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Old 2012-01-20, 08:29   Link #3501
Shinji01
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Join Date: Dec 2011
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Yu Ominae View Post
Having plans to study in Japan for the Japanese language program.

Right now I plan to look at Kansai Gaidai, Waseda, Keio, Ritsumeikan and perhaps ICU and Sophia since my Japanese political science teacher said that they have "excellent" Japanese language programs. I'll go and look at them carefully when I can...
I went to one of the universities you mentioned

I would have to say though, why go to Kansai Gaidai and pick up Kansai-ben when you can immerse yourself in standard Japanese in Tokyo...
Tokyo Gaidai can be an alternative if you prefer public schools.

ICU and Sophia have very good Japanese courses because they not only accept Exchange students, but a large part of their regular students grew up overseas etc and do not have very strong japanese skills.

Waseda, Keio and Ritsumeikan are all great schools, and no doubt have good language programs but their main target seems to be the Japanese students. Of course they are international too, but not as international as ICU and Sophia, maybe.

Location wise, if you want to enjoy Tokyo without commuting for hours on a train, stick to Sophia, Keio, Waseda and Ritsumeikan.
Waseda and Sophia central tokyo, Keio can be different depending on the campus, ritsumeikan, I forgot where they are...
ICU and Tokyo Gaidai is on the fringe on Tokyo, and not very convinient...
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Old 2012-02-06, 02:22   Link #3502
TheB0a
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Is this thread dead ? I'm interested in learning some japanese but after a page or two the "lessons" just stopped. Will there still be people posting on this thread ? Whether it be small lessons, links for learning, and such.
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Old 2012-02-06, 02:25   Link #3503
LeoXiao
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I've kind of given up learning anything from this thread. I feel that I've I've reached the peak of whatever self-study can offer me and I'll just have to take the language in school if I want to go any further.
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Old 2012-02-06, 02:28   Link #3504
TheB0a
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Will there still be people posting on this thread though ?
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Old 2012-02-06, 02:36   Link #3505
LeoXiao
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Ask a question, and see if it gets a response, is all I can say.
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Old 2012-02-06, 02:37   Link #3506
warita
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Sure why not. I am kind of an expert on self study, hahaha

But it is like LeoXiao said, you dont really get very far this way, you have to understand that.
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Old 2012-02-06, 02:41   Link #3507
TheB0a
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I don't intend to. Just little lessons and the such I would appreciate. I stopped reading at paaage 5 maybe ? Just a bit past the part where a couple of users just started bashing. What I would like to learn are just simple things for now. Such as time, dates, short sentences, questions, etc.
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Old 2012-02-06, 02:44   Link #3508
LeoXiao
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Quote:
Originally Posted by warita View Post
Sure why not. I am kind of an expert on self study, hahaha

But it is like LeoXiao said, you dont really get very far this way, you have to understand that.
Now it's not so much that self-study really can't get you anywhere*, but that at least for me, after a certain point it just becomes hard to keep yourself sufficiently motivated. I don't know why but having a teacher with regular classes seems to intrinsically allow me to learn languages much more effectively.

*= There is, of course, the time-honoured method of taking a Japanese textbook, trekking into the mountains, and dedicating yourself to every lesson in the volume before returning to civilization like a boss.
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Old 2012-02-06, 03:07   Link #3509
LeoXiao
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TheB0a View Post
I don't intend to. Just little lessons and the such I would appreciate. I stopped reading at paaage 5 maybe ? Just a bit past the part where a couple of users just started bashing. What I would like to learn are just simple things for now. Such as time, dates, short sentences, questions, etc.
There are decent sites and audio lessons that can help you with this.
Case in point: http://www.freejapaneselessons.com/lesson01.cfm
I used this a few years back and in conjunction with watching too much anime it seemed to make some sense. Read the first few lessons, learn the hiragana and katakana, and then when you watch anime, watch it subbed and try to figure out and and get an ear for the way they build sentences. A great thing about Japanese is that the sounds are very simple and thus easy to hear correctly.

Once you've gotten the basic pronouns and sentence structure memorized, make a point of thinking "how would that sentence be structured in Japanese?" whenever you think of something in English. This helps embed the workings of the language in your brain.
As for learning the alphabets, there being 50 symbols in each alphabet to learn looks difficult, but remember them in order (a i u e o, ka ki ku ke ko, etc) and rewrite them over and over again like crazy and you'll get it eventually. I used to take a sheet of lined paper, divide it into fifteen rectangles, and write the alphabet fifteen times, and then repeat the same process on the other side. I found that I didn't have to even fill the whole page before I could do it without mistakes.

Kanji, which is quite important, is a measure more difficult since you have to just memorize each character. But it's the kind of thing that you should honestly avoid learning until you've mastered the basics of the spoken language and the hiragana/katakana. Kanji is most important for nouns and verbs, especially more intellectual ones. You would write "sakana" (fish) as either さかな (hiragana) or 魚 (Kanji), but things like "Shogun" (general) or "hiragana" would probably always be written in Kanji ("將軍" and "平假名", respectively).

In addition to the above link I gave you, it would probably help a lot to get a set of audio lessons. Try "Pimsleur Japanese (90 half-hour courses)" or "Human Japanese" (a language software), I've looked at both and and they seem decent.

That's all for now. If you have complicated questions, ask someone who's actually Japanese.
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Old 2012-02-06, 03:52   Link #3510
warita
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LeoXiao View Post

In addition to the above link I gave you, it would probably help a lot to get a set of audio lessons. Try "Pimsleur Japanese (90 half-hour courses)" or "Human Japanese" (a language software), I've looked at both and and they seem decent.
I tried Pimsleurs, thats pretty decent I must say. My only critisism on that is, it teaches an overly formal form of japanese..... thats a problem you encounter in all books too. I personally find this a bit useless, because normal street japanese doesnt use this form.
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Old 2012-02-06, 05:19   Link #3511
LeoXiao
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Quote:
Originally Posted by warita View Post
I tried Pimsleurs, thats pretty decent I must say. My only critisism on that is, it teaches an overly formal form of japanese..... thats a problem you encounter in all books too. I personally find this a bit useless, because normal street japanese doesnt use this form.
I noticed that it teaches the "polite" form and doesn't go at all into casual, but it's good for teaching the basics in terms of structure and anyhow if you want to learn the casual stuff the watching a crapload of anime will certainly do the trick.
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Old 2012-02-06, 15:30   Link #3512
chikorita157
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LeoXiao View Post
I noticed that it teaches the "polite" form and doesn't go at all into casual, but it's good for teaching the basics in terms of structure and anyhow if you want to learn the casual stuff the watching a crapload of anime will certainly do the trick.
Actually, Kim's Guide to Learning Japanese teaches the short forms (also puts more emphasis on it too while teaching the polite forms). Also, a few textbooks like Genki series also covers this as well along with other usages.
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Old 2012-02-14, 17:16   Link #3513
Yu Ominae
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Shinji01 View Post
I went to one of the universities you mentioned

I would have to say though, why go to Kansai Gaidai and pick up Kansai-ben when you can immerse yourself in standard Japanese in Tokyo...
Tokyo Gaidai can be an alternative if you prefer public schools.

ICU and Sophia have very good Japanese courses because they not only accept Exchange students, but a large part of their regular students grew up overseas etc and do not have very strong japanese skills.

Waseda, Keio and Ritsumeikan are all great schools, and no doubt have good language programs but their main target seems to be the Japanese students. Of course they are international too, but not as international as ICU and Sophia, maybe.

Location wise, if you want to enjoy Tokyo without commuting for hours on a train, stick to Sophia, Keio, Waseda and Ritsumeikan.
Waseda and Sophia central tokyo, Keio can be different depending on the campus, ritsumeikan, I forgot where they are...
ICU and Tokyo Gaidai is on the fringe on Tokyo, and not very convinient...
I probably will stick to Tokyo, so it is nice to get some suggestions on probably where to check out first.
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Old 2012-03-09, 20:01   Link #3514
word sux
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I am using Tae Kim's guide right now just to get started. Its pretty good, I am copying the Hiragana over and over for a line while pronouncing it aloud. Just finished the vowels.


I am going to make up some flash cards so I can quiz myself
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Old 2012-03-10, 13:22   Link #3515
Alchemist007
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Flash cards are your best friends. After trying some techniques out myself (after my lovely Japanese The Written Language ran out of kanji to teach me), I'm just reading this other book filled with tons of Kanji and making flash cards out of every new one I encounter. I then look them up here (which is simple because the book gives the kana on top of the new kanji it introduces). And I add it to my flash card collection (the new book is this, btw, also includes listening practice with that cd).
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Old 2012-03-10, 18:30   Link #3516
word sux
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would it be wise to get down hiragana first as well as concentrating on the spoken language then once I have a better grasp on the hiragana and spoken language then move on to the katakana and kanji??

It seems to try and learn all three syllabus's before having a better grasp on the language itself would just be confusing and take longer. I am hesitant to use the "romaji" because I want my brain to associate the sounds and words with the kana.

would it be better to just get the spoken language down first to at least a basic level then start to incorporate the written language like you do when your a little kid? You learn to speak before you learn to write as a child so would it be logical to learn how to speak the language first??


man its hard learning a language from scratch..

Last edited by word sux; 2012-03-10 at 19:26.
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Old 2012-03-11, 20:25   Link #3517
Seitsuki
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Hey there everyone

Over the past few years I've been dipping in and out as a translator. It's alright, I can get stuff done at a reasonable pace, but recently after trying to scanlate a manga one major glaring inconsistency has been thrown into focus: my kanji.

Basically all my work earlier was based off txt files, whether VN or LN; if I didn't recognise something I could just throw it into a translator. For that chaper I spent far too long agonisingly searching up phrases and turning what should have been a few minutes work into hours. It was not enjoyable.

So my question is, what ways do you guys have to learn kanji? Not looking for a quick fix solution, I know that's not how languages work. I'm also willing to spend funds for textbooks or whatever. Just need something that *works*. Ok well, everything works eventually, so maybe what I mean is.. something that works fast? But not expecting it to be that fast. Oh you know what I mean.

Thanks for reading~
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Old 2012-03-11, 20:47   Link #3518
Aoie_Emesai
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I used www.amazon.com/dp/4789009637 and it has worked well for me so far. (and the work book) I've known so many people trying to learn the language and if you cannot at least partially dedicate yourself to learning grammar and the kanji it's almost pointless. But of course my goal is to be able to write, read and speak it.
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Old 2012-03-11, 21:06   Link #3519
word sux
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I just downloaded the pimsleur cd's to my mp3 player. going to start working on basic conversation and pronunciation on my way to work and back
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Old 2012-03-11, 22:57   Link #3520
Alchemist007
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Seitsuki View Post
So my question is, what ways do you guys have to learn kanji? Not looking for a quick fix solution, I know that's not how languages work. I'm also willing to spend funds for textbooks or whatever. Just need something that *works*. Ok well, everything works eventually, so maybe what I mean is.. something that works fast? But not expecting it to be that fast. Oh you know what I mean.

Thanks for reading~
A classroom and/or teacher imo is the best starting path for the language in general. By the end of it, you should at least come away with habits for continued learning. Other than that, I recommend reading my last post here.
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