CONTEMPORARY RUSSIAN VERB STEMS ENDING IN "I" HAVE TWO VARIANT NONFINAL SUFFIXES TO MARK IMPERFECTIVE ASPECT, "IVAJ" AND "AJ." PURELY PHONOLOGICAL FACTORS DO NOT SEEM TO DETERMINE WHICH PREFIX IS USED AND THERE IS LITTLE EVIDENCE FOR A CAUSAL RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN A PARTICULAR PREFIX AND A PREFERRED SUFFIX. IN MANY CASES THE "IVAJ" SUFFIX IS FOUND WITH THE EAST SLAVIC POLNOGLASIE VERB ROOT AND THE "AJ" SUFFIX WITH THE CORRESPONDING SOUTH SLAVIC/CHURCH SLAVIC FORM. HOWEVER, THIS TREND HAS EXCEPTIONS AND DOES NOT APPLY TO ALL VERBS IN THE SUBCLASS. A WORD COUNT OF ITEMS IN THE ACADEMY OF SCIENCES DICTIONARY SHOWS THAT 48 PERCENT OF THE ITEMS TAKE "IVAJ," 42 PERCENT TAKE "AJ," AND 10 PERCENT TAKE EITHER. ASSUMING THESE FIGURES ARE REPRESENTATIVE OF THE WHOLE SUBCLASS, THE SUFFIX"IVAJ" IS THE PRODUCTIVE IMPERFECTIVIZER AND MAY BE GRADUALLY REPLACING "AJ." ON A PRACTICAL LEVEL, HOWEVER, BOTH ARE IN FREQUENT USE AND NO RULE FOR FORMING THE IMPERFECTIVE OF VERBS IN "I" CAN YET BE DRAWN UP. (JD)