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There may be two forms of the word, the mythical creature and the Internet "troll" who spreads anger and discord through anonymous online forums. I am interested in the second form of the word, though the first form might be interesting, too.

Brent Washburne
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1 Answers1

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This word is borrowed directly from English and it's actually "тролль" or "троль" (pronounced almost like English trol but l is softer). It's quite common word in Internet slang and there is also a verb derived from it - троллить.

Also, жирный тролль (zhirnyj trol`, literally a fat troll) - about somebody who is, well, let's put it this way, a dedicated, passionate troll.

As of palatalization (the way final "l" is pronounced softer) it's not easy to pronounce for someone who is a native speaker of a language where there's no such thing. But you can try to pronounce trollee and than try to pronounce ee very quickly, as quickly as possible. And then even shorter :)

A sidenote - "original" troll is also тролль in Russian (since its a Scandinavian word both in Russian and English) but actually there's a theory that English trolling was initially based on the concept of trolling - a fishing technique, and only later this word became associated with mythological creature. More about it.

shabunc
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    fat troll is not necessarily a passionate and dedicated troll. fat implies that the troll is willing to use even the most crude and obvious ways of trolling, sometimes all the way down to direct swearing/name calling/etc. in contrast, "тонкий" (literally—"thin") troll tries to make the act of trolling implicit and smart, often to avoid being detected as a troll but still deliver hard feelings to the target of trolling. Usually experienced trolls can do it in both ways, but doing it "thin" requires more experience and cleverness. – Display Name Dec 20 '16 at 07:41
  • @SargeBorsch good point – shabunc Dec 20 '16 at 08:32
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    I think the pronouncation of the л with and without the "мягкий знак" can roughly be explained as follows: Without the ь, an л is pronounced with the "base vocal" o: Like pronouncing an o, but with the tounge touching the palate. With the ь, an л is pronounced with the "base vocal" ee: Like an ee, but with the tounge touching the palate. (I'm not a native russian speaker, so if this is entirely wrong, drop me a note, and I'll delete this comment) – Marco13 Dec 20 '16 at 13:01
  • @Marco13 no worries, as in my opinion, this is a very helpful explanation. – shabunc Dec 20 '16 at 16:12
  • Will an average speaker understand if I use троллить in a sentence or потроллить? – VCH250 Dec 21 '16 at 19:30
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    @VCH250 it depends on the social group but it's same to assume that people in 20-mid 40s know it pretty well. – shabunc Dec 21 '16 at 19:36