tangleweeds garden path log

[galaxyrocker]

Please let me know how Reading Japanese is. I looked at the preview and it seemed very interesting, but I admit I'm worried about it being out of date once I saw the publication date.

I suspect that to be an entirely reasonable concern -- I'm hoping for some handy cold war terminology myself. On the bright side, it's almost 15 years newer than the two volumes of her "Beginning Japanese", which I considered (also cheap used) but decided against because they date back to the early 1960's, making them almost as old as I am. Even Japanese: The Spoken Language (1986) dates back about 30 years by now.

Fortunately my Japanese consultant is my brother, who's lived there for almost 25 years. Given the nature of fraternal love, he'd have no qualms about laughing at correcting me when I'm say/write anything peculiar.

I'm jealous of your brother. I've really taken an interest in Japan lately, and would love to go live there. But, yeah, I think I'll probably still get the book after seeing your initial thoughts. I do find that older language learning material tends to be better in general.

[tangleweeds]

But, yeah, I think I'll probably still get the book after seeing your initial thoughts. I do find that older language learning material tends to be better in general.

Yes, I think of it as equivalent to using Assimil French without Toil (my 1975 copy with a 1940 copyright) alongside NFWE (neither of which I'm actively using at the moment my French having wandered off into graded novelettes).

Back to Eleanor Harz Jorden, I ran across an extensive obituary for her here:
http://vineyardgazette.com/obituaries/2009/03/06/eleanor-mudd-harz-jorden-dies-88
It has some interesting information about how Beginning Japanese came into being.

IIRC, Jorden's Beginning Japanese functioned as FSI Japanese, similar to Dawson's Modern Russian serving as FSI Russian (we need a way to earburn Speakeasy here to make sure I've got that right). Also, interestingly, the copyright page of Reading Japanese specifies that it goes into the public domain at the end of 1990. Which reminds me that someone found Beginning Japanese via ERIC (though this finding was never reproduced ), so I'd like to get a look at its copyright page to check whether it went the public domain as well. And look, Powell's conveniently has a copy of it in stock, at their location closest to a friend I owe a visit. I love the internet.

[tangleweeds]

It's impressive how long an ill effect that one long day at the library without audio had, just because I stayed too long without sufficient variation in study modality (i.e. reading vs. audiolingual drills vs. writing practice vs. listening comprehension, etc). I took the entire next day off to recuperate, and just enjoyed chatting on the forum instead. But still, the day after that, it was hard to psych myself up for the expedition. Until then, going to the library always felt like a spiritual homecoming, a return to the monastery of academia, perhaps because I always opt for the "vow of silence" floors (as opposed to the group study floors, which have much cosier decor).

Tonight I didn't want to go either, but I suppose it doesn't help we're having a classic Pacific Northwest days-and-days-long deluge. There's a cute downtown streetcar running directly from my neighborhood through the university district (and onward into twee-land), but when it's pouring rain, a few blocks walk and a couple of minutes wait gets one unpleasantly damp, even with raingear.

On the bright side, I've had a big breakthrough with Assimil Russian, motivated by my angry back & weight of books. I was playing around with the little Assimil book and admiring the flexibility of its spine, when I realised that it was a great candidate for copying short chapters from. So I did, enlarging the two page spread to fit standard office paper, and when I studied it was amazingly helpful to be able to easily read all those small print details about contextual pronunciation changes, etc. I'd had a similar breakthrough when I had enlarged pages from Learning Irish and Buntús Cainte, though that time I did it on purpose for the benefit of my eyes. I failed to think of it with Assimil, because the daily dialogue is in such huge print to begin with.

Today's big book to schlep was Reading Japanese. It starts with four chapters on katakana, then four more for hiragana, before the sixteen chapters on kanji. She doesn't teach kana in the standard order, instead choosing ones that enable lots of practice reading. She gives good discussions of how different English sound mutate into Japanese, and patterns to help puzzle out what English words the Japanese came from.

[tangleweeds]

After weeks of resisting the impulse, in fit of restless insomnia last night I popped out of bed at 2am and ordered that $2 "used, like new" copy of EHJ's Beginning Japanese from the same Amazon seller I got my aged but immaculate copy of Reading Japanese from last month. Reading Japanese is based on the vocabulary and grammar from Beginning Japanese, so it's worth the price some espresso concoction to have all that defined and demonstrated in use. If nothing else, I'm well trained at reading Harz Jorden's mutant romaji.

I've remained pretty goal-less, except for the very general goal to maximize study hours for the 6WC without stressing out about it. At first I was doing all Japanese, and that gave me a good good boost back into the language. But when I poked around the scoreboard, I noticed that other people with similar TL scores doing plenty of study in other languages as well. So I diversified, and began interspersing other languages between sessions of Japanese.

Extended study sessions at the library have motivated me to observe what helps me maintain mental alertness, and the answer is change. Up until now that's meant changing study modality, shifting between listening, reading, writing, drills, etc. Now it turns out that language switching freshens my brain up too, and is an enhancement rather than a distraction. My focus has been on Japanese, but between sessions of Japanese I'll intersperse about half an hour of one or another of my remaining languages {Irish, Russian, French}. The ideal might be to fit in all three each day, but the reality is that I usually get to two of the three, and remember the specific wording of my overarching goal: "without stressing about it".

At least that's how things go when they're going well. I had a weeklong migraine which derailed my studies completely, and it took several days afterward to regain concentration. It set me behind a place or two in the 6WC, and I have yet to catch up, but that's been motivational too.

I don't talk a lot about what specifically I'm doing, because I switch around a lot between different resources. My language learning habit is extensive exposure to different beginner media. I get happy when basic materials overlap. I thrive on that sensation of finding old friends in new places. I love getting different perspectives on basic grammatical structures, discovering where joints flex in the language, divergent possibilities.

Today I studied a bunch from JSL. I actually schlepped the main book to work through the dialogues & vocab, new kanji, and the first drills of Chapter 2.B. Usually I bring only the Japanese transcript, and let the familiar-from-long-ago audio inform me on what any unfamiliar kanji mean. For reasons I don't understand each chapter has two parallel yet autonomous (so far) sections, each with dialogues, vocab,grammar, and drills, cultural notes, etc. So it feels like I'm on the fourth chapter, but I'm only on the second half of the second chapter.

In Minna no Nihongo I'm starting chapter 3, though I want to review some exercises from chapters 1 & 2. Basic Kanji arrived from Japan, and I'm in chapter 2 of that. I'm studying both Minna and BK via Skritter as well.

In Irish I've been treating Buntús Cainte chapters like Assimil chapters, aiming for one a day, starting last week. I remembered chapters 1-10 just fine after neglecting the book for months, and so far I've worked through chapters 11-17. But today I ignored that and instead went through the Chapters 1 & 2 exercises from the Nancy Stenson freeware workbook for Living Irish. I got all of them right, including all those those I failed on when I did them long ago; instead, I clearly understood why the correct answers were correct.

In Assimil Russian I finally conquered chapter 5 and made inroads on 6. There's so much going on with clustered consonants and unfamiliar vowels. I really need to make some Anki pronunciation cards for this stuff. I explored much more with in Russian toward the end of last year, but for now I'm trying the pure Assimil experience.

And in French, I've been reading/listening to A1 Mystère sur le Vieux Port, in various study modes: reading ahead quickly or listening to the audio solo to stress test, reading and listening together, or stopping to look up anything I'm vague on; unsurprisingly I have different percentages of the book completed in different modes. Call it about half way through.

[tangleweeds]

I forgot to report on Reading Japanese. I've finished Ch 3 of the 4 initial chapters on katakana, and I've begun hiragana reading practice in chapter 5 (of ch 5 - 8 on hiragana). For practicing reading kana, RJ uses only vocabulary that a normal adult Japanese person (of the 1970's!) would write in kana rather than kanji. EHJ liked to start with katakana, so it's been lots of geography, tourism, and business vocabulary so far, and almost all loanwords from English.

Now I've begun the hiragana sections it's becoming clearer that the reader is expected to be more than halfway through Beginning Japanese. One theoretically begins the first katakana section alongside chapter 10 (of 20 chapters in BJ vol. 1). So by the time I reach this first hiragana section I'm expected to know 3/4 of Beginning Japanese already. So reading it exposes me to vocabulary and grammar that's feels very familiar, but I don't actually remember worth beans.

BJ's glossary tells me where vocabulary and associated grammar are introduced. However BJ was is printed in monospaced type called "IBM Documentary", and looks like it was typeset via computer (probably a big deal back in 1963). It's a big step up from FSI's typescripts, but this still does not make it easy to read. Whatever needs emphasis, get underlined.

ButI I like being pushed ahead through stuff I used to know, to get a overview of what's to come in during focused study later. In JSL I'd been holding back to a pace at which I could gain automaticity in the drills while also reading the Japanese typescript. But I could move much faster reviewing JSL's grammar sections, if it meant not having to read the monospaced "IBM Documentary" type in BJ.

Up next: what I've actually been doing most lately, which is studying from O'Siadhail's Learning Irish.

[tangleweeds]

So I'd been working through Buntús Cainte Assimil-style, aiming for a lesson a day. However, in reality my Assimil-ish study style flows ahead then bunches up -- I go between receptive phases when I can move ahead swiftly, then digestive phases where I notice the shallowness of my understanding, and I need to chew some grammar. So for the past few days I've been sucked back into grammar intensive Learning Irish, where I discovered I already know most of the grammar in chapters 4 & 5, and am ready for the many tenses of Bí in chapters 6 - 8.

However, the vocabulary from Learning Irish will need audio-editing and Anki-fying, since there isn't a lot of audio demonstrating its use. Lately I'm finding places where Anki is precisely the tool I need for drilling stuff into my head. One has been the Kun and On readings of kanji, where I need denser recall practice than Skritter is giving me (it's much better for learning to write kanji). Another good use LI's long old-fashioned decontextualized vocabulary lists, where there are irregular plurals, unpronounced letters, gender patterns, etc. to learn.

[tangleweeds]

I'm an irregular logger at the best of times, but in case anyone gets worried, I wanted to say I'm taking some time off from my language studies, and will be only intermittently lurking here for a while. I've travelled from Portland to Seattle to help a friend who is providing home hospice care to her (wonderful) mother, and I haven't found a good place to study here (impressive in a 6 bedroom house, but there you have it).

I brought a couple of musical instruments for my own stress relief (mandolin, tin whistles), expecting to practice in the garage, but it turns out that even just hearing me practice and noodle makes my friend's mom feel very peaceful and happy, so it looks like I'll be concentrating most of my spare energy on music while I'm here.

So be well, my friends, and study hard. Maybe I'll be back for the next 6WC!

[tangleweeds]

Well I've been away for quite a while. Exhausting myself doing hospice care triggered an extended health crisis on my part, which finally turned around last autumn, but not before I nearly died from misdiagnosis and inappropriate medication. In the middle of all that I had to move, much of which was handled by my wonderful friends as I was unable to do more than box things. Now I'm recuperating, I'm slowly beginning to unbox, and my language books have at last been sighted (though not actually shelved yet). So I'm back. in spirit at least, though the logistics of getting my audio resources into my current devices have not yet been worked out. But I am very much looking forward to resuming my studies.

[tangleweeds]

It's been an amazingly chaotic month, tossing up a fresh crisis every week, but I've been surprisingly consistent with my language studies considering. I've been focusing entirely on Irish/Gaeilge and Japanese/Nihongo.

I'll admit my studies have been pretty app-tastic, but language and study apps have gotten even better in the few years I've been gone. I still prefer Memrise over Duolingo, I think LingoDeer is awesome, and I finally caved and paid for iOS Anki (ouch!). I tried a cheaper audio-slow-downer program that kept getting confused about its location in the audio wave form, but now I'm using AudioStretch and it's great. I'm looking forward to really getting started with Skritter again, but as yet I'm only worried about writing Japanese kana.

I've also been studying some from paper, particularly in Irish, but keeping things light as I've been juggling crises. Because of the pictures and format, Buntús Cainte works very well for me, as does the Irish grade school series Leigh sa Bhaile (Read at Home). I've also been using Living Language's Spoken World Irish to start with, because the audio is plentiful, slow, and clear, and the grammar is well explained.

As I resume Irish, I find that I can now hear the broad vs. slender distinction very clearly in the audio of native speakers, as well as noticing its absence in non-native speakers. The young speakers on Leigh sa Bhaile are clearly not native, but the colorful pictures stick in my mind and the progression of usage works well for me. One of the speakers on Spoken World Irish is native and one is not, but again the format works well for me. All the speakers on Buntús Cainte are clearly native.

In Japanese, up until quite recently I've concentrated entirely on getting the kana back into my brain, because this time around I don't want to depend heavily on romaji. Only now am I branching out into actual language with kanji and audio.

[tangleweeds]

I've been tediously exploring Japanese kanji learning apps, and finally found one that lets me enter which kanji to quiz me on (iOS, app creatively named "Japanese"; as a bonus, I believe it was free). Because I'm misusing Eleanor Harz Jorden's Japanese: The Spoken Language a little bit, by leveraging my familiarity with this material that I studied intensely (albeit long ago) to enable me to use the Japanese language typescript alongside the all-Romaji text. But I've forgotten all my kanji, and needed to enter JSL's not-the-usual-beginner-kanji into a flashcard app in order to drill them into my head again.

Reading Skritter's FAQ I was reminded of how it's SRS accumulates mountains of reviews if neglected, and their saying, more or less, power through it. That's not how I'm working these days, and since the way I have been working has been giving me better study results than ever before, I've become reluctant to pay $15/mo to be drowned in cards without recourse. So I've also been looking at other apps (without subscriptions, thank you, I'm getting very sick of those) that have me draw my Kanji. So far my favorite is called "Kanji Star".

The way I've been working lately feels somehow lackadaisical to me, but it's giving me learning results like never before. The only guideline is to put what I'm studying down as soon as I begin to feel mentally fatigued, which can happen as soon as ten or fifteen minutes in. But what happens is that instead of consciously grinding through the material at length, I take a few bites so the language center in my brain has just enough to mull over happily. It chews on this and accurately burps up phrases I couldn't remember correctly consciously if I tried, demands to be reminded of their meaning, then swallows them back down again until the next snippet arises.

This happens as I go around the house doing basic domestic chores... chores repeatedly interrupted as I must find the book to recheck meanings or incredulously recheck how accurately this semiconscious language center has remembered more obscure phrases or idioms I had pretty much glossed over. It's kind of cool, and I'm speeding ahead in my books, at least compared to my previous methodical, Anki-ing pace.

Then as I pause between life maintenance tasks to rest my body and refuel my brain with more study, I'm not tired or burnt out at all. It feels like play to consume my next chunk of language, because I know that the moment I feel taxed, I can put it down and attend to other pursuits, knowing my brain will be chewing over and burping up what I studied.