Learning Japanese: What to do after having learnt the Kana

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reineke
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Re: Learning Japanese: What to do after having learnt the Kana

Postby reineke » Mon Mar 27, 2017 2:27 pm

I don't think the government is paying the extra 1100 hours for unnecessary frills. If something's estimated as requiring 2x the effort you should pay heed and adjust your expectations accordingly. You may be pleasantly surprised, who knows.

The Difficulty of Japanese

Language hat commentary on an article that appeared in Japan Times. Follow the link if you don't like the formatting:

"A Japan Times article by Roger Pulvers has fun with the notion, dear to people in Japan, that Japanese is “the most difficult language in the world”:

"No sooner had I closed my umbrella and entered the cab than the driver peered at me in the rearview mirror and said, in Japanese: “You’re not a Japanese are you.”
“No, I’m not,” I replied.
“Oh. Japanese is the most difficult language to speak in the world, you know. Isn’t it?”
Well, for the 15-minute ride home I strove to persuade my driver that this, in fact, did not seem to be the case. I pointed out the fiendish difficulties of the languages that I had studied in my life, Russian and, particularly, Polish being much more complicated in grammar and pronunciation, at least for a native speaker of English, than Japanese. I finished my discourse as we rounded the corner by my house.
“I mean, Polish, for instance, has elaborate case endings for adjectives, and even has a special one for the nominative plural of male animate nouns!”
Having listened attentively to my passionate, if pedantic, foray into the esoterica of comparative linguistics, the driver stopped the cab by my front gate, turned his head around to me and smiled broadly.
“Well, anyway,” he said, “Japanese is still the most difficult language in the world!”

So far, so amusing, but Pulvers goes on to say:

"Japanese, of the languages that I know, is actually the easiest spoken language to master.
For one thing, the number of words used in daily life is small compared to, say, English. Nuances in English are added by expressing an emotion with the use of any number of different words, incorporating layer upon layer of subtle meaning by dipping into what is an enormous chest of verbal riches. In Japanese, subtleties are added with the use of a variety of endings. When you get to the end of a sentence you can vary the tone, register and emphasis of what you say by using one or more of a number of word and sentence endings. These endings are not hard to master. The result is that a non-native can be very expressive and articulate in Japanese without having to learn thousands of words — in the case of English, words that came from Anglo-Saxon, Latin and the many other languages that have enriched its vocabulary.
And, you can pause, mumble, leave out core elements of sentences, even punctuate dialogue with long silences and still speak excellent Japanese! The other languages that I am familiar with do not allow for the huge pregnant pauses and embarrassing elipses that allow valuable thinking time for non-native beginners. What is considered an acceptable pause in Japanese, often giving the impression of profundity, would be taken for pure prevarication in English.
Verbs are generally the horror element of language learning. In English they are irregular, with auxiliary verbs and the conditional to make matters worse. Slavic languages have the perfective and the imperfective, not to mention so-called verbs of motion. (You need a different verb for “to go” depending on whether you are walking or riding in something.) Japanese verbs are a cinch. Just change the ending of the verb’s stem to get everything from “I eat” to “I ate,” “I didn’t eat,” “I wouldn’t have eaten,” “I didn’t want to eat,” “even if I didn’t want to eat” and “Sorry but I went and ate it,” which is tabechatta. Easy as pie."

This is just silly. Leaving aside the pauses, a cute but irrelevant distraction, the idea that a simple morphology means a simple language is ridiculous. Complexity is to be found in many areas of a language, and if morphology is simple I guarantee you syntax and other aspects pick up the slack. In the case of Japanese, speaking the language is rendered notoriously difficult by the necessity of choosing a politeness register before you can even formulate a sentence; this is one reason Japanese exchange business cards immediately, so they can see the other person’s title and decide which verb form to use. (Say tabechatta to your boss and you might be out of a job.) I don’t mind oversimplification in the service of a good joke, but the idea he’s trying to promulgate is just as pernicious as the one he’s making fun of.
More examples can be found in the comment section to Bridget’s ilani ilani post, where I got the link."

The comments section is interesting.

http://languagehat.com/the-difficulty-of-japanese/
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Re: Learning Japanese: What to do after having learnt the Kana

Postby Xmmm » Mon Mar 27, 2017 2:45 pm

vonPeterhof wrote:
Xmmm wrote:I never got to the level where Japanese politeness levels, etc. were taken into much consideration. Just standard college/business Japanese.

Unless by "business Japanese" you mean "a couple of basic greetings in order to impress your Japanese business partners before proceeding to the negotiations in English", the politeness levels are vital for business Japanese.


I thought I was clear but maybe I wasn't. I took first year college Japanese, where they specifically said they were going to teach one way of talking to strangers that would be "safest" for us. I threw in the word "business" I think because in class I was surrounded by business majors.

vonPeterhof wrote:Even though I'm a native speaker of Russian I can totally relate to those who say that it's more difficult than Japanese. If my experiences with Greek (both Ancient and Modern, though more so the former) are anything to go by, I'm definitely not the type of person who has enough patience to master variegated conjugation/declension patterns and exceptions therefrom.


Yes. I mean, I know FSI estimates Japanese at 2200 hours and Russian at 1100 hours, but at the beginning level of both languages you would guess it was the other way around.

My first response to this post didn't appear online. Hopefully this doesn't end up as a duplicate.
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Re: Learning Japanese: What to do after having learnt the Kana

Postby Kamlari » Mon Mar 27, 2017 3:01 pm

I said many years ago that if you want to speak a language really well, there are no difficult or easy languages. They are ALL equally difficult. Try to write a good novel in any language.

The thread seems to be derailing into another kenka, I mean fight.
Poor OP!


Ideally -
to save time and effort and avoid confusion and despair:

Thou Shalt Not Break
The TWO COMMANDMENTS.

1. LIE
- Listening Is Everything - (courtesy leosmith viewtopic.php?f=14&t=5071)

2. Think L2, stop thinking L1.
(L1 native language, L2 target language)

So
2.1 don't translate from L1
2.2 use L1 only as one of the tools to get to the meaning in L2 and once you've done it concentrate on L2 only
2.3 audio in L2 only
2.4 pronunciation as close to L2 as possible

So Japanese
1. no ローマ字 ローマじ (RomeCharacter/Letter) romaji except for typing
2. Heisig - a fool's errand
3. name kanji components in Japanese only
4. don't ignore pitch accent, at least you should know what you ignore
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J'aime les nuages... les nuages qui passent...
雲は天才である

1. There’s only one rule to rule them all:
There are no Rule(r)s.
2. LISTEN L2, read L1. (Long texts)
3. Pronunciation.
4. Delayed recitation.

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Re: Learning Japanese: What to do after having learnt the Kana

Postby reineke » Mon Mar 27, 2017 3:41 pm

Kamlari wrote:I said many years ago that if you want to speak a language really well, there are no difficult or easy languages. They are ALL equally difficult. Try to write a good novel in any language.

The thread seems to be derailing into another kenka, I mean fight.
Poor OP!

Ideally -
to save time and effort and avoid confusion and despair:

Thou Shalt Not Break
The TWO COMMANDMENTS...



Wouldn't that be "LIEP" (listening is everything to a polyglot)? I prefer "listening is paramount" so LIP (as in shut your lip) and I don't care if you're a wannabe polyglot.

The OP is now rich in resources and has also received some good advice. I am not sure that giving advice even works but if you deliver it in the form of capitalized, mockingly religious commandments you're sure to make an impression. I'm glad you're back, though. It would be nice if you could open an L/R thread and answer any questions. You are welcome to do as you please, of course.
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Re: Learning Japanese: What to do after having learnt the Kana

Postby aokoye » Mon Mar 27, 2017 4:28 pm

I'm going to stop engaging in the "how many hours" part of this thread because a. we've seriously derailed the thread and b. it's going nowhere.
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Re: Learning Japanese: What to do after having learnt the Kana

Postby reineke » Mon Mar 27, 2017 5:45 pm

The question "how long will it take" etc. is very relevant especially since OP wants to be able to read in Japanese and all he can invest into this endeavor is 30 minutes each day. What's irrelevant to the discussion is disassembling Japanese and turning it into illiterate pidgin just so you can call it "easy" or "easier than Russian".
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Re: Learning Japanese: What to do after having learnt the Kana

Postby Kamlari » Mon Mar 27, 2017 6:13 pm

As far as language language fora go, I've always believed only in two things:
sharing materials and PMs.

The rest is just small talk. It's nice to know that there are still people who want to learn languages, even if they can afford 30 minutes a day. It's laudable.
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Frei lebt, wer sterben kann.

J'aime les nuages... les nuages qui passent...
雲は天才である

1. There’s only one rule to rule them all:
There are no Rule(r)s.
2. LISTEN L2, read L1. (Long texts)
3. Pronunciation.
4. Delayed recitation.

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reineke
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Re: Learning Japanese: What to do after having learnt the Kana

Postby reineke » Mon Mar 27, 2017 7:52 pm

Kamlari wrote:As far as language language fora go, I've always believed only in two things:
sharing materials and PMs.

The rest is just small talk.


Cool beans. Welcome back.
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Re: Learning Japanese: What to do after having learnt the Kana

Postby Xmmm » Mon Mar 27, 2017 8:31 pm

aokoye wrote:I'm going to stop engaging in the "how many hours" part of this thread because a. we've seriously derailed the thread and b. it's going nowhere.


I notice though, that you didn't provide any alternate estimates or a suggestion as to how they could be derived! How did I know it would end like that?



Xmmm
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Re: Learning Japanese: What to do after having learnt the Kana

Postby DCDC » Mon Mar 27, 2017 10:12 pm

Xmmm wrote:
vonPeterhof wrote:
Xmmm wrote:I never got to the level where Japanese politeness levels, etc. were taken into much consideration. Just standard college/business Japanese.

Unless by "business Japanese" you mean "a couple of basic greetings in order to impress your Japanese business partners before proceeding to the negotiations in English", the politeness levels are vital for business Japanese.


I thought I was clear but maybe I wasn't. I took first year college Japanese, where they specifically said they were going to teach one way of talking to strangers that would be "safest" for us. I threw in the word "business" I think because in class I was surrounded by business majors.

This had to be the です・ます form that is polite enough, but is not business Japanese by any means. Business Japanese is hardcore keigo, the politness levels are crucial there.
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