some kind of vague milestone

[piranha]

i can now read kana fast enough to keep up with all but the fastest songs in my current jpop rotation (and even if i could read those fast enough, i can't even SING them fast enough, *heh*). i also know enough kanji to read those as well for those songs that are fairly simple in vocabulary. that's pretty much all johnny groups; they're not very demanding compared to, say, bump of chicken who have very complex lyrics, and i cannot follow those. that doesn't really mean i KNOW those kanji (i don't know all the readings and meanings, especially not in combination), but i can read them in a common reading well enough to recognize the kanji at first glance and not lose my place in the song.

this makes me happy.

*whew*. どうもありがと, さよなら, romaji, it's been a slice.（thank you, and goodbye.)

Comments

[littlebutfierce]

That's very exciting!

What kind of study techniques are you using, if you don't mind me asking? (apologies if you have posted about this recently & I've missed it) I'm generally interested in hearing about these things, but also I struggle w/being a lazy language learner w/o a formal class setting, so especially like hearing about what self-taught people do. Assuming you're one, that is, which could be wrong!

[piranha]

oh, i don't mind at all, and i don't think i've written about it lately. yes, i am self-taught. this is however not my first foreign language, which helps because i know from past experience what works for me and what doesn't.

i do study differently now than i used to, very much so. that's mainly because i started with japanese for a specific reason (translating manga and light novels), which means i am cutting out most of the speech training which i've done for other languages. that's is also why i am not using courseware like rosetta stone; all those programs concentrate on speech training. i do speak japanese out loud all the time, though not to form intelligible sentences that communicate whether the red pen is on, under, or near the desk, but to embed the sound and rhythm in my brain, and to make sure i don't learn bad pronunciation. i work pretty hard on the pronunciation even though i don't anticipate speaking japanese for a long time, but it's habit-forming and that matters.

the kana i basically learned by repeating, repeating, repeating. i have to repeat much more now than 20 years ago, which sucks, but what can you do. i use a spaced repetition flashcard program to train recognition; which works best for me. i didn't stop until i would reliably get 100% on all the tests. i also write the kana a lot, because writing anchors it better in my brain. i do the same with kanji, though i learn those in an unorthodox way, while the kana i taught myself like japanese school children, because that way i also learned the order in which stuff will be written in alphabetical lists. it is surprisingly hard to switch from "aeiou" to "aiueo" order.

i create as much as possible an immersion environment for when i study, which due to illness i can only do in spurts -- you can always tell whether i am studying by what i write about; if it's 99% about japanese stuff, training is on. ;) i listen only to japanese music, radio, drama cds, only watch japanese tv shows (a mix of (modern) drama and variety shows). it's not true immersion, not by a long shot, but it does help me "feel" the language, have it seep into my bones. i try to make everything i watch/listen to interesting/fun so i don't tune out because i get bored. i learn the lyrics for songs (even though i don't often know what they mean), so i can sing along. i read manga for which there are drama CDs that follow it closely (there are a lot!), so i can listen while i am reading. i even buy japanese foods -- this doesn't really help much with the language, but it sets a tone; gets me more into it.

i have several grammar books and i read those for fun -- i like grammar; i like figuring out the structure of a language. at first i learned the grammar in the order text books present it; at this point i am taking side roads (i read a lot about particles much sooner than the syllabus said, because i felt i needed it to figure out where word boundaries are), which is directly related to me wanting to translate as soon as possible. i keep a grammar book and a dictionary in the bathroom, so when i sit there for a while, i can study a little. i have another set in my bedroom. i listen to drama cds before falling asleep.

i started translating of manga very quickly -- i usually get a raw for which there is a good scanlation, so i can check back how close i am. this used to be incredibly painstaking; it'd take me a couple of hours for 2 pages. i am much faster now. i don't do much of this at a time because it is really exhausting, but it helps me to recognize phrasings and kanji. i retype all the text from the manga in my IME. ghods, that was horribly hard to start with -- i would recommend everyone learn conjugations before doing it, because the IME recognizes kanji much better when they come with verb endings. i made a chart and kept it near my desk together with the kana charts.

what else is different this time... oh yeah, the kanji -- i learn kanji partly in japanese student order (same repetition method), but i also learn kanji common to manga. and because a lot of the manga i read is BL, i have an ... interesting vocabulary, *grin*; i can swear and insult people, and know a lot of euphemisms for sex-related stuff, but fall short on keigo that goes beyond teinkeigo (everyday polite speech) -- except for common set phrases, which i recognize not just in keigo, but also in kansai-ben and various slang terminology. i don't anticipate needing much keigo in the foreseeable future. i also learned all the kanji for pronouns very early, because even though japanese is very stingy with pronouns, one finds them a lot more often in manga than in speech, and it helps with deciphering text if one knows who is talking about whom.

this is all fairly unstructured, but it is never boring because IME boring study materials are deadly for self-study (they're almost as deadly for classroom learning, but external forces keep one going there). i learn some parts in a syllabus structure, so i have some direction, but most of it i learn as i need it. this is the first time i've studied like this -- every other language i learned to speak as soon as possible. at first i thought my brain would break, because japanese is unlike any other language i know, and it's so very different in many ways. but by now i am feeling comfortable with the rhythm and word order. i can actually recognize when somebody speaks in a dialect, though i don't always know where that dialect is from. (i HATE dialect at this stage, *wry grin*.)

i think that's mostly it, but it's the end of an all-nighter. ask away if you have any questions; i like thinking/talking about process. obviously, *heh*.

[littlebutfierce]

Oooh, thanks so much for this detailed reply. This is great.

So definitely in the AJATT mode of study! It sounds like a really good way to go about things. I just... have difficulty w/motivation. :/ For me, also, I don't know if I could really get started w/a brand-new language via self-study--it seems to work out better if I can take a course first, & then have at least a little more luck doing self-study (except for aforementioned issue w/motivation & spoons).

I think I do some of this kind of thing anyway--like I listen to Japanese & Finnish music & occasionally make a concerted effort to learn lyrics (which works better than just letting them seep in through repetition) & watch anime/read manga, etc. I like your idea of checking scanlation vs. raws.

I really need to check out SRS stuff! I've been using smart.fm but now that it's going to a pay model I won't be anymore. I think I always considered SRS to be something people mostly used on smartphones, which is v. silly--but I think since most SRS programs seem to be plugged online w/testimonies about how awesome they are to use on the iPhone or whatever, it's not an entirely unreasonable thing to pick up.

I think one thing I find difficult is that I'm not v. good at learning or maintaining two (non-native to me) languages at once. My Finnish is slipping away now that I'm taking a Japanese class, & I suspect the reverse will happen if/when I go back to studying Finnish (I am considering getting a copy of Johanna Sinisalo's Sankarit & trying to read a page a day or so--b/c I don't think that one will ever get translated but I really want to read it!). I'm definitely not one of those people that can naturally pick up multiple languages, but also think I've been stymied by the US' stupid insistence on not giving young students much opportunity to study languages.

Grammar I find the hardest to pick up outside of a class setting where I can ask the teacher questions over & over, ha. I think w/Finnish I can pick up things now, b/c I've learned so much of it already (I studied it for about 4 years, though not for a while), but I think w/new grammar it's tricky. I don't have that same ground work of understanding for, say, Japanese grammar. But I really hope I don't just let my Japanese fall into disuse--the uni where I'm taking my class doesn't have any more courses after this one (this is my 2nd year), blergh.

Are there any Japanese language learning podcasts you've found useful? One thing I loved, & really need to start listening to again, is the Selkouutiset podcast -- the daily news in simplified Finnish for language learners. A quick 5-minute daily blast in learning comprehension -- brilliant.

[piranha]

yes, i think taking a course to introduce oneself to the language with the help of a trained professional is very helpful; kind of a jump start. if i didn't have depression i would have done it that way, but as it stands, getting myself to a regular class is a losing proposition.

i don't think i would ever again learn two languages at once, at least not at the start; it'd very likely be much slower than learning each separately. sure, when i was in high school, we learned both english and french at the same time, but we also didn't do immersion, and i can't exactly say that we learned them fast (and my french leaves a lot to be desired; i've learned more japanese in a year than french in 4). though if one could do it so one learned parallel concepts both at the same time, maybe that might actually help? i don't know; if one learned two romance languages at the same time, maybe, because they do have a lot in common.

i don't use my phone for anything but playing boggle. :) the SRS program i use is here: http://ankisrs.net/.

there are a lot of online study materials, and even if you can't take a class where you live, you could enroll in an online course. many of those are even free, and some are at a university level, like the ones from MIT. http://www.nhk.or.jp/lesson/english/learn/story/index.html is good, IMO. there are also online communities where one can find an exchange partner, like http://www.livemocha.com/, and http://mylanguageexchange.com/, which are a bit more personal than general forums.

i don't know what to do about motivation, and i suck at motivating other people; for me it's enough that i want to understand the language; and i just don't force myself if i run out of spoons, because that has never yet gotten me anywhere. if i run out, i stop learning for a while. that makes it take longer, sure, but i am doing this for fun, you know? i don't want it to be a chore.

i've never listened to any podcasts. somehow that tech advance has completely passed me by. it's probably because i am not a very aural person when it comes to learning -- i don't understand it as well as written material.

maybe you can also find somebody locally who might be able to help with questions? might also be good for conversational practice. http://www.wyzant.com/Japanese_tutors.aspx

[piranha]

oh, as soon as i stored it i realized i had forgotten a big part: i read A LOT about japan; cultural and religious matters mostly, and i research stuff that interests me in specific. i have quite a bit of esoteric knowledge by now -- one never knows what will come in handy, what will connect to other things. connection are important; they anchor concepts in memory.

Awesome!

[bzero]

I am envious. I minored in Japanese in college, but I haven't kept up with it, so I've lost almost all of my fluency. Congrats!

Re: Awesome!

[piranha]

thanks! that's sort of what happened to my swedish -- i didn't major in it, but i lived in sweden and spoke it fairly well, however 20+ years without using it at all hasn't left me with much.

Re: Awesome!

[bzero]

Yeah. I'm amused that I remember a lot more Spanish than Japanese, but that's not really strange since I encounter Spanish a lot more often day to day.