct consonant sounds because most can be hard or soft. Keep in mind that ж, ш, and ц are always hard, while ч, щ, and й are always soft. Russian also features final-devoicing (voiced consonants become voiceless at the end of a word, so 'зуб' sounds like 'зуп') and regressive assimilation (consonants adapt their voicing to match the following consonant; for example, voiceless becomes voiced in 'сделать' pronounced as [з]делать, and voiced becomes voiceless in 'водка' pronounced as во[т]ка). Note that 'в' is the only paired voiced consonant that acts as an exception and does not cause preceding voiceless consonants to become voiced, as in 'свет' (unpaired voiced consonants л, м, н, р, й also do not trigger voicing). However, 'в' still undergoes devoicing and assimilation itself when followed by a voiceless consonant (e.g., 'завтра' sounds like 'зафтра') or at the end of a word (e.g., 'лев' sounds like 'леф'). To apply these rules, you need to know the 6 voiced/voiceless consonant pairs: Б–П, В–Ф, Г–К, Д–Т, Ж–Ш, З–С. The remaining consonants are unpaired for voicing: voiced (л, м, н, р, й) and voiceless (х, ц, ч, щ).
• Signs: The soft sign (ь) and hard sign (ъ) have no sound. The soft sign indicates palatalization of the preceding consonant, and it also acts as a separator when placed before iotated vowels (е, ё, ю, я, и) to prevent the consonant and vowel from merging. The hard sign acts as a separator, used almost exclusively between a prefix ending in a consonant and a root starting with an iotated vowel (е, ё, ю, я), preventing the preceding consonant from merging with the following vowel.

Orthographic Rules:
Russian spelling is governed by core rules to help you become proficient in writing:

• 7-letter rule: After г, к, х, ж, ч, ш, щ, write 'и' (never 'ы').
• 8-letter rule: After г, к, х, ж, ч, ш, щ, ц, write 'а' and 'у' (not 'я' or 'ю', with rare exceptions like жюри, брошюра, and парашют).
• 5-letter rule: After ж, ч, ш, щ, ц, an unstressed 'о' becomes 'е' in grammatical endings and suffixes.
• Ц rule: After ц, write 'и' in the roots of words (e.g., цирк, цифра), but 'ы' in grammatical endings or suffixes (e.g., птицы, отцы), with a few exceptions.

Capitalization:
Russian uses capital letters far less frequently than English. For example, the pronoun 'I' (я), days of the week, months, languages, and nationalities are all written in lowercase unless at the beginning of a sentence.

Handwriting and Italics:
Printed and handwritten (cursive) Russian look different. In print, italicized letters often change shape; for example, a lowercase italic т looks like a Latin m, и looks like a Latin u, and д looks like a Latin g.