I asked myself this question almost 9 years ago when I started learning Japanese. I always found it so cool that people can speak in this secret language that only they could understand. A lot of times, I also felt left out as well. Being on the bus wondering what people are talking about, are they talking bad about you or others, or hearing people speak in groups, etc.
As for Japanese, in 2014, I found the idea of being able to watch anime without subtitles the coolest thing possible. Fast forward 6 years from there, I feel pretty comfortable watching whatever anime. Although, I completely stopped watching anime over 2 years ago… lol.
What I found cooler as someone who likes to socialize is being able to converse with Japanese people. I spent 2 years doing that. It never gets old. I usually hang with 4-5 friends on weekends and now we’re the ones speaking while noone else understands. Oh how the tables have turned!
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After reflecting, I think the formula for learning Japanese is simple but I came to realize taking “breaks”, “studying once a month/week/every few months”, and “not studying” gets you nowhere. Stay consistent and you’ll reach your goals.
Care to share what brought you to learn Japanese and why you continue?
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Your story is really cool 🙂 As for me although I’d love to move to Japan…..my fiancé would not like that cuz she hates the language lol…I, however, fell in love with it from the first time I saw a kana character….I was always intrigued by it ever since about 11 years ago when a friend I had at the time wanted me to go to his anime club in college just to see if I liked it. That day they were watching a raw anime…. So of course I understood nothing of it (and im pretty sure nobody in the room understood anything either) but ever since then I was intrigued by the language…I guess I liked how it sounded….
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Fast forward some years later (at the beginning of covid)…and I finally took the leap and started learning Japanese…..literally from the first day I got obsessed with the language…..to the point I would do 10-12 hours daily without even realizing it…..and that went on for a little longer than 2 years. I also refused to watch, read or play any content that was not in Japanese (my job was of course the exception)…but this means I also stopped watching anime…until I could understand it with at least jsubs…in those 2 years I learned the ins and outs of the language….every kanji/grammar point in the jlpt and got a ton of random immersion and practice for each JLPT level. Japanese also made me realize I enjoy the process of language learning….so I started learning italian and a bit of French…although I dont spend nearly as much as I once did with Japanese, I still consume content every day in the language (at least a couple of hours) and love every second of it 🙂
For many of you it’s the second language. But for me it’s the 3rd language. 1. My native language. 2. English because yeah it’s the world language 3. Japanese because I like Japan.
The reason I learned English as a kid was because I enjoyed reading books in my native language (Italian) but noticed relatively early on that the translations/phrasings were a bit weird and that after reading some parts of a book I loved in its original language (English) I realized that entire passages were very different from what was actually translated (for example they translated “chipmunk” as “sparrow” which changed a whole scene where the animal was a central point of that story).
For that reason, I just started reading stuff in English, and eventually transitioned doing pretty much everything in English cause it was easier and more international.
Then as an adult, with a passion for anime, games, manga, and all kinds of Japanese media, I realized that I was falling into the same pattern of weird/awkward translations, and that I wanted to play a lot of games that weren’t translated into English yet. That, and also I wanted to challenge myself so I decided to learn Japanese. Eventually I moved to Japan so now I have a more direct reason to learn the language and keep improving, but originally (and still a huge part of it) is just that I want to read books/play games, as that’s what I do.
In 2 months i will have a masters degree in international communications, so I wanted to speak a 3rd language to basically raise my market value. Japanese because I like Japan. Pretty simple really.
Being in Europe, I had learned 3 foreign languages (to different extents) when I graduated high school. Japanese is my 6th foreign language and 7th language including my mother tongue. I have to admit though that I’m far from fluent in every foreign language I learned but one (English).
But your question was why I learn Japanese. First of all I love learning foreign languages as you can tell and I will go on vacation to Japan later this year. So I thought it would be nice to know a little Japanese, so I can say simple things like “This one please”. And now it’s so much fun I just wanna know how far I can get until we go there.
I just want to be able to get around if I travel there
I’ve been around long enough to remember the days when you had to not only hope a scanlation group would pick up a series, but also they they’d be able to even get the RAWs in the first place and translate it at a decent pace. It still exists for some super-niche stuff today… but I remember the extra page advertisements recruiting cleaners, typesetters, and of course, translators.
The first two almost always required using Photoshop, and I STILL have spent less on my Japanese learning material than trying to officially buy Photoshop on a computer that doesn’t come with it- I never did attempt to get Photoshop through… other means, shall we say.
And this doesn’t account for the fact that I met Japanese people for the first time in college (I grew up in a very rural town in the States) and something just “clicked”- I thought they were just awesome people. Fast-forward to 2017, and after years of wanting to do an exchange program while in college but graduating before I ever took that opportunity… well, I at least got the chance to take a 10-day visit to Japan. Short version is, that sealed the deal: even though it meant giving up other things, I HAD to find a way to stay longer in Japan.
And now, here I am in 2023, starting my fifth year in Japan and wishing to continue for several decades. It’s kinda a good idea to learn the language of the country you want to be in, and I have a dream of being N2 by the end of this year (Not even N3 right now, and I’m extremely busy with my job).
Japanese is my 4th language – And I wanted to read gaming development books and side story novels and such. I was pushed because there were no English translations. I was fine with things like anime subs because I did not know how far off they were.
I would say I am reaching fluency in reading now – I generally understand 99%+ of any novel or material I encounter, but slang still gets me as well as classical Japanese. I have little desire for audio input or conversations, but I am making progress because I can’t pretend to be a deaf-mute. I can generally understand most anime and most conversations now, but other times I feel like I understand nothing.
Habits are the most powerful tool humans have.
Make it a habit to do useful things, and you will come to be able to do useful things.
Japanese is my 5th language (LOL) and I learned it because I needed to live in Japan.
When Pokémon was first a thing, everything was released in Japan first. When the new Pokémon in Gold and Silver were released, I wanted to know what they were called, so I worked through their names in katakana. Then people in my school were coming with Japanese cards asking what things meant and so, with a desire to actually understand how this language functioned, it snowballed from there.
I love your story!
I speak 5 languages (cheat sheet incorporated as I’m Danish/English so 3 of my languages are Scandinavian) and have recently begun my Study of the Japanese language, which initially was brought on by a visit to Japan, where I very quickly discovered it’s one of the few places they actually respect you trying to communicate in their language and butcher it, rather than not attempt it at all.
Following that I got into Anime albeit about 20 years too late, with a desire to revisit Japan soon, I figured adding Japanese to my repetoire was a good idea !
Back in high school I knew someone who knew Japanese. I thought it was cool but I never understood how I could learn it. Now fast forward 7 years later. I’m two years in learning Japanese. I wonder if I’ll run into him again.
For fun, that’s literally it.
It’s not my second language. My first is Dutch (i’m from the Netherlands), second is English, and then I’ve also learned German and French.
So I’d say I want to speak a fifth language because: I love languages. We’ve somewhere along the way decided to add meaning to certain sounds, and actually can use these sounds to communicate with each other, that’s wild to me if you think about it.
My husband and I will be travelling to Japan coming september and I’d like to be able to understand the people and signs, and be respectful by learning their language and customs instead of expecting them to adapt to me in their own country.
For me, it began with Katamari Damacy back when the first game came out. I never learned in that phase but it really piqued my interest. In more recent years I have made a few contacts in Japan and it’s embarrassing to me to have to use English all the time. That’s what drives me!
For me it’s fourth language. For me it’s
Firstly: cool, you speak when others can’t(Yay! I’m smart!)
Secondly you know you are improving and not degrading.
Thirdly: You can immerse to other cultures beside of ur own!
Because i can.
How did you start learning. I’m trying to learn the hiragana and katakana from Duolingo because I find there writing and listening for specific characters is easy to remember. I was using a genki book for a bit but I didn’t know how to really study with it or learn with it. And right now I’m just looking for something I can do even if it’s on the side to learn more phrases with the characters I’m learning
I’m not sure I want to speak Japanese, haven’t found my social niche yet. Being able to read it is a very nice change in perspective though.
Second? Its my 4th language…