Learning to read Japanese

imitation

Hello All,

I visited Japan last year (I did the rail pass all the way down to Kagoshima, fantastic experience) and I have an interest in Japanese video games and culture (mainly after that trip !).

My end goal is to be able to read Japanese websites, books etc and understand Movies etc, no intention of moving to Japan. Now I know this is a MASSIVE thing to learn, but I decided to make a start anyway. I got a few books, but naturally just reading doesn't really help learning really, especially with no understanding of the Kana.

I then tried two android apps from a company called learn experiment, I have to say they are fantastic, initially you can pick the kana from a deck of 4, and once you get a feel for them you can type in the romanji and draw them out. I now have a good grasp of the Hiragana and I'm starting into the katakana. Initally I was quite skeptical, but having gotten this far has actually been quite fun (must be childhood nostalgia!), and trying to decipher Hiragana is a fun puzzle in its own right.

I think will push on with learning Japanese books again, but they are quite dry, would anybody have any tips on other learning tips ? I think its going to get more difficult from here on as I will have to learn the meaning of words as well as try and start into the Kanji, the only real way I can see initially is by slogging through textbooks and dictonarys.

Just Like Heaven

If your goal is to learn to read the 2 Assimil Japanese with ease books are probably your best bet. For kanji you should at least look into the Heisig method and decide if it's for you. I learnt the kana by just writing them out a couple of times a day, I don't think you really need any apps for it. Deciding to learn the kana from the start is a good idea anyway.

If you have the patience for cheesy 90's broadcasting the Irasshai series was recently uploaded to youtube http://www.youtube.com/user/bustaballs/videos?view=0&flow=grid The worksheets are all available online too.

I've recently got hold of some parallel texts and can't recommend them enough, it's great to be reading actual literature and stuff, but these are for when you reach the intermediate stage I guess;

http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/Breaking-into-Japanese-Literature-Giles-Murray/9781568364155
http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/Read-Real-Japanese-Fiction-Michael-Emmerich/9784770030580
http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/Read-Real-Japanese-Essays-Janet-Ashby/9781568364148
http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/Exploring-Japanese-Literature-Giles-Murray/9784770030412
http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/Short-Stories-Japanese-Michael-Emmerich/9780143118336

I've wondered myself is there's a way of 'easing' into Japanese dramas and TV and stuff (kind of like the learn Japanese through anime method, although one that actually works) but I haven't really had much success. I have making out it in Japanese and another little 'colloquial phrase book' thing I guess. But really I'm just slogging away at it and every now and again I notice that I'm able to understand more and more of what I'm watching.

Once you reach the intermediate stage or know the kanji Schaum's grammar book is great and the core 6000 words/2000 sentences anki deck is very popular.

hibby

Learning to read Japanese really means learning Japanese. You won't be able to read and understand any text unless you have a grasp of the grammar.

Textbooks seem like the obvious route. Most textbooks gradually introduce kanji as the lessons become more advanced.

I am a little bit of a "Heisig sceptic" although I am prepared to be persuaded otherwise. Japanese text consists of words, not characters, and a lot of the time the meaning of the word is not predictable from the Heisig keywords of the constituent characters.

But I haven't tried it, and a lot of people say it works for them, so you should listen to what they say.

Here are my recommendations:
1) Get Anki. Get the mobile version if you have a mobile device. Download a Japanese vocab deck (with the vocab items written in Japanese, not in Roman letters) and memorise it.
2) Get a browser add-in such as Rikai-chan (for Firefox) that allows you to hover over a character and see the reading and meaning.
3) Sign up for a JLPT exam. This will give you focus and motivation, and force you to read.
4) When you have hiragana, you will be able to read books for very young (preschool) children, which is good reading practice and will teach you vocabulary.
5) Manga. Not just yet, but maybe later. Most manga have little furigana (yomigana) beside every single kanji. This is a big help, but actually manga can be really hard to understand for other reasons.
6) Be prepared for this to be a really long project. It's not like you will do Japanese this year and some other language next year. The Japanese writing system is extraordinarily complex and fascinating, and it takes a lot of time and commitment to master. Relatively few foreign learners ever do. I hope to master it one day, but that day is many years away.


I share the frustration of the lack of availability of reading materials for learners. I have never been able to find texts in "simple Japanese", so until you can start to tackle texts written for Japanese people, there is almost no opportunity to read outside of the textbooks.

ConFurioso

I'm reading Yotsuba!, a children's manga at the moment, and crikey it's hard. >_<

I would say if you do only one thing to start learning to read Japanese....it's download anki and start using it as soon as possible. (look in Spaced Repetition System [SRS] as well, to get the full use of anki)