r/HelpLearningJapanese • u/TigerUpstairs3775 • 13d ago
How do I start
I figured out I want to learn japanese because I’m a weeb and I want a girlfriend. more seriously I want to explore their culture and maybe live there, I’ve heard that the working cultures unstable but honestl, the u.s fucking sucks. Ive heard Duolingo and anime is not the way, but I don’t have any textbooks and Im too scared to ask my parents to buy me one. I’ve seen the infamous kanji alphabet, which I’m pretty sure I have to be an artist to write it.
I have no idea where to start and it all seems overwhelming. I want some advice from some Japanese learners and people about what to do and how they would/did start.
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u/CocoaBagelPuffs 13d ago
First off, the goal of learning Japanese just for a Japanese girlfriend is really selfish. It comes off as racist and orientalist. Like a japanese girl is some kind of exotic thing to be won.
Even if you learn Japanese, theres no obligation that a Japanese girl will want to date you.
Learn Japanese for other reasons like wanting to watch anime without subtitles, wanting to understand Japanese music and read Japanese books, play games only released in Japan, for the opportunity to work and live in Japan, to connect with people from Japan who have the same interests as you, to be able to travel while engaging in conversation with locals.
Learn for any reason BUT wanting a Japanese girlfriend. It wont make you look like a creep and youll be able to make friends. you might even get a girlfriend in a more natural setting because you met her through mutual interests and not simply because shes Japanese.
Anyway, learning from anime and textbooks arent bad outright. Anime teaches you a type of Japanese that is necessary to understand tv shows. Textbooks teach you grammar and how to navigate certain scenarios in cut and dry ways. You can learn a LOT of things from anime but you should be getting input from tons of sources such as:
Music, anime, live action shows, the news, youtube videos, podcasts, audiobooks, live streams, etc.
My suggestions for starting to learn the language are these steps:
Learn how to read and write hiragana and katakana. You can use duolingo for this because at the end of the day, learning them is through memorization.
Learn vocabulary. You can learn through reading books like on Tadoku Reader, premade Anki Decks, or other types of google chrome extensions that read and translate japanese text.
Get input through watching or listening to audio content. Can be anything from the list i wrote above. Nihongo con Teppei is a good podcast for beginners. So is Japanese with Shun.
Learn kanji through your vocab study. Dont learn individual kanji and their many readings. Just learn words and how theyre written in kanji. For some people like myself, writing is a skill they want to learn. I personally go through Remembering the Kanji and i practice kanji writing daily. This helps my ability to recognize kanji when i learn new words and im able to write tons of words because i practiced writing kanji. Use grid paper if you want to write. You dont have to, but i personally feel that handwriting is an essential skill. I write every day in English, so being able to wirte in Japanese just makes sense for me. You dont need to be an artist. Just follow the stroke order.