8 comments

1. Regarding sentence structure in japanese: In german there’s a mnemonic called “TeKaMoLo” which stands for Temporal-Causal-Modal-Local. This would be the typical order of terms in a german sentence. Is there an equivalent in japanese of such a thing, even if the language allows some flexibility? Maybe a standard order that would never sound wrong and would be the most natural order possible?

2. I’ve been learning for ten months, and watching unsubtitled anime has been a big part of my learning process for the past several months. I have reached a point where I can frequently understand the gist of what’s going on, especially if I pause and rewind, but frequently struggle with the speed at which characters talk and some vocabulary. Is it better for learning to pause, rewind, and look up vocabulary to get a better understanding of exactly what characters are saying, or power through and accept that I don’t understand everything?

   Personally I find it much more enjoyable to watch without stopping. I do pick up words through context that way, too. Still, I wonder what the most efficient way to learn is. I’ve got a decent vocabulary foundation from WaniKani, other anime, and classes (I’m a college student). This question also applies to manga, where I sometimes face a choice between stopping to look up unknown words or continuing. Thanks so much!

3. Well, since the automod is destroying this question, I’ll try posting it here?
   Erm:

   I’m trying to write Japanese with Kanji, but like
   There’s some nuance

   止める can be both とめる and やめる

   For what I’m trying to write, I want to be able to have the furigana be や not と
   Because I’m going for that word specifically

   But I can’t find a website that lets me choose the furigana

   Ideally, it would be copy paste (the kanji+furigana being one character)
   Cause I can get them separate with Jisho

   A keyboard would also work, the built in one with windows doesn’t have furigana, or at least, I don’t think it does, could be a skill issue

   Since the whole point of furigana is to help differentiate how the writer wants the kanji to be pronounced, you’d think there’d be a way to decide what the furigana is

   Thanks!

   Alternatively, there may be no such thing, because furigana+kanji is simply not a thing most text processors (what I mean by that, is like, places you can write things, like discord or reddit) can do
   Which would be annoying, but oh well, cause I’m trying to have 皆インターネットを止めるう

   But I want it to be clear that I mean “let’s all quit the internet” rather than “everybody shut off the internet”
   Which means I need to clarify the pronunciation of both 皆 and 止 to みんな and や respectively

   (also, let me know if I did indeed translate that correctly lol)

4. I have been learning Japanese for about 2-3 years now. I’ve passed N5 and am waiting on my results for N4. I will be going to Japan for the first time later this year finally. I feel somewhat comfortable making general conversations and definitely enough to ask and respond to simple questions.

   One of my goals for learning was when I traveled to Japan to be able to speak to anyone without needing to use English. I know that English is common in touristy areas, but what would be an acceptable way to ask someone that I would like to speak to them because I am still learning and want to practice? How do I approach the beginning of asking someone to speak to them on the train or at a restaurant for example? I am a guy in my 20s and am usually apprehensive to talk to strangers but want to try while I’m there.

5. I was watching a one-minute-long Japanese reel. There was only one word I didn’t know: 特技 (Tokugi). I decided to look it up and discovered that it is made by combining 特別 (Tokubetsu) and 技 (Ginou).
   Are these one of a word or are there too many?

6. -で and -くて are mentioned as grammar to string together adjectives and nouns in Tae Kim, and I was just wondering what these suffixes actually do. What function are they performing? Do you necessarily need them when putting nouns and adjectives together in a sentence, unlike how in English you might say something like ‘Mr. Tanaka is rich, handsome and charming, isn’t he?’ or ‘She is not a student, she is a teacher’ (without needing anything but a comma to put the nouns or adjectives together)?

7. English is basically from yourself, to wider world, to abstract. Japanese is the opposite.
   Often starts with a time 今日は, etc.

8. Do you guys know BunPro? If yes, what are your thoughts about it?