What next? (learning Spanish, maintaining German, random dabbling...)

Continue or start your personal language log here, including logs for challenge participants
User avatar
rdearman
Site Admin
Posts: 7231
Joined: Thu May 14, 2015 4:18 pm
Location: United Kingdom
Languages: English (N)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=1836
x 23120
Contact:

Re: Tatort und whatever

Postby rdearman » Sat Jul 24, 2021 12:34 pm

How about a listening project? All French all the time for example, podcasts and audio books?
2 x
: 0 / 150 Read 150 books in 2024

My YouTube Channel
The Autodidactic Podcast
My Author's Newsletter

I post on this forum with mobile devices, so excuse short msgs and typos.

gsbod
Blue Belt
Posts: 839
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 3:22 pm
Location: UK
Languages: English (native)
German (advanced)
French (intermediate)
Japanese (intermediate)
Spanish (learning)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?t=1152
x 2900

Re: Tatort und whatever

Postby gsbod » Sat Jul 24, 2021 1:26 pm

rdearman wrote:How about a listening project? All French all the time for example, podcasts and audio books?


Some French some of the time is rather more my style!

But watching a couple of French movies isn't a bad way to spend some time, after all...
0 x

gsbod
Blue Belt
Posts: 839
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 3:22 pm
Location: UK
Languages: English (native)
German (advanced)
French (intermediate)
Japanese (intermediate)
Spanish (learning)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?t=1152
x 2900

Re: Tatort und whatever

Postby gsbod » Sun Jul 25, 2021 1:55 pm

After losing a day to a stinking migraine, I'm now thinking rather than a language project, I just need a break.
4 x

User avatar
jeff_lindqvist
Black Belt - 3rd Dan
Posts: 3135
Joined: Sun Aug 16, 2015 9:52 pm
Languages: sv, en
de, es
ga, eo
---
fi, yue, ro, tp, cy, kw, pt, sk
Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=2773
x 10461

Re: Tatort und whatever

Postby jeff_lindqvist » Sun Jul 25, 2021 5:06 pm

I feel your pain. Hang in there.
3 x
Leabhair/Greannáin léite as Gaeilge: 9 / 18
Ar an seastán oíche: Oileán an Órchiste
Duolingo - finished trees: sp/ga/de/fr/pt/it
Finnish with extra pain : 100 / 100

Llorg Blog - Wiki - Discord

gsbod
Blue Belt
Posts: 839
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 3:22 pm
Location: UK
Languages: English (native)
German (advanced)
French (intermediate)
Japanese (intermediate)
Spanish (learning)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?t=1152
x 2900

Re: Tatort und whatever

Postby gsbod » Mon Jul 26, 2021 10:54 am

Thanks for the support jeff_lindqvist, it was much appreciated.

I woke up this morning with a clear head, the sun is shining (but not excessively), and I don't have to go to work today. Things are feeling good again.

I've decided I'm going to have a go at working on my Japanese reading. This is because:

- it is of immediate practical use (I have a pile of Japanese books on the "to read" pile, although it's not quite as extensive as the German pile)
- I don't have to spend any money (see above)
- I don't have to do it at my desk (all I need is an appropriate book and a mobile device for occasional dictionary look ups)
- I should be able to fit what I want to do within around an hour a day, but can scale up or down according to whatever else I have on.

I did wonder whether an emphasis on reading might become unbalanced, or at least I would lose any synergy effects from working on other skills, however I figure that fans of Latin and other ancient languages tend to prioritise reading without too much difficulty, so I should be ok. (And if not, I'll do something else).

The plan is to focus on the following to start with:

- よつばと!- possibly the only real Japanese text currently at, or below, my level
- Read Real Japanese Essays - this is a reader aimed at intermediate students, with eight essays by contemporary writers accompanied by substantial notes in English. Kanji words have a furigana gloss the first time they appear in a text, but then if they reappear it's without the furigana. This should all help reduce any time needed to look things up online
- Kanji in Context - yes, it's dry as a bone and I've not exactly used it to amazing success previously (although it definitely did help) but the plan this time is to take a much lighter touch approach. So I'll be using the reference book only as a reference, where needed, and will be focusing on simply reading and understanding the text in the workbook, hoping to benefit from the structured and thoughtful presentation of kanji vocabulary without ending up overwhelmed or thoroughly bored by it
7 x

gsbod
Blue Belt
Posts: 839
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 3:22 pm
Location: UK
Languages: English (native)
German (advanced)
French (intermediate)
Japanese (intermediate)
Spanish (learning)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?t=1152
x 2900

Re: Tatort und whatever

Postby gsbod » Thu Jul 29, 2021 8:28 pm

I had my second COVID jab this week which left me feeling more wiped out than I expected (didn't really have any issues after the first one...). On the plus side I didn't have to work this week, but it has put another dampener on my week off. Never mind. I'm looking forward to the extra COVID immunity, in any case.

I'm still going with my little Japanese project, although I'm trying hard not to feel overwhelmed by it - probably not helped by my feeling sub par this week. Japanese is hard though, and I think I had some generally unhealthy and unproductive (or at least sub-optimum) study habits back when I studied Japanese intensively that are bubbling to the surface. I'm really glad German came along and saved me from myself back then! :lol:

But there is still a massive gap between the small amounts of Japanese I can read with ease, and everything else I want to read. And a fear that the only way I'm going to be able to overcome that gap is through a lot of grinding, which makes it harder to relax and enjoy the process. If only I could install a 10,000 word Japanese-English dictionary into my brain (I've tried before, with the Anki method, but it always seems to get corrupted after around 3,000 words...)

Anyway, the good news is that よつばと! is still cute and surprisingly comprehensible. Last time I read the first volume in the series my Japanese was not as good as it is even now, after a long break, so I'm getting a lot more out of it this time around. I am actually enjoying it.

Kanji in Context is predictably dull, but manageable as long as I stick to the rule that the only thing I'm aiming to do for each workbook chapter is read and understand everything, rather than deliberately trying to commit the material to memory. I was on chapter 4 today, in which I found a helpful note of the date the last time I attempted to study it, in April 2016! Actually, as I've been through the early chapters a few times before, over a period of several years, I remember a lot of it already, but after a 5 year gap what I'm finding is that although the grammar is still pretty clear, some of the vocabulary and the trickier kanji readings are already long forgotten, although it generally comes back fairly quickly with a dictionary look up. The first few chapters in the book focus on the most common kanji, but as it expects you to know them reasonably well already the main focus is on the trickier words anyway. I think it starts to even out from level 3 onwards (thats from chapter 19 (of 143!), kanji no 351 (of 1947!)).

Read Real Japanese is probably the most overwhelming thing at the moment. The first essay was a very short one by Murakami and I remember very clearly reading it before, which helped with my understanding. But the notes are so detailed it's hard not to become a bit bogged down. I really don't know the best way to approach this. Do I read mostly extensively and only look things up when I get stuck (which admittedly tends to happen every other paragraph anyway)? Or do I try to wring every last bit of meaning from the text with the help of the detailed notes? I can see the benefit of both. With the Murakami essay I ended up reading the notes and finding it a bit tedious, but helpful in places. The essay itself is quite silly and playful, so not a bad read. I've now just read the second essay by Sakai Junko through twice (I hadn't read it previously). The first time was with no lookups, to see how much I could understand. The second time I made several references to the translation, which cleared up some gaps for me. Didn't enjoy it as much as the Murakami essay. But do I move onto the next essay tomorrow? Or do I go for an even deeper dive with this one instead? I expect there's probably some nuances I'm missing which the notes might help elucidate anyway.
5 x

gsbod
Blue Belt
Posts: 839
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 3:22 pm
Location: UK
Languages: English (native)
German (advanced)
French (intermediate)
Japanese (intermediate)
Spanish (learning)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?t=1152
x 2900

Re: Tatort und whatever

Postby gsbod » Sat Jul 31, 2021 1:17 pm

I went for the deeper dive with the Sakai Junko essay yesterday. It was actually worth it. Dare I say it, things are getting easier? Just a tiny bit, maybe.

It's certainly been a useful reminder of things like the use of くらい and 限り when talking about extent or limits, or the various uses of わけ, or expressions featuring ~という or it's contraction to ~って. It's also great when you see things like an explanation of how せずに is a more literary form of しないで and you know that you already know this, and it feels like you've always known it. It's not so great when you see explanations like "Here we have もの and のです. The もの is emotive; the のです is somewhere between explanatory and emphatic" and feel none the wiser.

I think the important thing is to keep in mind the very specific thing I want to achieve: to be able to read, without an impossible amount of friction, some of the books I already own. I'm not going to have to prove myself in any test, or indeed to anybody else in general. I do not need to demonstrate any productive ability at all. I don't have to be able to translate anything, or otherwise demonstrate my understanding. In fact, I could read something, enjoy it, fundamentally misunderstand it, nobody (including myself) would be any the wiser, and it absolutely would not matter. As somebody who generally gets hung up on trying to do things properly, this is putting me on very shaky ground indeed. Still, it might do me some good.
3 x

gsbod
Blue Belt
Posts: 839
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 3:22 pm
Location: UK
Languages: English (native)
German (advanced)
French (intermediate)
Japanese (intermediate)
Spanish (learning)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?t=1152
x 2900

Re: Tatort und whatever

Postby gsbod » Sun Aug 01, 2021 12:35 pm

So I moved on to the next essay in the book. 料理 ("On cooking") by Mitsuyo Kakuta. I took a first pass without looking at the notes trying to understand as much as I could and I noted two things: firstly, it felt like a vocabulary bomb had gone off, and secondly, of the bits I could understand, I didn't like it very much. Very much a case of sexism dressed up as humour. Thinking I may have missed something, thanks to that vocabulary bomb, I went back and read the first page again with the notes to help and it really confirmed that I'd understood enough to know that I didn't want to read any more.

So now I'm in the annoying position of having a text I don't want to read, full of vocabulary I don't know that is probably quite useful, and a load of notes which I know will be mostly useful.

Well, I don't have to read anything if I don't want to, no matter how good the notes are. So I think I'll move on to something else.
4 x

gsbod
Blue Belt
Posts: 839
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 3:22 pm
Location: UK
Languages: English (native)
German (advanced)
French (intermediate)
Japanese (intermediate)
Spanish (learning)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?t=1152
x 2900

Re: Tatort und whatever

Postby gsbod » Mon Aug 02, 2021 6:17 pm

Back to work today, so Japanese is firmly back on the "too difficult" pile, because after a day of earning my wage the last thing I want to do is try reading a Japanese book I only half understand. Still, I'm glad I did my little holiday Japanese project. There's never any harm refreshing an old language, and it's given me some thoughts for the future, should I ever want to pick Japanese back up properly, namely:

- start with よつばと! because it's easy (relatively speaking) and I quite enjoy it
- make some proper plans to review all the grammar and sentence patterns which I've half forgotten - something like Tae Kim's grammar is probably a good place to start, at least the Special Expressions and Advanced Topics sections
- be prepared to grind through a lot of vocabulary, because...
- there is a massive vocabulary gap between what I can read right now, and what I might actually want to read. Whether or not it's worth the effort (for me personally) to bridge that gap is an open question

Now I'm off to enjoy the deep pleasure of a German Krimi, which I can read with (relative) ease, before University Challenge...
5 x

gsbod
Blue Belt
Posts: 839
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 3:22 pm
Location: UK
Languages: English (native)
German (advanced)
French (intermediate)
Japanese (intermediate)
Spanish (learning)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?t=1152
x 2900

Re: Tatort und whatever

Postby gsbod » Tue Aug 03, 2021 10:28 pm

A classic 90s manga I've wanted to read for years is Monster by Urasawa Naoki. As it's a complex psychothriller with a brain surgeon as one of the main characters, and the Japanese version doesn't even have furigana to help you out, I've never felt ready to tackle it in Japanese.

I'm also not that keen on reading manga in English. But then it occurred to me that I could give it a go in the French translation (actually French is a pretty good language for manga - there seems to be more diversity in the types of manga translated to French compared to English). A quick search on Amazon did bring up the French translation, but it also brought up a German translation which has only quite recently been published. So I thought German is better for me than French, and ordered myself the first volume.

So far so good. The action starts at a hospital in Düsseldorf, so having the characters actually speak German makes a lot of sense. And yet, as I'm reading it, the voice in my head is definitely sounding like German dubbing rather than natural German...
4 x


Return to “Language logs”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests