Comment by daxfohl

Silence is neutral complicity in russian, like “copy”. No answer means we either do not care too much or it’s all clear. Sometimes things need time to sink in, but you will not receive any signal about it, unless they have an immediate objection. When explaining something to russian, you don’t ask them if they agree, cause our language culture is mostly statement-y rather than negotiating. If you explained good enough, there is nothing to say. If you expect an answer, make it a question.

Does the person think it's the dumbest thing he's ever heard? Did the person not understand what I said? Does the person need more time to think about it? Does the person not realize I'm finished? What is expected of the speaker in this scenario? Do I just wait? Do I prod? Do I explain it again? Do I leave?

You are expected to either not care more than you did already, or ask any questions you have explicitly. If you feel anxious or confused, tell it. Nobody’s going to comfort you, unless you’re showing clear signs of breakdown, especially if you’re a guy.

All of this is true in negotiation, official situations, talking to strangers, etc. When you talk to a friend, they’ll be more chatty and supporting/feedbacky, but not as much as you probably expect.

That said, we have types whose nature is “silent partisan”, that will be hard for you to detect.

Edit: reading this thread, I really wonder why binutils do not reply kindly to your actions:

  $ ls -1
  Oh here’s your one column list please:

  $ mv foo bar
  Glad you asked, consider it done!

  $ rm -rf /root
  You know I see your point, but Permission denied.

  $ vi
  Hope you’ll enjoy exiting that!

Americans (assuming you are an American) are used to people confirming that they are paying attention throughout the conversation (“Mhm”, “yes”, “I see”, etc.). Russians don’t do that. If they don’t have anything to add, they won’t, unless prompted.

You can just ask if they understood you, agree or disagree. It’s not super common to act like you described, but common enough to be a cultural thing.

I do this sometimes (the silence). I'm not Russian. When people do it to me and I'm really expecting interaction, I explicitly ask "What do you think?"

I know russian and I can confirm this. I started to notice this after living for a few years in a different culture environment. And now after many many years I have feelings similar to yours . I experience a froustration when I get this 'silence' response or no response to be exact.

>Or is this not actually a Russian thing and just an anomaly?

I think it is a "Russian thing". One of them. They would not admit it though because they simply do not notice it or because they do not want to admit.

By the way another "Russian thing" is: Never admit the obvious truth even if it is clearly prestented to them with evidence or even when it does them no harm. It is hard sometimes to understand why they do that because you see no obvious reasons but if you dig deep enough you can find some fear or embarrasment behind it. Unfortunately they would not admit it too.

How about saying something like "That was all, what do you think?". (I'm eastern-european as well :p)

What are you expecting them to do?

I don't think it's a Russian thing (I'm Russian).

It's definitely not a national but a personal trait (I'm native Russian)