Learning Japanese
Okay! I know this might sounds crazy and I know I may not be able to make much progress, but I am going to give it a try. Mind you I have tried to learn a new language as an adult, Spanish (!), and I couldn't make enough progress and sort of given up lately. That doesn't mean, I won't try it back up again, but right now that is the status. I have been interested in Japanese culture for a long time (yeah Pokemon, Anime, Studio Ghibli etc). However, I started reading a lot of Japanese literature (English translations) during the pandemic. So finally I thought I am going to give it try, knowing that it is not an easy language to muster. I am multi-lingual though (I am fluent in three, English, Hindi, and Bengali), I am told that always helps: who knows!
Image Created by Leonardo
Language learning is nothing new in my family. This is mostly because of our day job in oil & gas. My wife has Duolingo on her phone for a long time, and also Babbel. She can speak and read passable French, Russian and Arabic, all of that she self taught herself. It is mostly for survival (perhaps immersive a little bit), however, I haven't been so fortunate. Back in the days, I was mostly working in countries that read and writes English, as least as the official language. So I didn't have that need. Now, I am finding I do need to pick up on my language skills mostly for hobby and not work. Let me start with Japanese!
Resources
These days free resources are plentiful and overwhelming. After just a bit of search I quickly landed on some excellent resources.
NHK World is a great place to start, I am told by multiple people, community and message boards. It is free, and Japanese national broadcasting agency (I know about NHK for a very long time), so I am sure there is certain level of quality there. After spending about an hour on the site, I am already familiar with the first concept that Japanese language has three different types of characters: Hiragana, Katakana, and Kanji. Wow! That is going to be easy!!
Next is Japanpod101 website. This is extensive, and partly free to the best of my initial understanding. I am really enjoying this 4 hours long YouTube video!
Don't worry, there are chapter to navigate, and they are typically 10-15 min long each, and you can go back to it.
Next is the Kana iphone App to practice the letters on your phone. I also have paper and pencil, and I am practicing the characters.
There is also a conventional text book that a lot of people are talking about. It is called Genki. I have downloaded the text book, and associated companion audio app. However, I haven't spend any time on it.
In addition to all that, I also have Duolingo, but I am not sure how much I am going to gain from it. My point is, this is already a lot of resources, and they are all rather good. The question obviously is how quickly I will be able to absorb some of that.
Wish me luck!
When I was in college, I bought the Standard Japanese textbook, planning to teach myself Japanese. But I gave up after just one lesson.
After I started working, our company had deep and extensive collaborations with Japanese companies like Sony Ericsson and Canon, so we were assigned a Japanese teacher to help us learn the language. However, every time we got to Lesson 4, I just couldn’t keep up — it was quite embarrassing.
Many years have passed, and I’ve completely given up on the idea of learning Japanese.
Nowadays, learning a new language is so much easier than it was 20 years ago — there are countless online resources available. I sincerely wish you success in your self-study of Japanese.
By the way, have you ever considered learning Chinese? Haha.
You know it is really funny that you say that, because I was considering Chinese also, because of Kanji characters.
They are all originally Chinese, right?
Even the Hiragana is simplified Chinese characters!
So I am sincerely surprised how is that difficult for a native Chinese speaker to learn Japanese?!
Japanese is deeply influenced by Chinese, but in essence, it’s completely different from Chinese.
Although Japanese uses a large number of Chinese characters, its overall system is based on kana.
Each Chinese character carries a specific meaning, and when combined, the overall meaning still relates closely to the individual characters. In contrast, individual kana in Japanese have no meaning on their own.
The grammatical structure of Japanese is also entirely different from that of Chinese.
In short, for me, Japanese is just way too difficult — hahaha!
Ok. In that case I have hope for Chinese! Thank you! :)
By the way, I am not trying to learn like a tourist. I am trying to learn like a Japanese kid. Writing and grammar.
Practicing on my phone right now
Keep it up, and wish you success!
Good luck! You'll have fun no matter the level of competency you achieve. Learning a language is the best way to understand culture.
So many intersections here with my interests: Back in the '80s I wrote a long paper on Kagaro Nikki sp.? (in English, the Gossamer Years). And I had a good friend in a writer group who got me interested in Bengali Culture. I actually wrote a small book on Rabindranath Tagore for children--I figured American children would probably never hear of him otherwise. 😃
I love languages...only fluent in English, but took enough courses in Spanish and German to get teaching certification in those two languages. I never did teach them, but it amused me to be certified.
You see the intersections?
Have fun! I've read a lot of Japanese literature (mostly classic) but never was inclined to try the language. Now Chinese....😂
Well, maybe someday we can talk about Ravi Thakur :) as we fondly call him.
I am a native Bengali speaker and I have read all his prose/novel, can't say I even read most of his poetry because the sheer volume of that stuff!!
My older daughter is named after one of his poems :)
Camellia.
I learned a lot by reading about him. A window into a certain time in India's history. Also, his thoughts on education were way ahead of the times, I think, and influence education to this day.
Bengal renaissance!
Created the backbone of modern India.
And yet, if I say his name to anybody I know, I get a blank stare...amazing.
PS
Except my family...I bore them by talking about stuff that interests me :)
His house at Jorasanko still exists in north Calcutta. Now is the time of puja so they still have their family puja, although you do know his family is not Hindu :)
They were Bhrambha!
But they still did the traditional Durga Puja. It’s quite famous. I visited his home many times.
This is from this year, last week :)
Knock yourself out!
This is in English and well narrated.
The first one was entertaining, but the second one was lovely. All the reading I did about Tagore and I never got this view of his home and his life. Lovely.
Thank you!
Japanese pod 101 is an excellent YouTube site, you can learn a lot just there.
頑張って！
Yeah. I have learned most of it so far from there in the last few hours!
すごい！
(Sugoi)
Awesome
Trouble is, this is also Sugoi
凄い
they say if you know kanji it is better to use it, What do I know? :)
If you go to Japan you will hear that word frequently tossed around. If a Japanese person is texting or writing informally, すごい is the most common way. If you are reading a book, then the kanji version is more likely. Super fun language to learn as a hobby!
I find it fascinating that in Japan nobody likely says when introducing yourself:
My name is John Wick!
However, that is what a lots of books tell you.
I know in Bengali if you say that people will likely chuckle.
We say I'm John Wick!
Or just John Wick!... (now run for you life or I will shoot you!)lol
I am leaning that native Japanese are just that way.
Usually they will introduce themselves last name first followed by desu. In casual informal settings, I found there can be a lot of fun in their responses, as they try and speak English back to you. Often laughter and smiles follow. The Japanese do like to have fun and laugh a lot.
I love learning languages. It's one of the biggest advantages of our times to have so many tools and websites and all that available. Immersing into a culture in their own language has a totally different feeling, there's a deeper understanding waiting.
I'm still waiting for Kichwa to arrive on Duolingo, as I'm not yet at the point to squeeze classes into my schedules again. Lily is learning it at school, and so far, I can understand what they're learning there - her real name is a Kichwa word, too. She's bilingual now, and additionally learns Kichwa and English in school, and is exposed to both languages outside of school, too. I was able to pass my interest in languages on to her, and I think that is one of the greatest gifts that she got from me. She's always curious. Always asking which language I was speaking (usually when it's polish or french), and wanting to know a word or two. Languages open so many doors. Literally and figuratively.
So, I wish you all the best on your Japanese journey! As soon as I can speak for 2 minutes in polish, my next endeavor will probably be a language from Asia. But that might take a while, polish is really breaking my brain.
Thank you. I had no idea there are so many people here interested in Japanese language! The response so far is overwhelming! I was in fact hesitating which community I should put this post in. In the end it matters little but still. Hopefully I can keep up.
You're basically your own community now 😅 Japan has made quite the dent in modern culture, as you hint in your post, with Pokemon and Anime in general. Maybe the newest generation is more interested in Korea, but for me, it was Japan. Which reminds me that I still have a lot of One Piece to read...
Ah! Thank you for saying that! I am touched!
Well. Luck!! First of all.
Japanese is attactive to me as well, I gave it a try first to German, it's been a bit difficult though I have or better had made some small steps progress supported by Duolingo, a bit of babbel and a book I uave with some disks. I stopped a couple of months ago though. The plans I had that requires german are frozen for now, maybe forever, who knows. Now I think I want to learn it just for hobby, but I'll probably need Portuguese as well.
Anyway, Spanish is my home language and it's hard as hell. I can manage english a bit, let's see if I can get t9 the other 2 in time.
Spanish wasn’t hard at least at the basic conversational level. However, for some reason I lost motivation.
Well, without motivation it's hard going ahead. Spanish is beautiful, but I like english more.
Greetings.
You’re doing the right thing by learning some Japanese. Supposedly, everyone in Japan knows English, but in reality, they speak it very, very poorly, and it’s hard to understand them. It’s like Japenglish (if that’s even a real thing). After spending enough time there, you start picking up some words — the most useful ones (though I’ve already forgotten them all). In fact, I was always with an interpreter, which was expensive and quite annoying. So your interest is genuine and will be very useful.
I hope you get back to Spanish soon. I’ll say goodbye in it. 😁
Bueno mi hermano, date un abrazo acere. Saludotes desde Cuba la bella. La perla del Caribe. Cuídate mucho, que de los buenos quedan pocos. Bye
Thank you for saying this.
My wife went to school in Miami for a time (many moons ago). She used to live in Calle Ocho, the other Cuba if you know what I mean. We have many Cuban friends although I have never been to Cuba.
If 8th Street is a clone of Cuba, but without misery hahahaha, well I hope one day you can get to know the original even if it is not so beautiful. The hearts are the same.
I wish that my english would be fluent but I am unlikely to ever travel outside of Lithuania so it is not very likely that I will need it. I understand anime/ manga/ tv shows/ games/ Hive posts well enough. But I make mistakes when I write. And my spoken english is basically non existent at this point because I have not spoken english in years.
Anyway good luck learning Japanese. I think that it is a cool language to know just because some great manga are not printed in english.(I believe that for instance both One Outs and Liar game are only sold in Japanese versions. At least I was not able to find them in english...)
Well with internet and many free resources, now language learning is easier than ever. Only need time and mental stamina!
One of my regrets in life is not applying myself at school and learning Irish properly.
The problem is that it is compulsory all through school, it's a core subject you can't skip (core are English, Irish and Maths, the others you can pick and choose in later secondary school), because it was compulsory and taught in a rather old fashioned rote-learning manner, naturally any kid would reject it to some extent. Now after 14yrs you'd think something would stick, alas , very little.
I blame the teaching system that was rooted in a very boring and old style. Contrast to French which I started to learn at 12, we had tapes, videos, conversational sessions it was fun and alluring, within two years my French was better than my Irish.
I've taken more of an interest as I've become older and further from home, maybe a bit of an identity crisis :-).
It's on the cusp of a living language, my nephews live close to a Gaeltacht area ( no English spoken) and have attended a school that only speaks and teaches through Irish, they will continue through to university age in that manner.
So, about time I rolled up my sleeves as it were and rinne rionnt oibre ( did some work :-) )
When we were in school there were a lot of teachers who did not know how to teach. The curriculum also wasn't geared towards 'how to teach'. I remember that I hated history. However, as an adult, after watching history channel and movies over number of years, I find history to be fascinating. Who doesn't?!
Unfortunately, at higher lvl history was paired against Physics. After 15 I had to choose and it was science all the way. Biology ran up against another favourite , Economics and Chemistry ousted Accounting, such a shame to have to choose at such a young age, but at least there was a good general base up to 15
I'm learning it too. I suggest starting with Duolingo to build some vocabulary and basic grammar points. Then go to youtube lessons on Minna No Nihonggo for better grammar.
edit: I found my old post about Duolingo
https://peakd.com/hive-152546/@logen9f/learning-nihongo-with-duolingo-how-good-is-it
Oh! That is good resource! Thank you!
Would love to learn a language and have Duolingo installed and use it quite often but as soon as I close the app my brain goes blank!
Duoliongo alone is rarely enough. You must supplement it some conversational and writing/grammar things.
Yes, it’s hard to get conversational Spanish in the UK but it’s definitely the only way I’ll get it to sink in
Try AI tools like Pimsleur. They have AI coaches that they claim are better than Human.
Thanks I’ll take a look
I'm envious of anyone who speaks more than one language! I'm one of those awful Antipodeans that never thought they'd need another language, growing up. Conceited and parochial to say the least, and I wish my parents had insisted on at least one language. What are your thoughts on the AI conversation way of learning a language? I see them advertised a lot but I'm not convinced. Every time I've tried to learn a new language I've failed miserably. I am great at recognising words when I read them eg street signs, menus etc, but putting it all together to speak? No freaking way.
You must learn multiple languages, it is NOT optional :)
AI is very good as a trainer and teacher for adults (not good for kids, yet!).
Both Duolingo and Pimsleur(which is very good) uses AI effectively.
I've been learning Japanese seriously for the last 2 weeks using duolingo, got added to a friends family plan so I get premium for free basically, Gives me extra incentive to use it often since I'm mooching off of someone else.
It slow progress as I'm only doing one or two exercises a day but it's started to stick.
I think once I'm past the most basics of stuff and reasonably comfortable with hiragana I'll start added other resources into the mix like NHK world and some other sites I've been recommended.
My reason is also because I indulge in Japanese Culture on the daily watching anime and the likes.
I hope to at least get to a point where I can comfortably use Japanese mostly in reading, then I think my progress will speed up as I expose myself to more and more Japanese content.
Duolingo is great for building vocabulary but slow on grammar. I have been studying with duolingo but got frustrated since I can't understand Japanese when watching TV series or anime. Then I went to learn youtube which teaches better grammar points.
I am practicing Hiragana, as I write this. It is hard!
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/lesson/en/letters/hiragana.html
Good luck with learning Japanese. I've been using Duolingo to help me learn Spanish, I find it helps with vocabulary but not so much with conversation.
You might find this article useful for additional language learning tips.
tips are always good, the main difficulty is to put those tips into action
Yes, action is where the results happen.
Good luck! I am using duolingo to try to learn japanese, I also know a bunch of langugages including one with non-latin characters. And I don't want to scare you but Kana is challenging!! since they have symbols for single vowels but also for consonant-vowel combination lol like ka , sa etc. I am suffering a bit, lol maybe have your smartphone close to you to help you in your day a day life
You can't scare me :)
At my age and stage of life I am not easily scared :) I only started so ignorance is bliss.
You are used to other languages that is good, because you know that it can be different from all the other languages! Also something that I am learning how to deal is the order of the elements of the sentences change a bit, the verb is coming after the subject and adjective. It is an interesting language, I just started because we hosted a Japanese student at home this year and I got curious about it.
SOV
That's the model.
You really are going for it, learning to write as well!!!
It helps an awful lot if you have a hobby to push you to learn a new language, plus your imminent trip.
I'm trying to learn Spanish at moment, it started off quite well and I tried to learn at least an hour a day when I startes, but I've dropped the ball recently and sometimes don't go on my apps for a few days. They keep on telling me I'm going to lose my streak, but tbh, I'm not bothered about keeping my streak.
Yeah! In fact I should have done it years ago.
Yes, I must read and write. I am not doing this for tourism, although that helps a lot in the rural areas, where I will be most of the time.
But no. I want to read Kafka on the shore in original! Someday!
It's definitely crazy how many resources there are now. Back in the day it was mostly just books. I don't really even think they had videos until later on.
Yes, right now it is overwhelming! It's almost like way too much free resources
I guess that's probably not a bad thing though!
Nihongo o manabu wakai gakusei no minasan, ganbattekudasai!
we are hardly young
Rōjin
With your multilingual background, it seems your passion for the culture and literature will give you with a strong foundation ;)
Will see how it goes.
Anki is another good app. It is free on Android, $20 on iPhone, free on the PC, free on the web, and all of them sync to each other (the iOS one is more or less only pay because the community begged the author, who has been making the app for free for over 20 years, to allow them to pay as a thank you). It is maybe the best flashcard app around, based on the spaced repetition idea.