Alopex Fansubs

[AkemiYukio]

I would really. And I mean really like to be given the chance to learn the Japanese language. I know that it's an important language and it is way more related to my life than french.

I was wondering if you guys knew there was a place where I could start learning the basics and so on. Lessons from you guys here would be amazing though!

I am actually good with french but if I had a choice of the languages I could learn, I would have chosen Japanese but so far, I haven't seen a school around me that actually teaches it.

[Jellyfish]

Honestly, the best advice I have for anyone who wants to learn Japanese is probably "don't learn Japanese."

But seriously, if you want to learn you're going to have to be willing to put in a great deal of time in effort both in independent study as well as with others. University students going into the Japanese major typically study 15-20 hours a week at home and often take a full ninety-minute class every day of the week--and while there are a number of high schools that have started to add Japanese to their curriculum, it is difficult to find many schools that teach it in the US outside of California and Massachusetts. I've done some work at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, and found a particularly large Japanese student population. It seems that many students have found success there from what I've seen.

If you really want to learn but can't find a place to, try getting a book to teach yourself. Genki Japanese has become a fairly standard text in High School and University level courses. I'm not entirely happy with it for a number of reasons, but I've seen people do well with it. The famous Pimsleur audio-based language program extends to a full set of Japanese lessons, as well; either choice should be able to take you to the level where you can explain yourself to a Japanese person in common situations with a degree of effort.

The Japan Foundation released a video series called Let's Learn Japanese about twenty years ago. It goes slow for my taste and some of it is dated, but you might be able to learn some basic grammatical structures from it. You can find some of them on YouTube. I don't know if it's still for sale, but I have the entire 27-part series somewhere if you'd like to see it at some point. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t58Hblk8xQM

Programs like the flashcard program Anki are useful for practicing vocabulary. There are games and quizzes on the Internet to test you, as well. Books will give you an idea as to what kanji are good to know, but an official list of "standard" kanji by proficiency level can be found here.

Anyways, really, you don't need someone to "teach" you Japanese. You will do most of your actual learning on your own, for the most part. But supplementing it with a course of some sort is essential if you don't have any Japanese friends willing to devote some time to help you on a regular basis.

Wow, those are a lot of words. I hope there's something useful in there. If you do decide to pursue it, good luck.

[AkemiYukio]

Wow, yes. That is a ton of help! I think I have a little more of a chance to learning. I also know a friend who would want to learn it as well as she is a total fangirl of anime and manga. Maybe I can get her to study with me, that would be a lot easier I suppose.

Other than Anki, do you know other programs and or addons for firefox that are associated with getting to know and use the Japanese language? I actually have no idea how to enter characters on the computer. Maybe it's something I shouldn't worry about 'till later but it would come around eventually.

Once again, Thanks a ton!

[Jellyfish]

Firefox 3 doesn't have anything useful yet, but if you don't mind using Version 2 there's Rikaichan, a program that tells you what words probably mean and what the conjugation of the verb implies when you mouse-over them.

As for typing in Japanese on an English Windows machine, it isn't that hard. You essentially just have to change a couple of OS settings like on this page here. You can essentially switch back and forth between English and Japanese by pressing two buttons on the keyboard just like you can do to switch between any other languages. The actual typing process takes a bit of practice to figure out, but you'll eventually get used to it; you type things out the way they're spelled in kana and hit the spacebar to bring down a list of possible kanji to transform them into. It sounds complicated but it's really not that bad once you're used to it. And you can impress your friends!

[Snoopy007]

[AkemiYukio]

[AkemiYukio]

Once again anyways, thanks! Rikaichan seems to work for version 3. And with that I found out that your title means.....(lol nice..)

[Jellyfish]