Any tips on learning Japanese?

[Zeta]

I've got to take a foreign language to get my liberal arts degree. Nobody wants me to take Spanish, and I can't get the German or French accents down - and I don't particularly like the culture or people anyways. That leaves me with Japanese.

I know some people here have learned it. Any tips or information that would be helpful going into the class?

[Shiksa ♥]

Well, I think it is good if you have roots in another language that is easier, such as spanish. In a way, it teaches you how to learn a foreign language, if that makes sense. Knowing what some grammatical terms mean beforehand can really be a big help.

One way that really helped me learn kana and kanji was Pokemon and Inu-Yasha songs. At the bottom of the screen, there are the lyrics in kanji (except for some Pokemon songs, which are just in kana.) To strengthen my kana, I did was first transliterate the lyrics (write them in roumaji) on a paper. Then I would go somewhere else and write a page in hiragana and then one in katakana. Then I would copy the kanji and kana exactly how it appears in the opening/ending. I have a whole binder full of songs now. XD

What you need to do is just practice. When you learn something, make sure you know for sure that's what it means or how it's used, to avoid learning things wrong. Once you learn some things, listening to Japanese spoken (whether it be from fansubs to radio) is very good to do, especially if whatever has subtitles or otherwise a translation. You can recognize things you know, strengthen pronounciation, and get a hold on usage.

I don't know...hope at least some of that helped. ^^;

[Archaic]

Listening to fansubs, and singing along to karaoke, helped my pronounciation no end.

Any other tips I could give you would be very biased to my own learning style, so I'm afraid you wouldn't find much help from them. While I struggle with vocab and have an easy time with grammer, most people seem to be the reverse.

[Zhen Lin]

Learn the kana first. That will enable you to read the GB(A) Pokémon games without trouble - which could be good practice. Rōmaji come in many, subtly differing variants - it's much easier to understand the rationale behind each one once you learn the kana and sound system of Japanese - for instance, the reason why Nihon-siki uses di for ぢ (ji) and ti for ち (chi), or why zya じゃ is used instead of ja.

Another piece of advice to keep in mind: Japanese is similar and different. Keep an open mind. Not every English concept can be translated into Japanese, and vice versa. Some structures are expressed in the exact reverse order compared to English. Others are similar.

Finally: take the initiative to do some self-study. You're expected to learn an order or two of magnitude faster than a Japanese child without the benefit of total immersion.

[YumeHeart]

Well, first of all, I would say that the more Japanese you listen to, the better. Listening to anime and J-pop helps me a lot-- when I learn new sentences or words, I remember them more easily because I've already heard them. With remembering how to write words, it helps me to think of how many kana are in a word in addition to the word. As in "WA TA SHI is three". Also, keep writing the word over and over again. For me, with Spanish and French, it was easier to learn words by looking at them, but with a different alphabet, it helps me more to write them out. Lastly, I would say don't give up. A lot of people start out being really excited about learning it, but then start giving up on it when sentence structures get hard or they can't remember the kanji. Just keep at it, and you'll keep getting better.

[Quagbert]

May I suggest a few sites I regularly visit? ;-)

http://www.nihongoresources.com/
http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/wwwjdic.html
http://www.thejapanesepage.com/
http://www.guidetojapanese.org/

[Zhen Lin]

Another thing to bear in mind is that if you self study Japanese language, sooner or later you'll have to learn the traditional Japanese grammatical model. It's mostly terminology differences - like 連用形 ren'yōkei "continuative form" vs. pre-masu form, or 五段動詞 godan dōshi "5-grade verb" vs. Group I verb. It is most likely that you'll encounter the western terms.

Also, you will most likely be learning desu-masu language (丁寧語 teineigo "polite language") first, so don't despair if at first glance "real" Japanese looks nothing like what you learn.

[inu-liger]

And here's something that helps: If you know the Spanish vowels (a, e, i, o, u) and how they're pronounced, you're pretty much set there as they are pronoucned the exact same way (except 'u' is more silent, and does not involve rounding the lips when pronouncing it).

Also, the Japanese language does not have the letter 'l' in their system, even though the pronounciation of 'r' tends to be leaned more towards the way 'l' is pronounced, in a sort of "half-way combination" style, in other words l and r combined halfway.
Like for example, my real name "Richard" would probably sometimes be pronounced "Lichaado", but not with a full 'l' accent, but again a combined pronounciation of the two above mentioned letters, so it would SORT of be pronounced like "Lrichard", except not completely the way this last spelling would imply. Do you understand what I mean here?

It helps too if you watch fansubs, DVD's, or even listen to songs (while reading the romanji lyrics) too in Japanese, as you can easily pick up their way of pronouncing words and letters.

Heck, I've literally watched SO much anime, and listen to Japanese music 75-85% of the time now (partly cos I hate American pop music like Ashlee, Britney, and all their crap filler), that my pronounciation of 'r' has actually been heavily leaning way more to the Japanese way of pronouncing it, so I can't really change that if I wanted to without stressing it.
Not that I WANT to change it back, mind you, cos I still intend on learning and speaking good Japanese eventually!

That, and my pronounciation in Spanish, I'm told, is very good - if not, almost excellent(!) (although speaking actual Spanish is another thing, LOL! I've not had much practice, I can tell you that much!), so that helps, because partly I have a great ear for details, and I actually hate it when people don't pronounce Spanish properly (listening to my fellow students in Spanish was torture to me!).
And the vowels being the same, pronounciation wise, in both Spanish and Japanese really helps.

I tried learning French, and I could not grasp it at all, sadly enough. I hated it.


Another thing I don't ever really tell people is, is that at one time I apparently spoke some German when I was little and we were living in Germany for a few years after I was born (from 1986-1991, 1986 being my birth year, and 1991 when we moved back to Canada, where I was born originally). But sadly I don't remember any of that, but I think it helped my being able to pick up on accents and pronounce them almost perfectly and effortlessly.

But that's just me!

[Shiksa ♥]

Actually, the 'e' is much different in Japanese and Spanish.

[Zhen Lin]

The /i/ and /u/ of Japanese tend to devoice in unvoiced environments. This means that to the untrained ear, it sounds dropped altogether. (It isn't.) The /u/ is not entirely unrounded, but it's not quite rounded either. What's more: rounded /u/ is found in some dialects - generally the Western ones. Okinawan Japanese is said to have completely rounded /u/.

The /r/ of Japanese is said to be a (lateral) alveolar tap. The /r/ of Spanish is also an alveolar tap, but not lateral. (Spanish <rr> is an alveolar trill.) You may be able to get away with a Korean /r/.

Other difficult sounds in Japanese (for English speakers) are /ts/ and any palatalised consonants (except <ch> /tS/, <sh> /S/ and <j> /dZ/ - although the English ones are a little more forward on the palate than the Japanese ones). The long vowels and geminate consonants (/pp/, /tt/, /kk/, /mm/, /nn/, /ss/) might be a problem - but it's one of the easiest to get over.

One thing that might be extremely difficult to master is the moraic /n/. At the ends of words, it may vary between a uvular nasal or a nasal vowel, or just a plain alveolar /n/. For instance, Gion may sound like Giõ or Gioũ to a Portuguese-speaking person. Before /p b m/ it tends to become /m/ itself. Before /t d n/ it will be a plain /n/. Before /k g/ it will be a velar /N/ (<ng> in English). Elsewhere, it tends to be a nasal vowel. Remarkably, this is very similar to French treatment of <n m>.

[AbareMax]

Zeta, let me tell you that learning English would have been a nightmare if I didn't somewhat immerse myself (7 years of study!). Being a native Italian, I had to start English from scratch. I suggest to you, that you try and find someone either online or outside of school that could help you with Japanese. Immerse yourself into the culture and speaking aspects as much as you can.

Most of the suggestions mention are what I used, and they could surely be used for you!

I hope this helped,

AbareMax

[FireEmblemSP]

I learned Kana through repeated exposure. Playing Japanese Resident Evil games (BioHazard) introduced me to Kana and I memorized all of them over time as I looked at the charts over and over again. When taking a shower, I'd mark Kana on the steamed shower door with my index finger to practice. It took me awhile, since it wasn't structured and quite random, but I learned Kana - I completely mastered writing and reading it in the fall of 2004.

Like Archaic, the grammar makes a lot of sense to me but vocabulary has always been my weak side. I tend to learn things easier by taking it one at a time.

I haven't taken actual Japanese classes myself but will do so in the fall.

[Jedi_Amara]

I always wanted to learn Japanese but my school didn't offer it. Basically, I can read kana but I have no idea what it means XD. And no idea of grammar :)

[Shiksa ♥]

Just because your school doesn't offer it doesn't mean there is no way for you to learn it. You can read dictionaries (before the definitions), compare translations with songs or manga, and local community colleges often offer Japanese.

[Crystal Clair]

Hey, I've been trying to learn Japanese for about two years. I know about or more than 5 percent of the 2500 kanji and I practice. I know lots of Japanese Pokemon songs, watched lots of Japanese Pokemon eppies and even the 6th movie and the hosos in Nihongo. I also have a Japanese Leafgreen game.
I'd suggest all of the above for my tip. I'm actually learning Japanese at my pace so I dont force myself but consider it more of a pastime. And hey, now because of that, I can get around Pokesho! XD But I have to read out the kana and some of the kanji that I know unless it's like katakana or a word or name I know.
Oh yeah, write kana and kanji over and over again. I swear, if you do it for like an hour or two one night and the next morning, do more, you will actually memorize it.

[Jedi_Amara]

I never really had time to pursue learning languages outside of school, since I was always very busy with music. Someday I *will* learn Japanese.

[Artruis]

I recently bought a book "The Complete Idiot's giude to Conversational Japanese" and it says that the 5 most important things are:"

1. Be confident
2. Be brave
3. Be persistent
4. Be creative
5. Be Japanese

In other words, don't fear mistakes, try and use things you have learned to apply to completely new circumstance, and also act Japanese, (please note, I do not speak Japanese, I have just started working on the book, but they seemed good ideas)

Cheers Liam

[Zhen Lin]

Liam must be a very common name in Australia, seeing as I've encountered three on this very board already...

[Artruis]

Lol, not really, I only know one other Liam here in Australia, (a guy in my French class)...oh, and there's like a supervisor at work who occasionaly comes in and checks to make sure we're keeping to Baker's Delight standards who is called Liam.

I always thought it was a more uncommon name, lol, I guess it isn't too bad, 3 people is a fair few in a smallish community.

Cheers Liam

[FireEmblemSP]

Zhen Lin, I'm just curious; are you a Chinese living in Japan? Born in Japan or outside of it?

[Zhen Lin]

I'm Chinese, and have been to Japan a grand total of 3 times - about 2 weeks in total.

My location, as given in the forum profile, is more or less accurate and correct.

[Zhen Lin]

Recently, I've been introduced to #LearnJapanese on Rizon (irc.rizon.net) - there are basically two games: shiritori, and quizzes. It's somewhat fun.

[Archaic]

I've never met another Liam IRL in my life, though I did know a Liem (Vietnamese guy) in Primary School.

To my knowledge, there's only two Liam Pomfret's in the entire world. The other is in Northallerton, in England.

[Selphie Sanctuary]

If you are the kind who likes watching anime series in japanese, with subtitles, then you have no problem...

If you are also the type who likes listening in japanese music, then that's a perk too...

Well, based from experience since I know a little bit... Don't ask me to write in japanese because that, I don't know.. XP