Japanese podcasts: an exercise in inundation
There are a lot of ways you could go about learning Japanese and maintaining proficiency. You could read textbooks and take tests. You could go to classes once or twice a week. Maybe you could meet up with some Japanese speakers to practice listening and speaking once or twice a month. All of these are excellent ways to keep sharp. But there’s one big problem: it’s not nearly enough time spent on the language to be optimally effective.
Think about it: you study your text books for about 2 hours a day (maybe more, but on average) and memorize pointless abstractions of grammatical concepts which, although incredibly interesting, aren’t really all that helpful toward achieving fluency. You go to your classes once, maybe twice a week for an hour at a time and reinforce these grammar principles with listening and speaking exercises. You then meet with your Japanese friends once, maybe twice a month for dinner and drinks and spend a good 2-3 hours each time engaged in real-life listening and speaking practice that may actually help you in the long run. Let’s take the max values here and do a quick calculation based on a full month of study…
- 2 hours text book study x 30 days = 60 hours
- 1 hour class study x 8 days (twice per week) = 8 hours
- 3 hours social study x 2 days (twice per month) = 6 hours
Total = 74 hours per month of study. If we extend this over a year we get 888 hours of study in a year. And that’s with text book study as the highest percentage of total hours (about 81%).
Now, let’s compare that with the amount of study a person living in Japan gets, again on a monthly basis…
- 16 hours daily using, hearing, experiencing language and culture in context x 30 days = 480 hours
If we extend this over a year we get 5760 hours of study in a year. And that’s with practical listening/speaking/engaging study as 100% of the total hours. This is also assuming 8 hours every night for sleep. This is why people learn faster and more efficiently when they live in Japan.
The fact is, the best way to truly learn a language is by immersing yourself in that language. I could go on about why text book grammar study isn’t as important as people think and may actually hinder rapid fluency acquisition, but the scope of this article is slightly different. I want to talk about a good way to inundate and immerse yourself with a language even though you don’t live in the country of origin. I mean, we can’t all just up and fly to Japan, land a job, get an apartment and start living a Japanese life immediately (actually it *is* certainly possible, just not that feasible for all of us, myself included). But, we know that the best way to learn a language is to hear it daily over and over. So how do we pull it off if we don’t live in the relevant country? It’s simple: podcasts.
We live in a world of technological wonder where everyone has an iPod (yuck) or a Zune or some other portable mp3 player. An mp3 player can be purchased for as little as $20. Why not have a couple of news or entertainment podcasts on loop constantly on your mp3 player inundating you with Japanese language at all times? There are literally thousands of podcasts in Japanese regarding every subject imaginable. Get some. Put them on your iThing. Put it on repeat. Listen all day. Each time you hear it, you may recognize another word or two then eventually full sentences until finally you can remember and repeat whole passages. It’s so simple it’s stupid. Just listen to Japanese all the fucking time.
So let’s re-assess our original study schedule this time including some podcast listening study as well (NOTE: for reasons beyond this article, I’m replacing text book study with kanji study because I think it’s the better way to go)…
- 2 hours kanji study x 30 days = 60 hours
- 1 hour class study x 8 days (twice per week) = 8 hours
- 3 hours social study x 2 days (twice per month) = 6 hours
- 10 hours podcast listening study x 30 days = 300 hours
This brings our yearly total to almost 4500 hours. And this is just at 10 hours a day. Realistically, you could increase the amount of time you spend listening to Japanese to as high as 18-24 hours a day (why not sleep with headphones on playing Japanese podcasts/music?).
It may seem obsessive and even insane to some, but hey, this is how you learn. If you don’t want to become fluent in Japanese as quickly as possible, well that’s fine. But, if you do the answer is simple. Listen to the Japanese language all the fucking time. It’s so simple it’s stupid. So, how about a few examples of available podcasts to get you started:
- Yomiuri Shinbun (読売新聞) – excellent daily news podcast
- Nihongo Juku – bad ass site full of nothing but podcasts WITH complete transcriptions of the audio; covers a variety of topics; one of my top picks
- H!P Radio Shows – for those of you out there who share my love of Hello!Project, there are a shit ton of radio shows hosted by various members throughout the ages that are perfect listening material; if you’re interested in this one you’ll no doubt know where to find them
- iTunes – if you’re an iPod user you have it easiest as you can simply hit up the iTunes store and select Japanese as the language and take your pic from hundreds of excellent podcasts
It should be noted that I am in no way fluent in Japanese. I have a long way to go, I know that. But, I also know what has worked best for me throughout my learning experience and that is constant inundation. In fact, the only times I ever feel like I’m just not progressing is when I stop immersing myself fully for any period of time. So, don’t be like me. Don’t fall off the bandwagon and then have to pick up the slack again later. Keep yourself immersed and the language will come to you. It’s working for me and it works for Japanese people. Hell, it worked for you when you learned to speak as a child.
So get cracking and get listening. There’s no excuse. Put in the time, listen to Japanese, and become fluent, you sorry SOBs.
For more on the subject of immersion technique (and to read it as written by someone much more eloquent than I) visit AJATT. Great site, great guy.
Okay, I’m done. Until next time…
“Lay judge” trial in dynamic 3-D CGI action
Okay, more weirdness from my beloved Japan.
First of all, they’ve implemented this new “lay judge” system wherein select citizens preside in major trials as supplemental judges. Lay judge candidates are summoned to the court to go through selection procedure. Six lay judges and three alternates are then chosen and assist in the proceedings. The six lay judges and three professional judges then act as a jury of sorts and are tasked with reaching a verdict and if necessary meting out a sentence. Pretty interesting, right? Well, to make it even more interesting to us regular folks (and more creepy) a recent murder trial has been rendered in lovely 3-D CGI animation. That’s right. Nintendo court. Check it out:
Dude, that is awesome. And for those of you studying Japanese, there’s some great vocabulary in this vid. ^_^
How To Tell If You Are Unhealthily Obsessed With Japanese Culture…
I just found this funny list I wrote back in ‘06 when I first started studying Japanese seriously and learning things about the culture. Maybe you guys will enjoy it.
How To Tell If You Are Unhealthily Obsessed With Japanese Culture…
- You start pronouncing brand names like “Mitsubishi” correctly
- You use the word sushi in reference to rice
- You answer the phone with “moshi moshi”
- You bow as you say goodbye to the person on the phone
- You know the difference between Japanese tofu and other types of tofu
- You know what “otaku” means
- You know what “cosplay” is
- You like “cosplay” but not for any perverted reason
- You like “cosplay” for perverted reasons
- You’re working towards your Bachelor’s so that you can live in Japan
- You know what it means to use the “masu” form
- You have at least one Morning Musume album
- To you, the word “Gackt” is the name of a pop musician. And it doesn’t strike you in the least bit as strange
Oooh, maybe this could become a Facebook quiz like Shirow’s wonderful wota quiz. Hmmm…..
Yet another bullshit post…
So, here’s one of those posts where I list all the shit I’m doing that prevents me from being able to post to my friggin’ blog and even talk about posts that I’m planning to write but haven’t. Pathetic. It’s not much, but I have to post something since I recently kinda redesigned the site and made these nifty banners you see above. So, anyways…
I’ve been spending most of my time over in #wotachat as of late. I’ve managed to level up to the point that now pengie is stealing my lunch money. I feel so … well, I feel like part of the family, you know?
Got a couple of translating gigs to keep my 日本語 sharp (since currently it is as dull as Ai-chan). I’m working on “test projects” with both Hello!Fansubs and Haro!Rangers. More to come on how these endeavors turn out.
I’ve been listening to a lot of Perfume lately. I always say that Nocchi is my favorite and I insist that’s still true historically up to a point in their career. But, last night I had a dream that featured Kashiyuka. I guess I’ll just bite the bullet and join the ranks of Kashi fanboys. It’s that fucking haircut, man! かわいいさに負けた。
The usual band related crap has also been eating up time. Recently we were selected for a compilation CD to be distributed at the grand opening of a new winery in Houston. We also have a fest or two coming up and we’re still trying to secure a location for the upcoming Halloween bash. Anyone interested can check up on this shit at our website.
So, enough excuses. I’m trying my best to keep up, but I’m just a busy motherfucker lately. Luckily, AX is just around the corner so I’ll have a nice little vacation of unabashed wota-ness soon enough. Looking forward to some JunJun and some Erien, not to mention hANGRY (Yossie looooove)!!! And let’s hope Hello!Party is a reality!!! (shout out to bryan_; がんばってね！)
Anyway, more to come. Planning my first post on KBU for the metalhead’s blog and working on a character profile post of #wotachat all-stars. (^_^)
A new beginning…
Just a quick announcement that I’ll be taking a much more active approach to this blog moving forward. My main inspiration in starting this thing in the first place hung up his horned helm and called it a day last week. Yes, Henkka, the mad vodka guzzling wota himself has stepped down from the Giger-inspired throne of brutal metallic idol worship giving me the opportunity to take the reigns of this mighty beast and attempt to ride it into the short-lived (but greatly appreciated) meta-fame and inter-infamy that I so deserve. I’ll do my best to make you proud my Scandinavian friend.
My blog will cover more than just the girls, however. I’ll be dipping into all things related to Japanese idols, culture, language, and comedy. So, here goes nothing…
How (or more importantly, why) to be overly obsessed with H!P (pt. 1)…
We’ve all heard the comments.
“So you like little Asian girls now. I see.”
“What are you, gay?”
“Dude, you’re a @#$%ing pedophile!”
I always get some version of one of the above when I attempt to discuss H!P with non-wotas. It’s either confusion, a question of my sexuality, or abject disapproval and accusation of pedophilia. Pretty tough critique, really, since I’m neither gay nor predisposed to be sexually aroused by children. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised though considering the cultural identity of my country. But, if not the above then what? What is it that I like about these little girls so much that allows me to open my mind enough to appreciate music that I’ve shunned until now or drives me to scour the internet for footage of television appearances and interviews or <gasps> Saturday morning children’s programs.
Well, for me, the answer turns out to be much more complex than I imagined. It tells a long and intricate tale informed by a concept called “moe“, my own personal history and childhood, my interest in the linguistic character of the Japanese language, and more. I guess we should go back to my first encounter with H!P and a guy named Mat Swadling.
When I first started studying Japanese language and culture I was obviously most interested in things like Samurai and Ninja and Yakuza (still am, really). These are the introductory images of Japan that every westerner who is interested in the land of the rising sun finds so fascinating and intriguing (and indeed they are!). I would do all the typical things you would expect a person studying Japan to do: I watched a lot of Akira Kurosawa, read the Book of Five Rings, and even took Ninjutsu for a spell (shout out to sensei Corey Froelich). I ate sushi every week and went to the Japanese market in my area all the while reading through Japanese for Busy People and saving up for a trip to Tokyo.
At some point I began taking my linguistic pursuit more seriously and discovered that it would be beneficial to me to study children’s material and thus I found NHK and the myriad of programs available to help Japanese kids strengthen their English language skills. I realized how helpful it was to hear Japanese explanation of English and so I embarked on a little search for videos or audio of Japanese English teaching programs. My search found something called “Ayaka’s Surprise English Lessons” （「あやかの突撃英会話」） translated by a guy named Mat Swadling. Here’s the first one I saw:
Hahahaha! Oh, that Aibon! 僕も可愛いさに負けたね。
Needless to say, this video fascinated me. Who are these people? Who is this super hottie Ayaka and her zany, uber-genki little friend? Why is she being quizzed? Why is this little girl so crazy? Thus, my friends, began a long and continuing relationship with the works of Mat Swadling and Morning Musume (particularly Aibon).
I went on to watch every episode of “Ayaka’s Surprise English Lessons,” starting with the Aibon episodes. Then it was a quick jump to discovering Yaguchi-san and thus Mini-Moni and Tsuji-chan. I started to understand what I was really dealing with here and did more study on Morning Musume and ultimately Hello!Project. I started collecting data on all the different members and eventually found Hello!Morning and Utaban, the shows that would provide the most information on all the characters’ histories and specific traits. I learned that Iida “Johnson” Kaori could channel aliens and that Abe Natsumi often spoke to her hand and referred to it as “okaa-san.” I also learned that Nakazawa Yuko is really an oni. Then I found some fantastic supplementary shows like Mecha-Ike and HeyHeyHey, which of course spiraled me into the world of owarai combi. It’s a snowball effect, you see?
While this gives an indication of how I got into H!P, it still doesn’t quite explain the why part. Why was I so fascinated by Aibon’s hysterical daffiness or Yaguchi’s small but strong gutsy attitude? Well, this will be the content of part 2 of this post.
Yokoso!
Hello and welcome!
Please feel free to comment or email me with any suggestions or potential revisions to post content.
Thanks for coming by!
-delrey28
