| I took a year of it in my freshman year, but I moved to a school where they didn't have it the year after that. I did learn the Hiragana and Katakana along with grammar and some Kanji, though. And of course I know like 200+ words simply from watching anime. |
| Sore wa kawaidarou. StarBurzt said: You make it sound likes its not already that desu.Are you satan... Just imagine people trying to talk japanese while only knowing a few words... Mal would become like a weeaboo gathering place. |
| Nah, not really interested in learning Japanese, just subconsciously picked it up over the years I guess. I'd rather not ascend to the pinnacle of weeaboo status if at all possible. |
| My school provides a Japanese Class all the way to Jap.5. Dont worry my teacher is from Japan :D Im in Jap.3 Right now. Guess im lucky XD |
| I would be learning japanese because where i live its very useful, But i'm already learning chinese, Plus the little japanese i know from watching anime is already getting mixed up with chinese, remember people DO NOT learn two languages at one time its very confusing. oh and I live in an asian country where there are alot of chinese and japanese people so its useful :D I can understand a japanese coversation even though i have never had a lesson :D :D XD |
| NatalieS |
| The problem with learning Japanese is the Kanji (obviously). I don't necessarily mind the grammar, because tbh English grammar is much more vexing. However, having to memorize 2000 Chinese characters along with all of their Kunyomi/Onyomi, usages in compounds, and English meanings is simply a daunting task, plain and simple. The system of Kanji (and Chinese characters in general) is far too outdated. But oh well, gotta make do with what you got. It's going to be a difficult journey, just gotta persevere. |
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| If I could speak any language fluently, it would honestly be French, not Japanese. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against Japanese, it's just not a beautiful sounding language to me. French, Italian, and even Spanish all sound beautiful when they're spoken. Japanese? Sounds like a bunch of gibberish. |
 "Haunted by darkness... Cursed by light... I am Jyakotu." |
Kyuutoryuu said: The problem with learning Japanese is the Kanji (obviously). I don't necessarily mind the grammar, because tbh English grammar is much more vexing. However, having to memorize 2000 Chinese characters along with all of their Kunyomi/Onyomi, usages in compounds, and English meanings is simply a daunting task, plain and simple. The system of Kanji (and Chinese characters in general) is far too outdated. But oh well, gotta make do with what you got. It's going to be a difficult journey, just gotta persevere. I know what mean. |
Kyuutoryuu said: The problem with learning Japanese is the Kanji (obviously). I don't necessarily mind the grammar, because tbh English grammar is much more vexing. However, having to memorize 2000 Chinese characters along with all of their Kunyomi/Onyomi, usages in compounds, and English meanings is simply a daunting task, plain and simple. The system of Kanji (and Chinese characters in general) is far too outdated. But oh well, gotta make do with what you got. It's going to be a difficult journey, just gotta persevere. Read this article, and maybe your opinion about kanji will change. http://www.gaiwa.co/2014/05/3-ways-kanji-are-more-effective-than.html Kanji is interesting once you start learning it. 木 this is a tree. |
| 日本語で話してみとうございます、なにとぞ私どもにご連絡をくださいませ。 |
| I think it's fun to pick up the most often used pleasantries/phrases via anime. But in terms of a dedicated plan to learn the language? No thanks. Unless you plan to be immersed and use it on a consistent basis you're just going to forget it, especially in the beginning. I studied Chinese in college and have forgotten most of it, esp the characters which are a fucking nightmare. |
| 2011から毎日日本語を勉強しています。それでも私の文法は酷いです。 日本人と話す時、恥ずかしになる。 日本語を練習することが大好きです。 今、四千言ごろ日本語の言葉を勉強しました。 毎日十言の新しい単語を習います。 Learning Kanji isn't the half of it :( I find it very fun though, understanding just a few sentences in an anime or something makes me feel so proud. Once I hit approximately 3000 vocabulary words I started understanding good chunks of what I hear but I am still far from proficient. |
| Here some short awesome video's to encourage you to learn to speak Japanese: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFyZL4-sYJU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dlXWuiysQQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKJ_o1ww8w8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hi10MGQkAhM Whaaaaaa, you just can't resist learning Japanese after you've (seen)heard this :D |
“The One With The Stronger Heart, Always Wins The Battle!!!”  [i]Let's Go Out of Here..... Together..... (Yes, that red-car with a mustache is my car :D ) |
| Damn the op is so cool. I want to be like him and never give up on stuff. |
| As part of our curriculum, we had to learn Japanese. Most gave up on it by about year 10. Including myself because I'm so damn edgy I don't need classes it didn't fit in my schedule. |
| Practice is the keyword, Kanji is hard, anytips anyone? |
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greatyu said: Practice is the keyword, Kanji is hard, anytips anyone? http://ankisrs.net/ Anki= forced daily practice. It is perfect for some people. I use it for vocab and for kanji. If you want to get reading ASAP then you may just go on to vocab and memorize kanji compounds instead of individual kanji which in many cases is like learning letters of the alphabet in that you won't learn to speak or read by just knowing the letters. I learned the 1000 kanji that japanese students learn in school in grades 1-6. After the first 1000 I jumped in to vocabulary and pretty much learn the high school kanji through their use in words. It won't teach you to write them but for all applications besides physically writing out kanji it will serve you well. |
| This is from an older thread which went to shit and was deleted afterwards: i sure did, like oi oi, baka, sou da yo also more difficult like watashi wa kawaii desu ka im sure i'll learn even more It's the only quote I've ever saved to my hard drive. |
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| Kanji isn't that hard. It's less a matter of difficulty and more a matter of it being time-consuming. A lot of them you can learn just by seeing them so many times. 家, 声, 光, 夢, 話 and so on. It's more important that you recognise words rather than individual kanji, anyway. I can instantly recognise 記憶 but I don't know what the heck either of those kanji represent. |
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| I think this entire idea that people suddenly want to know Japanese is an idea that's been conjured up in the minds of the Nipponophiles on this site. I don't know a single person I went to university with that ever took Japanese. Mandarin? Yes. A lot of Mandarin. Korean a bit too. French, Spanish, even German and Arabic - never Japanese. |
| Anyone who doesn't hate anime hasn't watched enough anime. - Anonymous |
greatyu said: Practice is the keyword, Kanji is hard, anytips anyone? A lot of ways to learn them, but the Heisig method is most probably the best one. |
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greatyu said: Practice is the keyword, Kanji is hard, anytips anyone? I can highly recommend wanikani for anyone learning kanji. It utilizes a spaced repetition system with mnemonics made from radicals to get them down. I'm currently about 1/3 way through. |
Lelion said: Isn't that just Anki with fancy colors and buttons though?greatyu said: Practice is the keyword, Kanji is hard, anytips anyone? I can highly recommend wanikani for anyone learning kanji. It utilizes a spaced repetition system with mnemonics made from radicals to get them down. I'm currently about 1/3 way through. |
Lelion said: greatyu said: Practice is the keyword, Kanji is hard, anytips anyone? I can highly recommend wanikani for anyone learning kanji. It utilizes a spaced repetition system with mnemonics made from radicals to get them down. I'm currently about 1/3 way through. How is it in comparison to genki's one for kanji? Do you know about it? |
EucliJul 9, 2014 1:23 PM
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| People learning all in roumaji are worse than the ones dropping it at alphabet level. I'm learning since January but it feels like I know nothing :/. I'm currently at 560 kanji but probably forgot 30-40 now. |
WJB said: Kyouraku-san said: People learning all in roumaji are worse than the ones dropping it at alphabet level. I'm learning since January but it feels like I know nothing :/. I'm currently at 560 kanji but probably forgot 30-40 now. Doesn't matter how slowly you learn as long as you have good retention. I smashed through 40 Kanji a day then realised I was missing reviews to an unacceptable level. I found a sweet spot of ~15-20 per day with an average of 2-3 hours study to incorporate new cards and review older ones. But in the end, it doesn't really matter how slowly or quickly you learn if you aren't putting what you know to use. Reading frequently is important once you have a good base of Kanji to work with. I have a hard time believing even 15/day, for long term retention esp. That's over 5400/yr. I know people who've studied in Japan/China for 10yrs, and they don't consider themselves expert by any means. |
| I'm actually majoring in Japanese, and it's kind of funny to see how many people I started with in my 101 or 102 classes have now dropped out of the program. Then again, languages are all I really care to learn and I pick them up fairly quickly, Japanese being my 5th. |
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nucleon said: Memorize the basic radicals, they consist of both meaning and pronunciation - radicals help you guess how to pronounce sometimes. Kanji relies heavily on writing compared to alphabets. Kids learn them by writing the words repeatedly, starting from the simple ones and their names, then the common words. Dictation is important if you want to enforce revision with concentration. Writing helps providing an additional input for your memory, apart from seeing and reading it out. I can tell you even if you have grad from high institutions, if you don't repeat writing them, you will forget a whole lot of them. You don't know what you have forgotten. Seeing is not enough. Computer input in recent years does help people to cheat as it provides a lot of hints. Still, if users are not allowed to use input by pronunciation, they can have difficulties of finding words. Even if they know the words and are able to write it out, they may still write it wrongly in the smaller parts. Kids will also memorize a whole paragraph of tens to hundreds of words and write them out, starting from primary schools. It's far easier than memorizing random vocab in batch. Listen to that guy, he knows what he's saying. Stopping reviewing them, even if you read them often afterward, and you'll slowly forget more and more of them. Also, like said before in this thread. Memorizing kanji isn't especially difficult. But it's time consuming, and like said above, worst thing about it is that it doesn't really have an end since you're kind of forced to review them on a regular basis or you'll forget more and more. |
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Gymkata said: WJB said: Doesn't matter how slowly you learn as long as you have good retention. I smashed through 40 Kanji a day then realised I was missing reviews to an unacceptable level. I found a sweet spot of ~15-20 per day with an average of 2-3 hours study to incorporate new cards and review older ones. But in the end, it doesn't really matter how slowly or quickly you learn if you aren't putting what you know to use. Reading frequently is important once you have a good base of Kanji to work with. I have a hard time believing even 15/day, for long term retention esp. That's over 5400/yr. I know people who've studied in Japan/China for 10yrs, and they don't consider themselves expert by any means. Using spaced repetition software daily can overcome the issue. I finished adding new kanji to my decks a year ago (the reviews continue though) and it isn't very often that I can't recognize the kanji that I am presented from that deck. Using mnemonics including using radicals or any other methods to relate a story to the kanji identifying the meaning that can be gathered from the kanji components (radicals) can solidify them into your short term memory but the idea is to use the story until you link the kanji directly to the meaning. Anyway, I started learning kanji using that method 2 years ago at a rate of 10 new kanji per day and though the mnemonics I used to memorize them have faded, I still recall the meaning correctly 92 percent of the time (according to the software). Intervals between reviews are dictated by the software based on how well you recall them. I have yet to see how well I recall them after 12+ months but many of them that I am seeing for the first time in months I have no trouble recalling. Basically Anki is really awesome for this kind of stuff (most people use it in conjunction with the Heisig method and a lot of decks are modeled after the heisig method) |
| I've tried teaching myself japanese, but i have a hard time learning on my own. |
Chopstick said: Gymkata said: I have a hard time believing even 15/day, for long term retention esp. That's over 5400/yr. I know people who've studied in Japan/China for 10yrs, and they don't consider themselves expert by any means. Using spaced repetition software daily can overcome the issue. I finished adding new kanji to my decks a year ago (the reviews continue though) and it isn't very often that I can't recognize the kanji that I am presented from that deck. Using mnemonics including using radicals or any other methods to relate a story to the kanji identifying the meaning that can be gathered from the kanji components (radicals) can solidify them into your short term memory but the idea is to use the story until you link the kanji directly to the meaning. Anyway, I started learning kanji using that method 2 years ago at a rate of 10 new kanji per day and though the mnemonics I used to memorize them have faded, I still recall the meaning correctly 92 percent of the time (according to the software). Intervals between reviews are dictated by the software based on how well you recall them. I have yet to see how well I recall them after 12+ months but many of them that I am seeing for the first time in months I have no trouble recalling. Basically Anki is really awesome for this kind of stuff (most people use it in conjunction with the Heisig method and a lot of decks are modeled after the heisig method) Ahh recognition--gotcha. I thought we were referring to the ability to write it too, which was required in my college. Big difference. |
| To type in kanji requires knowing how it sounds (which basically means how to write it in kana) and basic recognition of the kanji in the compounds you use so you know you aren't typing homonyms of the words you intend to write. But hand-writing kanji (which was essentially most of what we did in my japanese classes) is far more difficult than just recalling. Recalling the kanji given a card showing you the meaning will emulate writing the kanji to some degree, some people recommend studying these "recall" cards by writing out the kanji either on your palm with your finger or by physically writing them out. I don't do that because i did for the first few hundred kanji I studied and it took 2-3 times longer than just learning to recognize. Basically I am sacrificing the ability to hand write kanji that I learn. So I wouldn't say that a person who really wants to couldn't learn to recognize and hand-write 15 kanji per day long-term but they would be studying for far longer than I do each day (anki says I averaged 30 minutes per day for the last 2 years). Actually the people on the forums that I am going to post a link to would probably say that is not a lot, they are nuts. Some of the people who make the popular Japanese decks in Anki post general Japanese study guides there, it is an awesome resource that I have used since I started studying: http://forum.koohii.com/index.php |
Thei9 said: When I see people saying they're learning 15/25/35+ kanji per day, I always roll my eyes a little. You're either a robot, have a crazy good memory, or you're not really learning the kanji. You're just learning to recognize them and associate them with a meaning. Which isn't bad per se.. But that isn't really going to help you to read or write anything. There's a lot more to learning kanji than just recognition. Or maybe I'm just slow? Who knows. I just like to take a more whole approach and learn meaning, how to write it on paper from memory, how to pronounce it (usually two most common ways), and also learn a couple vocabulary that use the kanji, or a sentence containing it. Doing it this way, I study 30-40 minutes per day and currently am learning about 10 kanji per month. Although my pace is picking up as I'm getting better at learning kanji. I would guess that 6 months from now I'll probably be at 20 per month. This might seem slow to some people (although like I said, it gets faster the longer you do it), but I've found that it's much more fun to learn this way because it's not just boring memorization of dozens of kanji everyday. I learn kanji, vocab, and get to practice with different grammar all the time. And I actually get to write stuff on paper, which to me is half the fun! Sorry to follow up my long post with another one. I was really jazzed up about learning kanji in my last Japanese class, I was discussing the use of kanji in words like 東京市 with a Japanese tutor and I asked why the kanji 市 is used as opposed to 町 or something like that and the tutor had a hard time answering it. The tutor had to think long and hard about it because knowing what the kanji meant was irrelevant to using the kanji in normal speech. I realized that knowing the meaning of the kanji doesn't in its own right translate to Japanese speaking/writing ability. What I was discussing with the tutor was etymology. There is some value to knowing etymology but I was sacrificing study time that I could have been using to gain skills that translate directly to writing ability. Take 北海道 for example. Kanji teaches me that this means "North Sea Road" approximately. It is not until I get into vocabulary study that I learn that is Hokkaidou. Knowing "north sea road" is somewhat useful, but had I just learned 北海道＝ほっかいどう＝hokkaidou I'd be just as well off. Learning the kanji as part of the vocabulary teaches me 3 things in one go: Meaning of the word, the reading of the components (ほ かい どう） and the three kanji. The reading of the components carries over to other words like 海路＝seaway ＝かいろ, 水道＝すいどう waterway, 剣道＝けんどう =kendo seeing many words using the same kanji with similar meanings will teach you what the individual kanji mean with better accuracy than a keyword (a keyword is only an attempt to emulate the meaning concisely) Obviously what to pursue depends on your end goals. If you want to be able to hand-write kanji then you must practice that skill specifically. If you want to write in Japanese by typing then you don't need to be able to recall the kanji completely (recalling it), you can do fine by just being able to recognize the kanji IF you can recall how to sound it out. I can't hand write 看護婦(かんごふ, nurse) but I know that かんごふ is nurse and I do have the abiltiy to recognize 看護婦 as kangofu/nurse so after typing it I know what I have translated to kanji. I honestly felt like I had wasted my time, a massive amount of time, by learning the first 1000 kanji that are taught in Japanese schools after I started to study vocabulary because essentially I was just learning etymology in that time. I learned to recall and recognize the kanji but my Japanese ability was hardly better than when I had started(edit: I was exaggerating here, it was significantly better than when I had started but far less than it would have been had I spent the year it took me to study vocabulary instead). When I started learning vocabulary and dropped learning Kanji I gained so much more ability so much faster. I am approximately 4500 words into a 6000 word deck on Anki and I am totally able to learn and use words that contain kanji that I did not learn to write individually. I can still understand speech, text, and I can even type them out. Will the world judge me too harshly if I cannot write them out? edit: Thei, I read your post. I understand that you enjoy being able to hand-write the kanji which I can really appreciate! I really love being able to write out Japanese. I can write out much of the early Kanji that I learned. I hope to eventually learn to write out most of what I have been learning since I stopped learning to write new words. Keep up the hard work and know that as long as you don't give up you'll get better every day. :) |
ChopstickJul 9, 2014 10:02 PM
Thei9 said: Hmm, I guess I just don't get why someone would study kanji if they don't want to learn to write them. That's half the fun. Reading and writing just naturally go together. And if you are learning to write them, then going super fast isn't going to happen. It's just so much more time consuming. And thanks for the link, I'll check it out. True, to some extent. I loved caligraphy and miss my brushes lol. However, I think the advances in automation/translation software/etc. have made written recall less of an essential skill/goal for most, with recognition increasingly the primary. You'd think such a techno-unfriendly and complex written form would cause, among the younger generation especially, a massive push towards English, German, Spanish...hell, anything LOL. Does any such trend exist though? I remember in college being a dozen lessons ahead at a time because Chinese has Pingyin. Problem is, that eventually has its own limitations... Thei9 said: I am approximately 4500 words into a 6000 word deck on Anki and I am totally able to learn and use words that contain kanji that I did not learn to write individually. I can still understand speech, text, and I can even type them out. Will the world judge me too harshly if I cannot write them out? Damn...That's awesome. |
DouluoJul 9, 2014 10:16 PM
| My vocabulary deck has been strictly set to 10 new words a day since I started it. The progress may seem slow at first but before you know it a year has gone by and you know 3600 words that you wouldn't have known otherwise. It seems like every few months I have a revelation about how many more words I can recognize in songs and anime than I could a few months before. Even slow progress is progress so my advice to anyone is to get the ball rolling and stick with it. |
| I have learnt Japanese before and that was before I got into anime. I only did it because I had some experience in Chinese and I needed to choose a language to learn at school. I never really enjoyed learning it though watching anime did motivate me a little. I can still read and write hiragana and katakana though I'm a bit slow. I've recently fallen out of love with Japanese culture so learning the language is a lot less attractive to me now. I'm not letting anime be a reason to learn it because I feel that's silly when I'm much more interested in learning other languages first. Perhaps a trip to Japan might change my mind, but until said time arrives, I'm not too interested. |
| This is slightly off topic, but does anyone know if there's an app/device yet that will recognize spoken, foreign languages and instantly/reliably translate it for you (& vice versa)? I always make a concerted effort to speak a foreign country's language, but I often wonder what's more embarassing: me butchering the pronunciation, or utilizing an electronic "broker" LOL. |
| Been studying for six years and now practice my speaking regularly with some of my Japanese friends over skype. It's not easy and it's not something that you're going to be able to master in a year or two. It takes a lot of hitting the books. Even after six years of practice I still mess spelling and speaking up all the time. Going to be studying abroad in Tokyo in 2 years to hopefully localize my pronunciation. If you're really committed than keep at it but just know that it is a long hard road ahead. |
| I got to learning it and dropped it like a week ago - I'm gonna pick it up I swear c;!! I don't understand the difference between hirogana and katakana though why are they the same yet different x_x |
| Only an idiot starts a fight he can't win. — Sora |
| I probably fall into this category. I learned all my kana over a year ago now and was starting to learn kanji ect but since I became an official student I have had less time. I honestly think to learn a language you have to be immersed in it so I plan to learn when I get to Japan. Being multilingual has no drawbacks though, I only wish I had been encouraged to learn another language earlier. |
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| Well, I can say cramming the language into a single summer is not SUPER effective, but it does give progress if committed. For these two months, I've learned 350ish kanji, but unfortunately really slowly going through the grammar. If anyone can recommend some simple mangas or visual novels, that would be great. not some ridiculous stuff like btooom. :P Perhaps will attempt to read them after finishing -enough- of kim tae's stuff. |
| It's been a year since I started learning japanese.. No problems so far. Learned the romaji version first though ._. |
 私 は あ な た が 私 を 養 う た い ! |
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