Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[rutsber]

Spoiler: Background (click to show/hide)

I decided a few months ago to learn Japanese. I've been talking with my high school's guidance counselor on ways that I could actually get credit for doing this. We found a few options which she presented to a board of education(?), and they turned down all but one. This option would require me to pay around $4000 to go to a camp over the summer. I don't have nearly that much money, so I asked if I might be able to take the AP test for some form of credit. She said that she would look into it, but sounded doubtful that I would be able to cover the material on my own. I think that I might be able to cover the material on my own time before this spring comes around, but I need some advice. Right now I can read most hiragana from memory, and can write a lot from memory as well. I'm nearly done learning katakana, but memorization will probably take longer because it isn't used as much. I also learned Te-form and a few particles. I do not know any kanji at this point.

Has anyone here learned Japanese, and if so, do you have any advice? Any resources would be great as well.
I have:
Genki and it's workbook
Anki
Rosetta Stone¹
this video series (has swearing)
and I've been looking at the app Human Japanese.

Thanks in advance!

¹ I know it's bad compared to other software and extremely overpriced, but I didn't have to pay for it, and it is decent for learning how to pronounce words.

[Karlito]

As someone who took AP Japanese in High School, I can tell you that the test is ludicrously difficult. You probably don't need to have mastered Japanese to do well on it, but you do probably need like 3000 hours of serious and fairly tedious study. That's 2 hours a day for four years, and I'm not really sure even how far that'd get you without an instructor fluent in Japanese.

[LordBucket]

Has anyone here learned Japanese, and if so, do you have any advice?

Sukoshi demo mada joozu jaa arimasen


Yes. Do two things:

1) Take a class at your local community college. They'll be at night, so they won't interfere with school. They'll be cheap, probably under $200. And they'll definitely give you school credit...since you'l be taking a college course at a college. Yes, you can take college classes while in high school.

2) Get the Pimsleur CD set. It is vastly superior to anything else out on the market because it drills you using complete sentences at conversational speed from day one. It won't give you a huge vocabulary...that's what the class is for. But it will set you on the path to good pronunciation and the ability to listen to, and make sentences without stumbling over every word. If possible, I recommend getting physical CDs rather than torrenting them. Very clear audio is important, and ripped audio tracks tend to be less clear than CD. You don't want to be guessing at vowel sounds because you're listening to  low resolution recording. Try your local public library. Mine has an entire section for language learning CDs. Yours might too.

Incidentally, if you want to try before you buy/acquire, here's lesson 1 on youtube. When you do it...don't just listen. Interact with it. The silent parts are for you to speak aloud. Do that.

I'm nearly done learning katakana

That's not very useful. Katakana is only used for words that aren't native to Japanese and in some cases to emphasize words in marketing copy, sort of like italics. Learn hiragana. It's used for words that are actually Japanese.

I do not know any kanji at this point

Don't worry about that yet. Kanji will be learned as you go while taking the classes. I advise that you don't try to learn kanji on your own. There are some major conceptual things going on that need to be understood. You can't just memorize characters and expect them to mean anything. Kanji doesn't work that way. Unlike English letters, which represent sounds, kanji characters represent ideas. For kanji to make any sense, you'll need to already understand the language and words that the characters relate to.

If you have more specific questions, ask them.

[TSTwizby]

As a person currently in their third year of Japanese classes at a college, who has tried using Rosetta Stone in the past, I can say that the former is likely your best bet and the latter almost worthless after a while. I may not have given it enough of a chance, but Japanese is a very contextual language and context is not something that Rosetta Stone is good at providing.

More specifically, I would recommend looking at/listening to Japanese media from time to time, even if you can't understand it yet, and just give it your best shot. You won't have a clue what's going on the first few times, then you'll notice that some word keeps popping up and look it up, and expand your vocabulary by one, and then you notice that you're seeing a bunch of adjective with 'sa' on the end and so on. I like specifically to memorize songs, which slowly lets me learn the words used in the lyrics (which has had the side effect of, for a while, me knowing that 'ryuusei' means meteor but not knowing how to ask where the bathroom is) and understandably helps with pronunciation. An important thing to keep in mind with regards to anime and the like however is that people in TV shows do not necessarily talk like people in real life.

One website I cannot recommend highly enough is http://jisho.org/, which is a decent free J-E and E-J dictionary as well as a kanji dictionary.

Also:

I'm nearly done learning katakana

That's not very useful. Katakana is only used for words that aren't native to Japanese and in some cases to emphasize words in marketing copy, sort of like italics. Learn hiragana. It's used for words that are actually Japanese.

I must disagree with this. Not learning Katakana is like not learning about capitalization. It doesn't affect most things, but on occasion is very important. With regards to 'actual Japanese' words, is コンピュータ not Japanese just because it has an English cognate? Does that mean 'legion' is not English since it comes straight from the Latin? Also, how about クモガニ?　サバ?　サラ? Not to mention onomatopoeia. Which is Greek, by the way.

[LordBucket]

I must disagree with this. Not learning Katakana is like not learning about capitalization.

Allow me to rephrase with clearer context: I'm not suggesting to never learn it, I'm suggesting that it's low priority, and not something someone new to Japanese needs to do right away. Look at the spoiler tag. The OP appears to have learned most of hiragana and katakana, and is talking about learning kanji, but the extent of his actual language study is "Te-form and a few particles."

So he's probably spent what...a couple weeks? But after all that probably only knows a dozen or two words and can't actually construct a sentence? He'd have learned more in a single night of class, or even just a single half hour Pimsleur lesson.

With regards to 'actual Japanese' words, is コンピュータ not Japanese just because it has an English cognate?
Does that mean 'legion' is not English since it comes straight from the Latin?
Also, how about クモガニ?　サバ?　サラ? Not to mention onomatopoeia. Which is Greek, by the way.

Ok, but what's the goal here? If the goal of a foreign speaker were to "learn to speak useful english" I'd rank words like legion and onomatopoeia as both being extremely low on the priority list. They could safely set things like that aside and not worry about them. Japanese is the same. Yes, there are a few "important" words typically written in katakana. I'll grant you that computer is a useful word. I'll even volunteer トイレ as being probably more important than any of your examples. But most of your examples shouldn't even be written in katakana at all.

how about クモガニ?　サバ?　サラ?

Assuming those aren't typos...I don't know what any of those words are supposed to be, and neither does my dictionary. If you mean mackerel and plate, both of those would be written in hiragana: さば and さら. As for the first one...spidercrab? I can only assume that's a mistype. But if it isn't, none of these words would be written in katakana.

So, yes. computer and toilet are fairly important. And beer. There are a few. But if the goal is to be able to actually speak usefully, then focusing on katakana and loanwords is really not an efficient way to accomplish that.

(which has had the side effect of, for a while, me knowing that 'ryuusei' means meteor
but not knowing how to ask where the bathroom is)

...exactly.

By all means learn katakana. But it's something you can safely do a couple months down the road.

Japanese is a very contextual language and context is not something that Rosetta Stone is good at providing.

I'm inclined to agree on this. I found Rosetta Stone to be pretty much worthless.

[DeKaFu]

My younger sister self-taught herself Japanese so that she could enjoy Japanese games, music, TV shows and manga. Mostly by reading/watching/listening to said games, music, TV shows and manga. While "take Japanese lessons" is excellent advice, it doesn't do much good if none are offered in your area.

I know that one tool she's relied on immensely is JWPce. It's a word processor that supports both English and Japanese, and has a built-in dictionary and kanji-lookup. You can even search for kanji using their component parts and/or stroke number, which is great when you've seen a mystery kanji and want to find out what it is when you have no idea of the reading.

[Il Palazzo]

"Charles Kelly's Online Japanese Language Study Materials"
http://www.manythings.org/japanese/

This site has got a multitude of learning materials and links to even more. Highly recommended, but rather as an addition to a properly structured course book.

[TSTwizby]

クモガニ and サバ are spidercrabs and mackerel, both of which are typically written in katakana, though they are admittedly more obscure words. サラ, a contraction of サラリー, is the colloquial term for a salary-man, significantly more useful. And with respect to onomatopoeia, I was referring to words/phrases such as モグモグ, キラキラ and the like, which are often, though not exclusively, written in katakana. If you actually want to learn Japanese as a language, rather than just learn enough to get by on a vacation trip there, you want to learn the whole language, not just the useful bits. That said, I was indeed misinterpreting your comment, and being unnecessarily aggressive in my response. Sorry.

[rutsber]

snip

It looks as though taking a class is out. The nearest one I found was 3 hours away. I checked out Pimsleur, and I see why you recommended it. It seemed really good to me.

snip

snip

Both of those look useful.

snip

I haven't had a chance to really look at it, but based on the descriptions on the site it will be really helpful for quizzing myself.

[Mlamlah]

I would suggest you start watching japanese television/movies, anime is okay i guess, but not anywhere near as useful. It is very important for you to start getting used to context if you really want to learn japanese, and unless you've got a fluent teacher that's rather difficult. Also keep in mind that if you're relying a lot on translations and subtitles when you are first watching things that the translations often don't mean exactly what a charachter may be saying. There are a lot of culturally specific words and phrases that get glossed over in favour of audience understanding for example. The japanese language is very specific and rich in references that might not initially make sense coming at it from an english understanding, personally i find that part of the fun, but it makes it a lot more time consuming.

[Eagle_eye]

Here's some audio resources from the textbook my japanese class uses: http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/0072408154/student_view0/ . Trying to translate dialogue is good practice.

[rutsber]

I would suggest you start watching japanese television/movies, anime is okay i guess, but not anywhere near as useful. It is very important for you to start getting used to context if you really want to learn japanese, and unless you've got a fluent teacher that's rather difficult. Also keep in mind that if you're relying a lot on translations and subtitles when you are first watching things that the translations often don't mean exactly what a charachter may be saying. There are a lot of culturally specific words and phrases that get glossed over in favour of audience understanding for example. The japanese language is very specific and rich in references that might not initially make sense coming at it from an english understanding, personally i find that part of the fun, but it makes it a lot more time consuming.

I thought that would be useful as well, I just haven't had time to find anything because of school. I'm getting used to things now though, so I should have more time for watching tv/movies.

Here's some audio resources from the textbook my japanese class uses: http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/0072408154/student_view0/ . Trying to translate dialogue is good practice.

That site has a lot of quizzes on it. It looks really useful, thanks.

[Mlamlah]

Depending on your taste in television i could reference you shows and movies i really like, though honestly most of what i watch is pretty girly and silly.

[rutsber]

Depending on your taste in television i could reference you shows and movies i really like, though honestly most of what i watch is pretty girly and silly.

That would be great! I'm not very particular about what I watch, so girly and silly is fine.