I think I was just confused because I've seen so many people discussing learning the syllables of the characters rather than discussing the actual vocabulary. I thought maybe you must know some of the kanji characters before understanding words written in hiragana, which is wrong. Thanks.
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The Big Ass Superior Thread of Learning Japanese
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I think I was just confused because I've seen so many people discussing learning the syllables of the characters rather than discussing the actual vocabulary. I thought maybe you must know some of the kanji characters before understanding words written in hiragana, which is wrong. Thanks.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
Hiragana and Katakana are just phonetic writing systems. It's good to learn them first because it will teach you what sounds are possible in the Japanese language, and it will allow you to read and look up words. Once you've got a handle on those two writing systems, you should then start studying some Kanji.
I'm not sure if I have the commitment to actually learn Japanese but I'd definitely like to. Again, thanks for the helpful information.
It's pretty much just a good idea to learn the kana right at the beginning, it doesn't take too much effort and it makes it easier to get along with the language. However it is completely possible to learn the language without knowing any of the writing systems, but I wouldn't recommend it.
The 'tricky' thing about reading in the language is that to be able to know where one word starts and one word ends you have to have a good feel for both grammar and vocabulary. Fortunately the division between kanji/katakana/hiragana helps alleviate this.
Should grammar and some vocabulary be something that is learned before kanji? I'd imagine learning them simultaneously is possible too but I imagine that'd be pretty hard.
Probably best to do it all at once. Start out with the basic characters first.
I'll show you what I mean with a simple sentence:
犬は水を飲んだ。
The dog drank water.
Bold are 'nouns'
Underlined are particles - a grammatical word to show role, similar to how articles in English show plurality and definitiveness.
And that word at the end is a conjugated 'verb'. The kanji represents the idea of drinking, and the hiragana at the end is the "did" in drank, it makes it the past.
I can also write it without any kanji, but it becomes a bit messier, or write dog with katakana, because there is a convention to write animals/plants/living things using katakana.
Although a sentence this easy isn't very hard to parse no matter what way you choose to write it.
Some kanji make more sense to learn before others, since some nouns and verbs are used more than others, making learning kanji a long - lifetime learning experience rather than something that should be done all at once such as the kana.
Basically:
kanji is mostly used for nouns and the beginning part of verbs
katakana is mostly used for sounds, science terms, and foreign words
hiragana is mostly used for grammar, inflection (conjugation), and words you forget the kanji of.
I searched all of the characters individually and the sentence structure is starting to make more sense. The explanations of when to use kanji, katakana and hiragana are also very helpful. How common is it to put the hiragana in small print above a kanji symbol in things like manga? I'd imagine that would be helpful for trying to read Japanese while not knowing a lot of kanji.
Thanks for the explanations though, they're really helpful. The sentence structures in different languages always seem to be the most intimidating part at first.
Furigana (what this is called) is pretty much a given for shounen/shoujo manga, even on basic words with kanji kids have learned by the end of first grade. When meant for an older audience however, it can range from common but not everywhere to pretty sporadic. Actual literature books for teens, from the few I've seen, seem to be coordinated to some degree with what the readers are expected to know. It can still appear in books for adults for obscure readings, names, rare kanji and readings the author wanted to have there instead of the expected. Well, in most cases it's really to the right rather than on top of the kanji, since unless it's a textbook or academic text, vertical writing remains the norm for most other printed materials.
It's called furigana, and it depends on the target audience of the writing. If it is a manga for a young kid there will be a lot of it. If it is in a newspaper, it will be used on characters that are not the 1945 taught in school. There is another case where they are used as well, the writer may want to use an unusual reading of the character. This happens mostly in manga and karaoke, for instance the author might want 拳骨(genkotsu, fist) to be read as フィスト(fisuto, fist).
It's a neat language, and while the writing can be quite a hurdle for some, it's grammar and pronunciation is pretty easy and forgiving, so I like to see it as balancing out its difficulty. If you find time, I am sure there will be people that can give you a leg up in this thread.
Edit: Beaten by alekth
Thanks for the information. It definitely seems like it could come in handy as a way to read before knowing a lot of kanji.
ivedoneyourmom said:
One of the first things I noticed is that the pronunciation is relatively easy. I've looked at some Korean before and I often have no idea how to pronounce some of the words so it's a relief that Japanese pronunciation isn't that hard. I still have to look into grammar a bit though.
I like languages a lot and I have an interest in Japanese. Maybe I'll just start out with the kana and see if I enjoy it. Should I learn to write katakana and hiragana like I would kanji or should I just learn to recognize the character?
Memento_Mori15
Member
So I'm just curious, is anyone going to take the JLPT this year? I took N5 when it was first introduced and passed it. However, I didn't really study Japanese from the summer of 2011-spring of 2012. I did resume this summer and been going through an integrated approach to Intermediate Japanese(I did complete Genki I & II before I stopped for that year). I'm thinking about taking N4 or N3, but would N3 be out of reach? I definitely feel like vocabulary is my biggest weakness but it is improving slowly.
EDIT: Nvm, a friend and I decided to take N3 this december.
@Cranzor
Learn to write and read it. It shouldn't take you long at all.
EDIT: Nvm, a friend and I decided to take N3 this december.
@Cranzor
Learn to write and read it. It shouldn't take you long at all.
bigmit3737
Member
これ　持ってかれると
俺ら　心もとないわ
I need help with 持ってかれる
In this situation, the waitress is threatening to clean up the customers' (friends) coffee because they are just loitering in the restaurant.
So the friend/customer says, "これ　持ってかれると
俺ら　心もとないわ"
I was thinking it means something like, "if it runs out, I will feel uneasy".
If so I don't understand the use of 持って　in this situation.
Thank you.
俺ら　心もとないわ
I need help with 持ってかれる
In this situation, the waitress is threatening to clean up the customers' (friends) coffee because they are just loitering in the restaurant.
So the friend/customer says, "これ　持ってかれると
俺ら　心もとないわ"
I was thinking it means something like, "if it runs out, I will feel uneasy".
If so I don't understand the use of 持って　in this situation.
Thank you.
None of the kana have more than 4 strokes, so they are pretty easy to learn. I learned them in a couple of days. Besides it being a useful skill because you can use it to write, and substitute kanji for it, production often is a good way of memorization. If you know how to write it, you know how to read it.
The と is what throws me off a bit, I suspect that the 'then'/'when' clause is implied. I would translate it something like this:
Here, we'll hold onto it - when it runs out (we'll leave).
Something like that - I'm assuming the waiter/waitress left the pot of coffee?
Edit: The customer says 俺ら　心もとないわ？ I'm a bit confused, male or female?
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
Before going any further... are you aware that the "かれる" in this is just another way of saying "いかれる" (行かれる
?If he's talking to the waitress, he's just saying "If you take this away..."
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
Probably a little bit, since you'll be able to roll your R's easily. I don't know if there are any downsides, though.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
I haven't seen Mik2121 post in this thread in a long time, but I believe he's a native speaker of Spanish (Spain Spanish, I think). He speaks Japanese and last I heard he works at a Japanese video games developer in Japan. Maybe he'll know more about any benefits of being able to speak Spanish before learning Japanese.
Rosetta Stone is good but the thing is that you have to sit down and do it every day. That's a problem for some people. I like Pimsleur much more. It has 30 minute audio lessons that you can listen to while your driving. I listen to it on my way to and from work. It's like studying for an hour every day. If you buy Pimsleur make sure not to buy the scam version "10 lessons for $10.", buy it off of amazon.
Shit. Should have thought of that. My bad.Before going any further... are you aware that the "かれる" in this is just another way of saying "いかれる" (行かれる
If he's talking to the waitress, he's just saying "If you take this away..."
That reading makes more sense.
bigmit3737
Member
Before going any further... are you aware that the "かれる" in this is just another way of saying "いかれる" (行かれる
If he's talking to the waitress, he's just saying "If you take this away..."
Def did not know that-Thank you so much.
So it's the passive form of 持っていく。
shanshan310
Member
Its good, but not on its own (I guess that applies to most sources really). You will need to supplement it with grammar and kanji study. It also teaches based difficulty rather than usefulness, eg. the first chapter focuses on sentences like "the man eats", "the girl reads a book". Its good for pronunciation and listening practice, but its fairly expensive.
I strongly dislike Rosetta Stone, the whole concept of learning it how a child would (by immersion) strikes me as futile - first of all adult brains are not the same as children's brains, especially when it comes to how we learn languages. Secondly it ignores the biggest strength we have when learning a second language - having a first language to fall back on for explanations/descriptions.
Personally I'd say the best route is Genki I book and Michel Thomas Japanese audio courses. The latter I discovered way too late to make good use of but it is by far my favourite audio course for beginners. Rosetta stone spends more on marketing than developing the actual materials (supposedly).
Personally I'd say the best route is Genki I book and Michel Thomas Japanese audio courses. The latter I discovered way too late to make good use of but it is by far my favourite audio course for beginners. Rosetta stone spends more on marketing than developing the actual materials (supposedly).
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
Never used Rosetta Stone, but I learned Japanese mostly through immersion and I'm absolutely better off for it. When you completely rely on your native language to study another language, you'll never learn how to use the new language like a native speaker does, because you will always be putting it through the filter of your native language.
Well, true immersion with another culture (I take it you lived there for a bit?) is without a doubt the best way of learning, I'd give my left testicle to have had the chance to go over there and learn it that way - and I can understand why you didn't need to use any other method with that. But Rosetta Stone is a one way process, unlike living in Japan you are not truly interacting and therefore not getting any real feedback on which to correct yourself, your just associating example sentences with often vague pictures and without that interaction, you are basing a lot of your knowledge on your own guesswork - which is insane considering just how many great books and resources you can find to get a real technical knowledge of the language.
There are many reasons not to use Rosetta Stone, but I am currently not at my computer to detail my dislike for the program. I am a full supporter of immersion, but RS is not that. RS makes a facsimile of the language and overlays it over a Rosetta Stone intermediary language that is targeted at native English - specifically American English speakers. One quick example that pops to mind is that when teaching colors they show a picture of a sun, and the user must say that it is 黄色, which as we all know is not the case for the Japanese language.
I've not really looked into Pimsleur, but I imagine it has many of the same flaws Rosetta Stone has.
RoyalFool: immersion always works, but the reason we don't often use it is because once you have a primary language you can take shortcuts in the process of learning additional languages, especially when it comes to grammar which via immersion often requires several stages of reanalysis due to initially forming imprecise rules, or the language being inundated with exceptions - fortunately this does not present much of a problem in the case of learning Japanese.
Oh, while I'm here.
Are there any tricks to learning the transitive and intransitive verb pairs? I've kind of noticed how the intransitive one often has a 'a' sound in the middle while the transitive has the 'e' sound. Is that consistent in any way or am I just imagining things?
e.g.
受ける < transitive
受かる < intransitive
Are there any tricks to learning the transitive and intransitive verb pairs? I've kind of noticed how the intransitive one often has a 'a' sound in the middle while the transitive has the 'e' sound. Is that consistent in any way or am I just imagining things?
e.g.
受ける < transitive
受かる < intransitive
One is usually an 一段動詞 and the other is usually a 五段動詞. The pattern is highly irregular, I think maybe only about 65% of the 他動詞 are 一段. The best way to do it is learn verbs as sentences, verbs that take を will always be the 他動詞 (transitive).
beanman25
Member
If anyone is looking for Japan TV on the internet.
http://qvc.jp/cont/live/Main?serverId=8
There is always text on the screen, so it is interesting to try and translate.
EDIT: Anyone aware of other japanese TV channels that stream?
http://qvc.jp/cont/live/Main?serverId=8
There is always text on the screen, so it is interesting to try and translate.
EDIT: Anyone aware of other japanese TV channels that stream?
I've decided to start out with hiragana first and then move on to katakana. I'm a bit confused though. When I look at a chart for hiragana, it splits them up into different classifications. I'm pretty sure I am supposed to learn all of these but the stroke chart only shows the characters under the monographs classification. Can anyone clear this up?
There are 46 basic Hiragana. Learn all the ones without the tenten(ぼ） and maru（ぽ）. Download anki and and the deck called "Japanese Kana" and you'll learn em real fast.
Download Keyhole TV from this site for free Japanese TV. http://www.v2p.jp/video/english/
Download Keyhole TV from this site for free Japanese TV. http://www.v2p.jp/video/english/
Learn the stroke order now, it helps in remembering how to write it. There are several apps, I have iKanji, there are somethings I don't like about it, and there is the occasional mistake, but the repetition alone is what aids in the process.
There is a general order that most characters stick to. Any good kanji book probably reviews it in the first couple of pages, there is also a wikipedia article on the subject.
Cranzor: I've been milling over what you asked, but still don't understand the question. As Adent points out, there are characters that can be loaded with a tenten, which will make the sound voiced k->g, s->z, t->d, etc. And there is the handakuten (maru) which makes the は (ha) row a plosive. Many tables also have an area where they include characters in the い column that have been paired with a small や(ya), ゆ(yu), よ(yo) to show to perform a palatalization called a youon.
If you are still confused, you could post a picture of the table and circle the area of confusion and that may help us understand what is being asked.
I didn't realize there was a kana deck for Anki. I've been practicing with that. It's helpful, thanks!
I would post a picture but the table is pretty big. I'll just link directly to it so I don't take up a lot of space. I was using this table on Wikipedia. I don't understand why the table is split up into different areas. I've seen people say there are 46 hiragana characters but that table clearly has more than that. Also, the stroke chart down the page only has the characters in the top left area of the chart. So the top left area of the chart labeled "Monographs" I understand, but I am confused about the other parts.
I'm also still a bit confused on the characters that have functions other than being a syllable. I'm slowly figuring them out, though.
beanman25
Member
You're probably right. I don't want to have to backtrack only to learn stroke order. It'll be worth it in the end!
Oooh, I get what you are saying. Yeah, they have this thing completely expanded.
What they are calling monographs in the upper left are 'single character', they are the 五十音 - the 50 sounds (46) - this is the standard table. In the upper right are 'double character' digraphs - what the Japanese call youon 拗音 - the are palatized sounds derived from the い column. You are expected to glide the sounds together - for instance if you say ri + yu together fast the i becomes muted and you get ryu. These are not characters in their own right, it is just meant to make things easier, and are good to learn as a unit of sound. The bottom left are the voiced/plosive versions of the sounds, they are what take the tenten (dakuten), or maru (handakuten). The lower right are the voiced versions of the youon.
Small little walk through:
These are all the same character.
ひ, び, ぴ - hi, bi, pi - sounds like he, bee, pee. The first one is a pure sound, the second one is voiced (vibrate your voicebox while saying hi and it will sound like bi), and the third one plosive (pucker your lips and quickly open while saying hi and it will sound like pi)
ひゃ, ひゅ, ひょ, - hya, hyu, hyo - ひ glide to や, ひ glide to ゆ, ひ glide to よ.
You can also combine them so that ぴょ - plosive hi, glide to yo - pyo.
There are exceptions of course, but in general just go left to right and top to bottom for stroke order. Don't know about iOS, but for Windows/Mac/Linus you can get Tagaini Jisho (free, and there are probably others), which has animation for pretty much every character that isn't extremely obscure, so at least you can compare and see whether you got it right. You'll get used to the flow pretty quickly (though left-handed people might have a harder time), and as for the exceptions, my Japanese teacher said the Japanese themselves often get it wrong, so recognition software ought to be made to compensate.
But really, when you're starting out, kanji will have furigana, so it's easier to just enter the reading and click on individual kanji for details.
Okay, that makes a lot more sense. I didn't realize they were constructed from the 46 characters. Once I learn all 46, it doesn't seem like the additional ones should be too bad. Thanks a lot!
bigmit3737
Member
This is from a Naruto episode and I need a little help.
Kabuto: 白黒ゼツは連れて行かないのか？
Madara: ゼツはサスケの見張り役として
置いて行く.
戦争の隙に　お前に連れて
行かれんとも限らんからな
I need help especially with the underlined portion.
I don't understand the conjugation of 行く　nor the 限らん　portion.
Thank you.
Kabuto: 白黒ゼツは連れて行かないのか？
Madara: ゼツはサスケの見張り役として
置いて行く.
戦争の隙に　お前に連れて
行かれんとも限らんからな
I need help especially with the underlined portion.
I don't understand the conjugation of 行く　nor the 限らん　portion.
Thank you.
90TilInfinity
Member
Quick (maybe stupid, apologies if so, lol) question, are the top and bottom characters the same here? One's a Japanese font I found while the other is MS Gothic.
行かれん = 行かれない, 限らん = 限らない.
Think you got it now?
Cranzor: Yeah, it's not so bad. Learning the syllabary is the hardest part of the language.
Quick (maybe stupid, apologies if so, lol) question, are the top and bottom characters the same here? One's a Japanese font I found while the other is MS Gothic.
Both are Japanese. The top is 表メ必 (hyoumehitsu), and the bottom まこと (makoto). まこと means sincere, I can't really make sense of the top, maybe it is a play on words, or a joke? This use of メ is not something I have ever seen before, or it could be a typo and 表面 (hyoumen) was the desired word. 表 usually means surface, and 必 invariable, certainty.
90TilInfinity
Member
Thanks alot for the response.
Is WWWJDIC available on iOS? I haven't noticed it being too strict.
In general top-bottom, left-right, outside-in, horizontal crossing strokes before vertical should be 'close enough'.
bigmit3737
Member
Thanks. I got it. If you don't mind, can you translate the underlined sentence?
I'm having trouble getting a clear picture of the meaning.
Thank you.
beanman25
Member
I type that in, and it's just an app called "Japan" is that the one.
Also, big thanks to Leroy on page 73 for showing conversationexchange.com Already have a partner!
Well I have hiragana down now. It took about two days but I'm going to keep practicing. It's pretty neat to be able to read it even if I can't understand it. I'm still a bit confused on some of the other uses characters have besides representing a syllable though. I get what the iteration marks ( ゝ and ゞ do but I'm not really sure how common they are. Wikipedia says they are now only used in proper names. Is that really the only function they have now? I still haven't read about particles yet either so I'll get around to that soon. I'll be working on actually writing hiragana while learning katakana at the same time now.
What are some good resources for learning vocabulary and grammar? I am probably going to pick up Remembering the Kanji after I learn katakana as that book seems to have helped a lot of people, but I'm not sure what resources are good for vocabulary and grammar.
do but I'm not really sure how common they are. Wikipedia says they are now only used in proper names. Is that really the only function they have now? I still haven't read about particles yet either so I'll get around to that soon. I'll be working on actually writing hiragana while learning katakana at the same time now.What are some good resources for learning vocabulary and grammar? I am probably going to pick up Remembering the Kanji after I learn katakana as that book seems to have helped a lot of people, but I'm not sure what resources are good for vocabulary and grammar.
beanman25
Member
Well I have hiragana down now. It took about two days but I'm going to keep practicing. It's pretty neat to be able to read it even if I can't understand it. I'm still a bit confused on some of the other uses characters have besides representing a syllable though. I get what the iteration marks ( ゝ and ゞ
What are some good resources for learning vocabulary and grammar? I am probably going to pick up Remembering the Kanji after I learn katakana as that book seems to have helped a lot of people, but I'm not sure what resources are good for vocabulary and grammar.
That quick? What did you do to remember them? It took me forever.. haha
I mostly just had little stories to go with them. き sort of resembles a key so I associate it with ki. ね resembles a horse from the side (at least to me!). Horses make a neigh sound which I associate with ne. り looks like the letters "ri" upside down so I associate it with ri. Just things like that. I'm not sure if that would work for everyone but it worked really well for me. I used Anki a little bit to practice but mostly just used a kana app on my iPod that has a flash card function built in.
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