Learning a new language can be a daunting process. Here are a few tips for those starting their journey to learn Japanese!
Change how you listen to your conversational partner’s sentences.
Japanese word order is different from English in a couple key ways, but the most important is that English has the order Subject-Verb-Object (ie “I ate sushi”), while Japanese has the order Subject-Object-Verb (ie “I sushi ate”). This is hard at first, because it means you have to wait for the end of the sentence to hear what your partner did, or to explain to your partner what you yourself did. Just remember to wait for the verb and you’ll get used to the new word order in no time at all!
Memorize the Hiragana.
Reading and writing in Japanese is pretty difficult at first glance, since Japanese has three writing systems: Hiragana, Katakana, and the Kanji. All three systems are commonly used throughout Japanese society. The most important of these, especially at the beginning, is the Hiragana syllabary.
Syllabary is like an alphabet in that it’s a writing system that represents the sounds of a language rather than whole words or concepts. However, unlike alphabetical symbols for separate consonants and vowels like “K” and “A,” a syllabary symbol represents a syllable like “KA.” The entire Japanese language can be written using nothing but the Hiragana syllabary, and crucial parts of Japanese grammar (like verb endings) are commonly written using Hiragana. Mastering Hiragana is a critical starting point for anyone looking to master the language as a whole.
Practice, practice, practice.
This tip applies to learning any language, but for a language as different from English as Japanese, it’s vitally important that you take time to practice the language when you can. This can be as simple as looking over vocabulary or practicing writing words and simple sentences, or as complicated as listening to J-Rock or J-Pop with the lyrics open on your computer to puzzle out what the singers are saying.
Pay attention to the particles.
Particles are Japanese’s way of marking important words in a sentence. To simplify, subjects are usually followed by wa, times are usually followed by ni, places by de, and objects (of the verb) by wo. Japanese speakers will often use these particles as places to pause slightly when speaking, allowing their conversational partners to follow along with the important information as it’s conveyed.
For example, the sentence “I read a book at the library at 3 in the afternoon” becomes, “watashi-wa gogo sanji-ni toshokan-de hon-wo yomimashita.” When translated word-for-word, it sounds like this: “I (subject) afternoon 3 (time) library (place) book (object) read.” It might sound strange for now, but it’s important – and fun – to listen for the particles.
Don’t overcomplicate things.
Japanese is a vibrant, expressive language where you can encode degrees of politeness, your feelings about the action being described, and even your gender expression into the grammar of your speech. While that’s a wonderful part of the language, it can be intimidating at first – “I’m meeting a professor for the first time! How polite should I be?” or “I don’t know if using more casual or more heavily gendered speech will offend my new friend!” My advice is that you should default to the middle-of-the-road polite forms, at least for now. It might be less expressive to introduce yourself with “watashi no namae wa Charlie desu” than “ore, Charlie da ze,” but you’ll never have to worry about causing offense or confusion if you stick to the basics.
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