Learning Japanese

[Tenken's Smile]

I have a question: If a doctor says 胸を開けてください, what does that mean???

[Doraneko]

Originally Posted by Tenken's smile

If a doctor says 胸を開けてください, what does that mean???

It simply means that the doctor tells you to show your chest.

Originally Posted by Kylaran

First of all, you can't use exceptions to general practices to doubt the efficacy of established methods for teaching a foreign language. Your friend may be able to achieve JLPT 1 with half a year's study, but I guarantee you not everyone will be able to do so.

Somehow I feel that our stances are not that drastically different.

From the very start I have mentioned that I am not ready to recommend my friend's unique way of learning Japanese to everyone, since it is exactly an "exceptional case" as you said. But my point was not saying how good his method is. I only meant that some students, however few, may perform better by unconventional learning approaches, as shown by my friend's poor performance in school. Therefore it is not always helpful to force the traditional system on everyone and turn a blind eye on specific circumstances.

Everyone learns language differently, but that doesn't change the fact that there are certain methods which have been used for a long time and have been analyzed for their usage.

Exactly. Whether every single student learns equally efficiently under the traditional model is another question though, since there are exceptional cases as you also seem to agree.

I am neither advocating nor bashing the conventional teaching methods. I was only saying that one should keep an open mind to other people's ways of learning, and examine each method to see which suits their style and goals the best. Sorry if I come across as rude, but your direct and outright comment of "I do not approve of this method" and your perceived image of being an absolute authority on the issue did not leave me with a pleasant feeling. I guess my English comprehension capability has already been thoroughly eroded by my Japanese.

Reading novels won't do you harm, and I never said it did. I merely said that one should be prepared for extra confounds existing during the language acquisition process because novels are not written in the same way that communicative texts are (such as newspaper articles or news blogs).

But at least you seem to be strongly against the idea that novels may be a good and viable tool to some learners. Quoted from your previous message:

Also, children's books are not a good tool to learn a language with. Children's books are designed for native speakers, and are similar to novels (if they're not novels) in that they have many cultural or natural references unbeknownst to a non-native individual.

For light novels, as I stressed before, they serve as effective, irreplaceable learning materials for people who aspire to learn Japanese for the sake of enjoying manga/anime/light novels in their originality. Yes, there are extra confounds, but those are the stuff some people exactly want to learn . You can be a native Japanese and still have no idea what tsundere is. But to anime/manga fans, getting comfortable with the otaku language and all those obscure terms is the fundamental purpose of their study.

That is why I have reiterated countless times that one should identify their ultimate goal first before diving into the language. Contrary to what some people firmly believe, there is no one-size-fits-all approach. A well-planned study approach can certainly reduce the hassles of your journey and lead you to your goal in the shortest time possible.

For English-speaking anime fans who aspire to work as anime/manga translators in the future, it may be a good idea to choose a balanced approach with equal focus on both traditional classes and extensive exposure to anime/manga/light novels. Since there is no JE otaku dictionary, to prepare for your future work you need extra effort in loading all those otaku stuff into your brain. If you can skip all classes and still be comfortable with translating anime/manga/light novels in an appropriate manner, then more power to you. Perspective employers do not hire people by the number of hours they spend in language classes, but by how well they perform.

For students who fell in love in Japanese literature and plan to pursue postgraduate study in that area in Japan, besides conventional grammar classes they need to pay extra time and effort in ancient vocabulary/grammar and try their best to feel comfortable with archaic text. Writing an undergraduate dissertation in Japanese certainly helps a lot in getting admitted to any postgraduate programme in Japan. But you have to be highly disciplined to brush up your writing to the level of the natives, through daily writing practices and extensive reading of journals.

For people who want to become professional freelance translators. It is recommended to get a professional, non-language-study degree, like engineering/law/finance. Develop your Japanese capability simultaneously, with attention to the recent developments of your field in Japan and learn to be comfortable with technical writings (which is very different from news articles and novels of course). After graduation, get some professional training in translating text of your speciality. Remember to offer free translation services to NGO during your study to spice up your CV and gain valuable experience.

For people who dream to become corporate zombies and aspire to turn themselves into tiny components of the gigantic corporate machine, a learning approach with extra focus on grammar, business/hierarchy expressions and attention to Japanese current affairs is certainly needed. But on top of that they also need to be extremely comfortable with the Japanese business culture as well as their prudent manner of exchange and pesuasion. You certainly don't want to stand out as a nosy and arrogant gaijin who is ignorant of your boss/colleagues/clients' feelings, since in the Japanese society "what stands out must be hammered down."

Simply speaking, learning Japanese is more than learning the Japanese language. Besides attending classes regularly, think more about what you want to achieve, make a good study plan and challenge your limits. You will be surprised at how much you can accquire in one or two year's time, when compared to your classmates who are satisfied with staying in the comfort zone of weekly grammar classes and reluctant to move an inch beyond that.

For every "exceptional case" I met who got JLPT1 in less than 2 years, there are another three who have spent 5+ years on the language and still can't get a JLPT2. However those "exceptional cases" are certainly not the most brilliant people on earth and many of them are just average Janes and Joes you can see in the streets. Call me retarded if you like, but I believe that everyone has the capability of becoming "exceptional." What matters are only will and dedication.

[sonotme_9FedriqSama]

what does ムッサイ means....I couldn't find its's meaning in edict or any online...dictionaries...but what I could infer from the sentences on internet was that it could mean "macho" but I am not sure at all. Also I found similar words whose meanings caouldn't be found in dictionary. except for one. "mossai"

モッサイ: unfashionable
ドッサイ : ???
マッサイ: ???

can the natives from japan, please give me the meanings of those work. 頼むよ。

[LiberLibri]

Originally Posted by sonotme_9FedriqSama

モッサイ: unfashionable
ドッサイ : ???
マッサイ: ???

Dossai is a dialect expression of "many", used in Kyusyu area. Similarly Massai is "exhausting" in Okinawa.

[sonotme_9FedriqSama]

Originally Posted by liberlibri

dossai is a dialect expression of "many", used in kyusyu area. Similarly massai is "exhausting" in okinawa.

有難う　リベッリビリさん、ではムッサイってなんですか？

[Kylaran]

Originally Posted by Doraneko

I am neither advocating nor bashing the conventional teaching methods. I was only saying that one should keep an open mind to other people's ways of learning, and examine each method to see which suits their style and goals the best. Sorry if I come across as rude, but your direct and outright comment of "I do not approve of this method" and your perceived image of being an absolute authority on the issue did not leave me with a pleasant feeling. I guess my English comprehension capability has already been thoroughly eroded by my Japanese.

But at least you seem to be strongly against the idea that novels may be a good and viable tool to some learners. Quoted from your previous message:


For light novels, as I stressed before, they serve as effective, irreplaceable learning materials for people who aspire to learn Japanese for the sake of enjoying manga/anime/light novels in their originality. Yes, there are extra confounds, but those are the stuff some people exactly want to learn . You can be a native Japanese and still have no idea what tsundere is. But to anime/manga fans, getting comfortable with the otaku language and all those obscure terms is the fundamental purpose of their study.

I will admit that I was a bit forceful in my initial post. I'd like to apologize for the tone with which I wrote it. However, you also seem to be misunderstanding my goals for the post.

First and foremost, I want to discourage people from the illusion that once you pick up a book, it'll help you learn. Language just doesn't work that way. We're not talking about simple matters of grammar + vocabulary, we're talking about the necessity of learning to think in an entirely different way. You don't have to be a hardcore linguistic relativist to even understand this: languages are a window to thought. With such interesting differences between cognition in individuals that speak just the same language, think about how much you need to learn of another culture in order to truly benefit from something as abstract as a novel. It's all text, and sometimes very referential and metaphorical. Master the language first before you delve into deeper than the surface.

Now, I'll also admit I was generalizing a bit much when I said all novels are bad. In fact, I read light novels quite often in order to work on my Japanese. I also spend 5-6 hours a day bathing in Japanese, from music to anime to chatting with people, while at the same time taking courses. That's not the same for everyone. If you're at the stage where you want to up your Japanese reading level, novels are not a path that one should go down. There are much easier texts to read that simply provide you with more value for your time (i.e. information-oriented communicative texts). This is because many times you need a literal understanding to simply be able to comprehend an entire text. Once you've increased your reading comprehension, afterward it's best to start working on the metaphorical stuff. It saves time. But if you're going to try and learn the language from a children's book, you're severely underestimating the knowledge that children have and possess, even though they can't use sophisticated language to express it.

That is why I have reiterated countless times that one should identify their ultimate goal first before diving into the language. Contrary to what some people firmly believe, there is no one-size-fits-all approach. A well-planned study approach can certainly reduce the hassles of your journey and lead you to your goal in the shortest time possible.

Simply speaking, learning Japanese is more than learning the Japanese language. Besides attending classes regularly, think more about what you want to achieve, make a good study plan and challenge your limits. You will be surprised at how much you can accquire in one or two year's time, when compared to your classmates who are satisfied with staying in the comfort zone of weekly grammar classes and reluctant to move an inch beyond that.

For every "exceptional case" I met who got JLPT1 in less than 2 years, there are another three who have spent 5+ years on the language and still can't get a JLPT2. However those "exceptional cases" are certainly not the most brilliant people on earth and many of them are just average Janes and Joes you can see in the streets. Call me retarded if you like, but I believe that everyone has the capability of becoming "exceptional." What matters are only will and dedication.

I agree with you in that people who are dedicated will be able to learn, no matter how they learn it. But that doesn't mean you can simply hand people a list of 500 possible ways to learn Japanese and tell them that you believe in your pokemon, and be done with it. If you're going to study, find the least time-intensive way, and then learn from there.

I'm not saying you can't customize your schedule or training regimen. But I am trying to seriously convey to others the mistaken idea that novels are an effective way to learn. They're great when you reach a certain level (closer to fluency), but there are simply better sources to learn from. It doesn't matter if you're learning inside a classroom or outside; it doesn't matter if you only like a certain aspect of Japan or Japanese culture. There are global sources to optimally learn from no matter your interests.

What I'm emphasizing here is not that everyone should go to class and learn from teachers, I'm emphasizing that novels are simply a less effective method of increasing reading comprehension. You've mistaken me for Confucius. I myself arrived at my current level of knowledge because of unconventional ways of learning Japanese, so I do support focusing on one's hobbies and self-tailoring their learning. But that doesn't change the fact that newspaper articles use words much more literally (for purposes of communicating information) than, say, a novel would.

It's not about the classes. It's about understanding which sources help you achieve your goal faster than others. By all means, get out of your comfort zone. But novels are complex, and have just far too many more confounds and some other materials. That's what I'm trying to say. Learn to walk before you learn to pole vault.

[Raiga]

I've skipped most of the long posts so far so I'm sorta jumping in... I might be repeating things that have already been said, but...

Originally Posted by Kylaran

First and foremost, I want to discourage people from the illusion that once you pick up a book, it'll help you learn. Language just doesn't work that way.

Doesn't it? I mean, obviously not just picking up a book, but if you read it and think critically about it, I'd think you'd get something out of the experience.

We're not talking about simple matters of grammar + vocabulary, we're talking about the necessity of learning to think in an entirely different way. You don't have to be a hardcore linguistic relativist to even understand this: languages are a window to thought. With such interesting differences between cognition in individuals that speak just the same language, think about how much you need to learn of another culture in order to truly benefit from something as abstract as a novel. It's all text, and sometimes very referential and metaphorical. Master the language first before you delve into deeper than the surface.

Eh, that's pretty hotly debated, really; Chomsky universalism vs. Sapir-Whorf relativism. Taking a bit from both camps, yes a language is intimately tied with its culture and speakers' way of thought, but we are all human, we all need to communicate a lot of the same ideas, and form logical thoughts in similar ways. We all basically sense the world in five ways, go through the same basic cycle of birth, maturation, reproduction, and death, etc. Foreign languages are certainly much more different and difficult than your average speaker of a single language probably thinks, but if you're willing to open your mind and think flexibly, they're much easier to grasp than some people would have you believe.

I just think you're giving the people who want to learn Japanese, or any foreign language, a little less credit than they deserve. People are capable of metacognition. People can think about what they learn, and they can think about thinking, and of course learn the same information in many different ways. People are capable of seeing a metaphor, seeing less-than-literal language, recognizing it, and thinking, "Okay, that's a metaphor, that's not literal, and I can simultaneously understand it in its literal sense and its figurative sense." People can see a cultural reference and think, "That's a cultural reference," and heck if they're motivated enough they'll go look it up and gain some more understanding. What works for you and suits your style of thinking may not work for others, and what you might think would be difficult and misleading to learn from, others could benefit from.

And in the end I'm of the general opinion that there's no such thing as bad exposure to a language. So maybe that's just me, maybe that's just the way I like to learn, personally. *shrug*

[LiberLibri]

Originally Posted by sonotme_9FedriqSama

有難う　リベッリビリさん、ではムッサイってなんですか？

It is an abbreviate form of "むさくるしい(musa-kurushii)", which means too masculine, not smart, stinking.

[Kylaran]

Originally Posted by Raiga

I've skipped most of the long posts so far so I'm sorta jumping in... I might be repeating things that have already been said, but...

Doesn't it? I mean, obviously not just picking up a book, but if you read it and think critically about it, I'd think you'd get something out of the experience.

This doesn't change the fact that if someone asked me "What's the best way to improve my Japanese reading comprehension?" I would never recommend a novel. There's a ton of more viable methods out there.

Eh, that's pretty hotly debated, really; Chomsky universalism vs. Sapir-Whorf relativism. Taking a bit from both camps, yes a language is intimately tied with its culture and speakers' way of thought, but we are all human, we all need to communicate a lot of the same ideas, and form logical thoughts in similar ways. We all basically sense the world in five ways, go through the same basic cycle of birth, maturation, reproduction, and death, etc. Foreign languages are certainly much more different and difficult than your average speaker of a single language probably thinks, but if you're willing to open your mind and think flexibly, they're much easier to grasp than some people would have you believe.

I'm personally not partial to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, and I'm certainly not much of a relativist, but I'm referring to language as a "window" into the mind mostly in the way that psychologists tend to look at it -- as a way of expressing what one person's thinking, but not being a necessarily 100% accurate gauge of thought. My point here is that just because you think you've figured a metaphor out, doesn't necessarily mean the way other people use it or understand it are the same.

I just think you're giving the people who want to learn Japanese, or any foreign language, a little less credit than they deserve. People are capable of metacognition. People can think about what they learn, and they can think about thinking, and of course learn the same information in many different ways. People are capable of seeing a metaphor, seeing less-than-literal language, recognizing it, and thinking, "Okay, that's a metaphor, that's not literal, and I can simultaneously understand it in its literal sense and its figurative sense." People can see a cultural reference and think, "That's a cultural reference," and heck if they're motivated enough they'll go look it up and gain some more understanding. What works for you and suits your style of thinking may not work for others, and what you might think would be difficult and misleading to learn from, others could benefit from.

And in the end I'm of the general opinion that there's no such thing as bad exposure to a language. So maybe that's just me, maybe that's just the way I like to learn, personally. *shrug*

Now, don't get me wrong (it's been happening a lot, it seems). It's not that I think it's "bad exposure", it's just "ineffective" unless you're at a level where you have much of the kanji and grammar mastered. The original point of discontention that I held was about children's novels, and my point is two-fold, 1.) that children don't use the same mechanisms for learning language that we do as adults, so don't assume that simpler language simply means easier to understand, and 2.) that imagery from reading solid text is a very powerful, but a complex tool that not only relies on our comprehension of language, but also requires us to rely on other sensations (vision, smell, touch, etc.) to fully engage us in the story.

I'm not claiming people are too dumb to figure out metaphors. If you're dead-set on figuring out the metaphors in a book, then be my guest; it's a great way to learn. But it also requires thinking about the sentence, understanding both literal and figurative elements, then attaching it to appropriate mental imagery. Sometimes you have to find a native or someone better than you to explain it. Compared to this, does it not make sense to teach words and grammar in a straightforward way, then rely on exposure so people can later attach meaning to those words via metaphor? Learning both of them takes a lot of effort.

By the way, just because we all have 5 senses, it doesn't mean our worlds and experiences are the same. The smallest difference in your brain can mean the biggest change in experience.

[Raiga]

Originally Posted by Kylaran

This doesn't change the fact that if someone asked me "What's the best way to improve my Japanese reading comprehension?" I would never recommend a novel. There's a ton of more viable methods out there.

I'm personally not partial to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, and I'm certainly not much of a relativist, but I'm referring to language as a "window" into the mind mostly in the way that psychologists tend to look at it -- as a way of expressing what one person's thinking, but not being a necessarily 100% accurate gauge of thought. My point here is that just because you think you've figured a metaphor out, doesn't necessarily mean the way other people use it or understand it are the same.

Well like I said, flexible thought. My understanding of words among the vocabulary I've amassed so far is constantly changing, and I'm constantly reanalyzing, wondering if I properly get it. And for that matter, is there really an authoritative "correct" meaning? If even among native speakers there's subjectivity, does it really matter if you understand something the exact same way as someone else? Seems to me that there'd be more like a ballpark range of accepted usages while something like cognitive understanding... well you can't really measure that, can you?

Now, don't get me wrong (it's been happening a lot, it seems). It's not that I think it's "bad exposure", it's just "ineffective" unless you're at a level where you have much of the kanji and grammar mastered. The original point of discontention that I held was about children's novels, and my point is two-fold, 1.) that children don't use the same mechanisms for learning language that we do as adults, so don't assume that simpler language simply means easier to understand, and 2.) that imagery from reading solid text is a very powerful, but a complex tool that not only relies on our comprehension of language, but also requires us to rely on other sensations (vision, smell, touch, etc.) to fully engage us in the story.

I'm not claiming people are too dumb to figure out metaphors. If you're dead-set on figuring out the metaphors in a book, then be my guest; it's a great way to learn. But it also requires thinking about the sentence, understanding both literal and figurative elements, then attaching it to appropriate mental imagery. Sometimes you have to find a native or someone better than you to explain it. Compared to this, does it not make sense to teach words and grammar in a straightforward way, then rely on exposure so people can later attach meaning to those words via metaphor? Learning both of them takes a lot of effort.

At this part I'm still thinking, people have different ways of learning. I grant, learning a language as a child is definitely a different experience, but I still think there are people who could process literal and figurative meaning together, and perhaps enjoy it more that way, too.

By the way, just because we all have 5 senses, it doesn't mean our worlds and experiences are the same. The smallest difference in your brain can mean the biggest change in experience.

Certainly, but that's really subjective and again, impossible to observe. It's impossible to know how different or similar people's ways of thought are. Besides, I never said our worlds and experiences are the same; only that there's enough universality to bridge understanding if you put in enough effort. Sure, parts of things like novels might speak to you as an American, or as a Japanese, or as a European or as whatever, but a lot of other parts just speak to you as a human.

[Doraneko]

Okay I guess I can't really give any technical/psychological input to the debate given I am a complete layman in those areas . But still I am more on the side of "there is no bad exposure to a language".

Correct me if I am wrong, Kylaran, but you seem to be kind of worrying that people would take novel (1)beyond their level of fluency (2)as their sole source of grammar and vocabulary as well as reading comprehension practice. I would agree with you if the circumstances are completely identical to the above, given novels indeed don't serve as good grammar guides given the lack of explanations and examples. But in reality, both are non-issues in my opinion.

For (1), people read novels because they enjoy them, not because they feel obligated to read them. If they fail to understand a majority of a story for whatever reason, due to boredom they will immediately drop it anyway. They will then continue to search for books of lower levels until they find one they truly enjoy, and would then start progressing slowing and steadily upward again.

An ideal novel would have a level of difficulty that matches the readers' fluency in the language. They should be able to grasp the main ideas with minimal use of dictionaries and grammar guides. If they are dedicated enough, they would study the vocabulary, cultural references and etc more closely. At the end they will become more knowledgeable than before on a number of areas, and find the learning experience a highly rewarding one.

For (2), since it is comparatively difficult to pick up new grammar from novels, I would assume people who read novels should be of an intermediate level, and they aim to learn new vocabulary and expressions to complement their conventional study in classes. People who are far below the required level of grammatical fluency will search downwards, as I explained before, until they find the book that suits them.

Regardless of the effectiveness (or lack thereof) of novels as grammar learning materials, they provide a more extensive selection of vocabulary that is beyond your normal classroom materials. News articles are meant for conveying facts as accurate as possible, while novels shine for the purpose of conveying feelings and emotions. At the end of the day you need skills learnt from both to survive in a Japanese environment. No one like to see a news-report robot in a friendly gathering, or a bard in a formal business conference.

When I was learning English (as a second language) in secondary school, it was required for everyone in the class to submit a book report every month. I am sure such practice is by no means unique to our school. Teachers surely wouldn't find the extra workload fun. But they should have been believing that reading books is in some way beneficial to the students, and such benefits justify the extra hassles for them to mark the book reports.

Furthermore, while half of my English textbook is essays and non-fictional articles, another half is short stories and novel excerpts. As "ineffective" as those mini novels, I suppose the linguists and educational psychologists responsible for planning the curriculum should have some reason behind including those materials.

[Kylaran]

Originally Posted by Doraneko

Correct me if I am wrong, Kylaran, but you seem to be kind of worrying that people would take novel (1)beyond their level of fluency (2)as their sole source of grammar and vocabulary as well as reading comprehension practice. I would agree with you if the circumstances are completely identical to the above, given novels indeed don't serve as good grammar guides given the lack of explanations and examples. But in reality, both are non-issues in my opinion.

That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying novels are a waste of time if you simply want to up your reading comprehension, unless you're at an advanced level.

For (1), people read novels because they enjoy them, not because they feel obligated to read them. If they fail to understand a majority of a story for whatever reason, due to boredom they will immediately drop it anyway. They will then continue to search for books of lower levels until they find one they truly enjoy, and would then start progressing slowing and steadily upward again.

Here's my point: if you're at the level where you can read novels, then you wouldn't be asking other people for the best way to up your reading comprehension, seeing as you're already at a level where only high amounts of exposure and difficult material will improve your ability. See where I'm getting at?

As I said, novels are hard. Stay away from them, unless you're ready. You'll get bored and give up, and it'll negatively affect your drive to learn the language.

An ideal novel would have a level of difficulty that matches the readers' fluency in the language. They should be able to grasp the main ideas with minimal use of dictionaries and grammar guides. If they are dedicated enough, they would study the vocabulary, cultural references and etc more closely. At the end they will become more knowledgeable than before on a number of areas, and find the learning experience a highly rewarding one.

For (2), since it is comparatively difficult to pick up new grammar from novels, I would assume people who read novels should be of an intermediate level, and they aim to learn new vocabulary and expressions to complement their conventional study in classes. People who are far below the required level of grammatical fluency will search downwards, as I explained before, until they find the book that suits them.

Novels are written for native speakers, not foreigners. If your level is already high enough to read one, then you don't need anyone telling you how to improve your reading comprehension. An ideal novel is one that interests you -- your comprehension level would not matter as much if you're already reading novels.

Regardless of the effectiveness (or lack thereof) of novels as grammar learning materials, they provide a more extensive selection of vocabulary that is beyond your normal classroom materials. News articles are meant for conveying facts as accurate as possible, while novels shine for the purpose of conveying feelings and emotions. At the end of the day you need skills learnt from both to survive in a Japanese environment. No one like to see a news-report robot in a friendly gathering, or a bard in a formal business conference.

I already stated my stance: learn the literal meaning first, then learn the figurative and emotional meanings later. Novels are a great source of information, but they'll be slow going for even people who are in their 3rd-4th year of college level Japanese, let alone self-study.

When I was learning English (as a second language) in secondary school, it was required for everyone in the class to submit a book report every month. I am sure such practice is by no means unique to our school. Teachers surely wouldn't find the extra workload fun. But they should have been believing that reading books is in some way beneficial to the students, and such benefits justify the extra hassles for them to mark the book reports.

Furthermore, while half of my English textbook is essays and non-fictional articles, another half is short stories and novel excerpts. As "ineffective" as those mini novels, I suppose the linguists and educational psychologists responsible for planning the curriculum should have some reason behind including those materials.

You're studying them in class, which is fine. A teacher will guide you through all the difficult terminology and areas you don't understand. If you want to read novels on your own time, that's another story.

You're still misunderstanding my main goal. I want to emphasize that there are very effective ways of learning Japanese will most likely help anyone from a beginning to an intermediate level. Children's novels are a terrible choice to study from. Some people may decide that they want to give it a shot, that's fine. In fact, I support that decision. But if people are going to ask me for a recommendation on improving reading comprehension, I would be very hesitant to suggest novels.

I'm not going to disturb the thread anymore with my highly opinionated and charged posts; I've said enough. :P If either of you or Raiga would like to talk, I'd love to in private.

[sonotme_9FedriqSama]

Originally Posted by LiberLibri

It is an abbreviate form of "むさくるしい(musa-kurushii)", which means too masculine, not smart, stinking.

thnx LiberLibri...I was guessing along those lines as well. Although I guessed macho earlier I was hoping it to be in a sarcastic way. Thanks for clarifying it.

[Doraneko]

Originally Posted by Kylaran

I'm not going to disturb the thread anymore with my highly opinionated and charged posts; I've said enough. :P

Since you are not interested in continuing the debate, this will also be my final remark on the issue, for the purpose of clarifying some points you seem to have also misunderstood.

I'm saying novels are a waste of time if you simply want to up your reading comprehension, unless you're at an advanced level.

Novels are not all of the same level. There are still tonnes of English and Japanese novels that I cannot comprehend even though I have studied both for quite some time. By the same token, easier novels for the less fluent certainly exist. Still, improvement in reading comprehension is an unavoidable outcome of extensive reading, and as simple as that. It doesn't matter if the books are read for study or leisure.

Here's my point: if you're at the level where you can read novels, then you wouldn't be asking other people for the best way to up your reading comprehension, seeing as you're already at a level where only high amounts of exposure and difficult material will improve your ability. See where I'm getting at?

Children's novels are a terrible choice to study from.

If your level is already high enough to read one (novel), then you don't need anyone telling you how to improve your reading comprehension.

See the above. Btw I don't think anyone in the thread has recommended any novel to newbies. The closest I did was recommending Tsubasa Bunko, a novel label with teen novels/light novels republished with furigana marketed towards the less kanji-fluent students. The audience of my recommendation are of course intermediate learners of the language instead of beginners. Remember that novels printed with bigger fonts and furigana for children to read easily are not always solely written for children. Go to the Haruhi novel thread and say it is a book solely for grade school kids, and see what will happen.

As I said, novels are hard. Stay away from them, unless you're ready. You'll get bored and give up, and it'll negatively affect your drive to learn the language.

Certainly true, if you define "not ready" as the first 6 months of study in class. I would be shocked however if an intermediate learner who is about to take JLPT2 haven't touched the simplest novels at all.

Novels are written for native speakers, not foreigners.

As a non-native speaker of English, I have been reading English novels written for the UK/US readers since 10 and they have never negatively influenced my drive to learn English at all. The same applies to some 200k people of the same age of mine in my former-colonial city.

I already stated my stance: learn the literal meaning first, then learn the figurative and emotional meanings later.

How about learning both at the same time? Your logic reminds me of those advocating to learn Japanese in romaji in the first year, kana in the second year and kanji in the third year. You can certainly tell how much they have achieved in the end without me going into depth.

Novels are a great source of information, but they'll be slow going for even people who are in their 3rd-4th year of college level Japanese, let alone self-study.

You are again squeezing other people's study modes into your model, which in itself is far from universally applicable. We only have 3-year college here (okay you probably know which asian city I'm living in now ). Japanese majors here who can't finish JLPT1 by year 2 will certainly be kicked out of college as they need to study in Japan in year 3. I would be truly surprised if they were not reading novels madly by the end of year 1 . Let's not talk about the usual progress of Japanese self-study in my city, as I have been talking about it in every other post.

Anyhow, novel recommendations only work for the target audience. Trust the automatic selection mechanism.

You're studying them in class, which is fine. A teacher will guide you through all the difficult terminology and areas you don't understand. If you want to read novels on your own time, that's another story.

That is only true for textbooks but not for novels used for book reports. In my school, if you get caught reading novels in class, rather than going through the difficult terminology the teacher will give you some good slaps in the face. You still have to hand in the book report on the next day btw.

[Raiga]

Haihai, got a question...

What does 濃ゆ mean? I can't seem to find it in the dictionary... funnily enough, Google turns up an article that appears to be about the fact that it's not in the dictionary...

(then again I was lazy on that count and used Google translate for the article. I know, for shame)

[Doraneko]

Originally Posted by Raiga

What does 濃ゆ mean?

Not too sure about 濃ゆ, but do you mean 濃ゆい(こゆい)? Apparently 濃ゆい is from the regional dialects, meaning exactly the same as 濃い.

茨城弁講座『こゆい（濃ゆい）』とは？
「濃ゆい」 - Yahoo!知恵袋

[Raiga]

Originally Posted by Doraneko

Not too sure about 濃ゆ, but do you mean 濃ゆい(こゆい)? Apparently 濃ゆい is from the regional dialects, meaning exactly the same as 濃い.

茨城弁講座『こゆい（濃ゆい）』とは？
「濃ゆい」 - Yahoo!知恵袋

Ah, brilliant, thanks! I probably should have figured out it was an adjective but I wasn't quite sure with the ending so I left it out.

[Autumn Demon]

Originally Posted by Kylaran

(i.e. information-oriented communicative texts)

What are some good websites where you could find such texts?

[sonotme_9FedriqSama]

can somebody tellme what the phrases "なんぼの　もんじゃーい" or "どんなの　もんじゃぃい" means....is it some dialect form...since I can't find the word もんじゃーい or もんじゃぃい in dictionary....教えてください、お願い。

[sonotme_9FedriqSama]

Originally Posted by sonotme_9FedriqSama

can somebody tellme what the phrases "なんぼの　もんじゃーい" or "どんなの　もんじゃぃい" or "どんなもんじゃぃい"　means....is it some dialect form...since I can't find the word もんじゃーい or もんじゃぃい in dictionary....教えてください、お願い。

I was able to get the meaning of the phrase "donーna monjai " which means "See? How's that!?" but I am still pondering over "nan-bo no monjai", as I recall nan-bo means "very" or "how much", so could the sentence mean similar....but I am confused over use of nanbo and donna now. Although they mean almost same, I want to know in which case which one can be used.
Thanks