Tofugu.com – Wonky Japanese Language and Culture

Passing the JLPT at any level requires being able to read some Japanese and of course the best way to learn to read is well….reading stuff.  The problem with reading is that it’s really hard.  For most of us below the JLPT Level 1, pulling out a newspaper, book, or magazine in Japanese and just reading and understanding it is next to impossible to do in a reasonable amount of time.  To be fair, those newspapers, books, and magazines are written for adults and the JLPT only tests up to a middle school level of language comprehension.  If our Japanese reading level is the same as kids, why not read like one?  Most people solve this problem using manga, but the JLPT makes you to read paragraphs not text bubbles with pictures.  Thanks to my JLPT prep class teacher, I found a great way to study for the JLPT: Japanese Newspapers for Kids! Read more…

I get all kinds of weird questions in my e-mail inbox. Sometimes they’re creepy, sometimes they’re hilarious, sometimes they’re interesting, and sometimes they’re a part of a pattern. This is one of those patterns. A few times a month I’ll get the following question:

What is the best Japanese Language electronic dictionary?

Once I get the same question too many times, there’s a good likelihood that I’ll just write the answer via a post here, which is exactly what’ I’m doing. So, what is the best Japanese Language electronic dictionary out there? Let’s find out. Read more…

Japanese girls are great for a lot of reasons, I mean, get real, they’re loved world wide because they’re small, cute, wear tiny tiny skirts, and sometimes dress up in school uniforms (even if they’re not in school anymore).  It seems to be a rite of passage for every male exchange student, every JET, and everyone visiting Japan to try to find a Japanese girlfriend when they visit… Read more…

When it comes down to it, I’m pretty certain that most people don’t quit learning Japanese because it’s too hard. Really, the Japanese language isn’t that hard at all (at least if you know English already, which is a big ol’ mess by comparison). The problem with most Japanese learners is that they just don’t have the right motivation and inspiration to keep them going. Learning a new language is 99% motivation and 1% “other.” Originally, I kept this mailing list reserved for TextFugu members only. This morning, though, I took a looksy over the TextFugu Manifesto (as I try to do every morning) and stopped for a moment on #3: “Help People To Learn Japanese.” That’s when I realized that this mailing list is perfect for anyone learning Japanese (whether they use TextFugu or not), and thought it could be really useful if made available to the public. Read more…

With the advent of computers, e-mail, and all those other fancy things that causes our handwriting to be terrible and makes us dependent on spell check, getting opportunities to actually write kanji with our hands is becoming rarer and rarer. I know my hands hurt several seconds into writing something. I have weak hands that a grandma would scoff at (though they’re very beautiful, I’m pretty sure I could go into hand modeling if this whole blogging thing doesn’t work out).

The other day I got an e-mail from Skritter. They’re a pretty rag-tag bunch, but I like that. Skritter lets you practice writing kanji using various flash card sets (either Skritter made, community made, or you-made). Sure, you could do all this with your hands, but here’s what makes Skritter interesting. Read more…

This is a guest post by the awesome Japanese language teacher and blogger Rainbowhill. Be sure to subscribe to his newsletter (a personal favorite of mine!) and follow him on Twitter.

On Friday last week I spent most of the afternoon being verbally abused and physically threatened. It was all part of the training in conflict resolution offered by my employer and conducted by a wirey ex-cop that reminded me of an Aussie version of Clint Eastwood in Dirty Harry. Our police trainer hired actors to play a client that had reached a level of aggravation beyond negotiation.

Our trainer told us that he wanted to scar our subconscious deeply enough so that when we were confronted with a potentially life threatening situation we would know how to respond instinctively. So with little knowledge of the conflict unfolding behind a closed door we were thrust into a room where we had to rescue a co-worker from a hostile situation. Read more…

Not content to blindy folllow popular methods of language study a Jedi Knight searches the near and far galaxies for hitherto unknown tools and techniques with which to master Japanese. Hidden beneath the long sleeves of a hooded cloak is a tool for deciphering even the densest of Japanese literature, the Kanji Sono Mama Rakubiki Jiten on Nintendo DS. Read more…

J-blogger buddy Thomas from Nihonhacks has recently told me about his latest venture, which is sure to excite Japanese (or any language) learners out there. Traditionally, if you wanted to get audio for something, either it would be there or it wouldn’t (and then you’d be out of luck unless you found someone to record something for you, which doesn’t sound like much fun to me). Enter stage right: RhinoSpike. Read more…

Way back in the day, I published a list of my 10 favorite (free) Japanese learning resources, which is great, but not as great as 100 Japanese learning resources. With a list this big, you’ll be able to procrastinate to your heart’s content, which is probably why you’re reading this blog and not learning Japanese instead.

This list has been broken up by category, that way you can find the things you’re most interested in quickly and easily (without having to scroll through the entire list). Within each category, I’ve listed resources starting with my favorites and working my way down. Those marked with a tofugu logo () are “Tofugu approved,” which mostly just means they’ll give you a warm and fuzzy feeling when using them (oh, and I would use the resource myself). Things that I just kinda-sorta like don’t get a sexy fish next to their names. But hey, we have a lot to go through, so let’s get to it. Read more…

One application which I’ve used for a long time is Evernote, though I’ve mostly been collecting and organizing recipes… until now. Just today, as I was scrolling through the Asahi Shinbun, I had an epiphany. I should be saving articles, sentences, vocabulary, and what-have-you in Evernote so that I can easily search for them later if I ever need to come up with examples on how grammar, vocab, etc., is used in a sentence. Doing this with Japanese blogs would be splendid too. More importantly, I’m going to deconstruct how to use Evernote for language learning (specifically Japanese in this article). It’s a very powerful tool with a lot of potential – I’m sure you’ll even find some interesting uses that I won’t even think of too. Read more…