Hello,
I have what may seem like a strange request: I would like to find a textbook, meant for English speakers, that aims for being comprehensive rather than necessarily “easy to understand” or aims to not scare away students by the density and volume of material.
In case it helps explain where I’m coming from, I’m a classicist and used to studying languages academically (i.e. philologically rather than “just” understanding). The textbooks I’ve seen so far, such as Genki, don’t seem to explain certain concepts to the depth I’d like, and I often have to look them up understand them better/on a deeper level. I suppose I’m looking for a textbook more similar to those I’m familiar with, where a great deal of information is laid out all at once — Genki and related textbooks feel a bit like being spoonfed.
I hope that what I’m asking makes sense — essentially for a more academic or “difficult” textbook than those listed in the subreddit wiki, I think. I would greatly appreciate any recommendations.
14 comments
“An Introduction to Modern Japanese” by Bowring, Cambridge University Press is precisely what you’re looking for.
(Book 1 has grammatical explanations and Book 2 is a workbook.)
*Japanese: The Spoken Language* and *Japanese: The Written Language* (JSL & JWL) books might suit your needs. Some people don’t like them because they (1) have overly complicated grammar explanations, (2) are too difficult, (3) highlight pitch accent ‘too much,’ and (4) use romaji.
I would also get the *A Dictionary of …* books that are so widely recommended. (I believe people usually reference them when Genki fails them in their grammar explanations.) The explanations read really nicely – feels well thought out and well written.
In your case I would recommend looking for an overview of all necessary grammar in a grammar dictionary. Your best bang for buck would be something like the A Handbook of Japanese Grammar Patterns.
A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar (Makino and Tsutsui) along with the Intermediate and Advanced versions.
(Note: I can’t vouch for the Advanced one, since I only found out about its existence when I went to look up the other two. It must have been released more recently than the others. I’ve just ordered a copy to complete my set.)
Maybe the short books “Making sense of Japanese” in the Kodansha collections can also help, or “How to sound intelligent in Japanese” in the same collection.
The 1st one will more discuss on why for instance are used directional verbs, causative, etc. Not in a full grammar mode but rather a “philosophical” analysis. It will not cover everything but is a good read.
The second will more be a list of suffixes and prefixes that often appear in academics/newspapers (why it is rather “-ri” or “-ron” for instance).
If you speak French I also knows some resources as you described.
Sadly book format just doesn’t fit it. The more detailed it becomes, the more space it takes and no one is ready to publish 10-20-50 books encyclopedia. Even if you look at very precise definitions and comparisons like DoJG has, it’s already 3 books and no general guidance, rather more like a list of forms and sometimes even that isn’t enough, especially with more abstract forms like という or particles, which need a lot of overlap explanations. For example, when to use は and when to use が.
Thus I move from dense to detailed. I usually check needed form in DoJG first, and when it’s not enough, I google. Usually [https://japanese.stackexchange.com/](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/) have many good explanations, but sometimes can be other sites too. When even that isn’t enough, I dig into research papers. Usually there is nothing more detailed than that, because people are ready to write 20-50 or sometimes even 200-300 pages about a single topic.
I highly recommend Tae Kim’s “A Guide to Japanese Grammar” – should be free online at guidetojapanese.org
It’s pretty dense, but so far has been covering grammar points really well. Doesn’t really focus on vocabulary, but does what I think you’re looking for (doesn’t shy away from harder concepts)
This might closer to what you’re looking for. https://www.imabi.net
IMHO “comprehensive” and “textbook” don’t really mix too well. If you’re just starting out and are looking for a fairly dense textbook with exercises, aimed at adults, I can recommend:
Shoko Hamano, Takae Tsujioka: “Basic Japanese”, ISBN 978-0415498562
Takae Tsujioka, Shoko Hamano: “Intermediate Japanese”, ISBN 978-0415498593
Great structure and explanations and surprising depth. Next to no pictures, lots of tables. Very precise terminology. For instance, regular verbs are categorized into 1-row and 5-row, like in native Japanese.
For looking up individual grammar points, I second the recommendation of “Dictionary of Japanese Grammar” series by Makino et al. These 3 books are a must-own, I sometimes browse through them just for fun!
Classical homeschooler here. For context we use Athenaze, Oxford Latin, the progymnasmata, classical math and the great books. We practice festina lente.
Due to the nature of Japanese we are doing things differently. I created a 5 year plan based on the JLPT levels and he’s studying Kanji on the side systematically as well as reading. The core text includes reading, writing, speaking and listening. I will find a speaking partner after N4. The plan…
My main texts are Minna No Nihongo (N5, N4), Tobira Gateway (N3), Authentic Japanese (N2) and then a test prep booklet for N1.
Kanji is Kodansha Kanji Learner’s Course with Japanese Kanji Study. He is also using the workbook and readers for KKLC.
Reading is White Rabbit’s Graded Readers followed by Satori Reader.
I plan to have him read A Dictionary of Japanese Grammar as well, but we haven’t started yet.
So, I didn’t answer your question properly, but after much research I decided what you want to do, which is what I wanted to do originally, was not the best way to tackle this particular language.
Good luck.
A Reference Grammar of Japanese by Samuel Elmo Martin comes to mind, despite the weird romaji it’s really deep-level.
i can’t attest to their quality, but from the relevant section of my notes are:
* Hasegawa, Japanese A Linguistic Introduction
* Kuno, Structure of the Japanese Language
* McClain, Handbook of Modern Japanese Grammar (probably superseded by the basic, intermediate, advanced dictionaries of japanese grammar that have been suggested in other comments.)
give [imabi.net](https://imabi.net) a shot
I love the dictionary of basic japanese grammar book. It gives good examples