Breakdown of По-вашему, почему ООН молчала?
почему
why
молчать
to be silent
по-вашему
in your opinion / your way
ООН
UN
Questions & Answers about По-вашему, почему ООН молчала?
Why does the verb молчала take the feminine ending here if ООН ends in a consonant?
ООН is an indeclinable acronym that stands for Организация Объединённых Наций (United Nations). To find the gender of an initialism, you look at its core noun. Since the main word is организация (a feminine noun), the entire acronym takes feminine agreement, resulting in the feminine past tense молчала.
Since ООН ends in a consonant, does it decline like a regular noun?
No. While some Russian acronyms ending in consonants (like МИД or вуз) shift to become declinable masculine nouns, ООН strictly keeps its feminine gender. Because it functions as a feminine noun but ends in a consonant, it does not fit standard Russian declension patterns. Therefore, ООН is indeclinable and its form never changes, regardless of its role in the sentence.
Is ООН pronounced letter-by-letter?
No, it is pronounced as a single word of two syllables, rather than reading out the names of the individual Russian letters. This is typical for Russian acronyms that contain vowels and can be easily spoken as regular words.
Why is there a hyphen in по-вашему and why is it followed by a comma?
Adverbs indicating opinion or manner formed from the prefix по- and a possessive pronoun with a dative ending always require a hyphen. The comma is mandatory because по-вашему acts as an introductory word that frames the sentence, and Russian punctuation strictly requires isolating such words with commas.