I’m almost done with MNN 2. I wanna start reading One Piece in Japanese. I’m wondering what’s the best way to do this? I bought the digital colored version on amazon. Should I just like google translate any words/sentences that I don’t understand? Also I know there’s a companion app for novels (I forgot what it’s called) that translates anything you tap on on a tablet. I didn’t know if there was something like that for manga (I’m using Kindle). Any tips on how to turn reading manga into a learning experience would be much appreciated!
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Maybe someone else can give a better idea but here’s how I do it
1. Try and read a sentence. If you understand it, great.
2. If you don’t understand it it’s probably either a) grammar or b) kanji or c) vocab but it could be d) slurring/contractions too
3. If it’s grammar you look up a grammar point you don’t know. I just use google, there are a lot of grammar sites. If it still doesn’t make sense, take a picture of the page and post to the daily question thread. But definetly make an attempt at translating it first and post your attempt too.
4. If it is kanji you don’t know, think about how it fits into your goals with kanji. If you wanna learn all kanji up to N3 or something, see if it is an N5-N3 kanji and learn it, or leave it for later if it is N2-N1. If you need a story to help you remember try https://kanji.koohii.com/. Remember, you can identify unknown kanji with jish.org’s “radicals” menu.
5. If it is a vocab word you don’t know but you have seen the kanji before (or it has no kanji) look it up in a dictionary such as https://jisho.org/. Consider adding it to Anki.
6. If the sentence still seems a bit off to you even if you know the grammar, vocab, and kanji, you can ask on the daily question thread. Take a picture of the page to help people get context and put that somewhere like imgur.
7. Special thing: a lot of slurs/contractions will occur in a manga. If you are like me these will trip you up. The best you can do is ask for help online and hopefully you can eventually pick up on it. I keep a text file of contractions, you can do the same.
When I read something (usually books but this works with manga) I keep a text file. This file has words that show up a lot in this book. It helps me read it. I can also add those words to anki if I want. But make sure you don’t add ALL the words or anki will have too much in it. The goal is to keep anki under control, rather than having anki run your life.
Not an answer, but a follow up question. Does anybody know where/how to get NEW japanese manga in europe. I ordered some used off of ebay and it smelled like tobacco smoke… I would really like to have some physical manga copies in japanese, but cant find new ones that ship to europe.
I know a guy who started reading one piece after finishing mnn and half of tobira and he is really struggling..
It’s mostly the contracted forms but also the amount of text and humor that make it difficult, I believe. I’d chose a manga with a rather simple setting for your first manga instead. School, slice-of-life and romance tend to be close to textbook vocabulary.
I usually recommend extensive reading, so that’s what my advice will be based on.
1. I wouldn’t look up every word. Manga is great to read because the panels will give you context to understand what is being said.
2. Try summarizing. Having a broad idea of what is being discussed/what just happened on a page is usually enough to just continue reading.
I wrote more about reading manga as a first time reader here: https://dokushoclub.com/2022/04/14/start-reading-manga/
There are two comments here that basically describe the two methods:
1. Push through reading and don’t get caught up on what you don’t know. You can occasionally look up words that seem important or are repeated. You might also add these words to your vocab study list. The positive about this is that you can get through the manga without spending too much time looking everything you don’t know up. The negative is that in the end you won’t fully comprehend what you read and might make assumptions about word meanings that aren’t correct.
2. Look up everything you don’t know. This can make reading very slow if you don’t know a lot. It can also be discouraging and frustrating when you can’t find the meaning. The positive is that you are properly trying to learn everything, but the negative is the slowness.
There is a third method where you can study the grammar/vocab before you read something, but there are very limited resources for this.
Either method is okay. Someone else mentioned something similar, but you might want to start with something easier. Some manga are much harder to understand than you expect. Don’t be surprised if you need to study more first before reading certain manga.