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+--- Thread: Book Review: Business Japanese (Tuttle Language Library) (/thread-2493.html)
Book Review: Business Japanese (Tuttle Language Library) - kfmfe04 - 2009-01-28
Just bought a pretty good book from Kinokuniya:
http://www.amazon.com/Business-Japanese-Essential-Language-Library/dp/0804837805/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1233150442&sr=8-1
The title is a bit of a misnomer - it doesn't teach you how to speak polite business Japanese - rather, it lets you learn 熟語 that's often used in business, industry, and finance.
The book is broken out into 50 steps. A step consists of:
1. A list of 15-30 Vocabulary Words
2. English translation of the list in 1
3. Example sentences of 1. (not translated)
4. A practice reading section to make sure you have learned the vocabulary
GOOD POINTS
Based on frequency from Nihon Keizai Shimbun: list of 1,700 business terms.
Lessons are bite-size so you can finish a lesson in 30min-1hr.
Furigana only used about 5-10% of the time.
With sample sentences, you get to learn in context: no real need to SRS.
BAD POINTS
Format is raw (looks like someone typed it) - no nice red letters/red sheets for vocab.
Book is bulky/hard to carry around.
No conversational vocab: this will only help you read business periodicals.
No business phrases.
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This is an intermediate+ text: you probably need around JLPT2 vocabulary/grammar to use this book comfortably: it is definitely beyond KO and somewhat overlaps KiC. I think it is a good resource as a stepping stone towards reading newspapers. If you see it in the bookstore, I would definitely recommend that you take a look, if this is your level.
I will see if I can go through the book over the next couple of months.
Book Review: Business Japanese (Tuttle Language Library) - wccrawford - 2009-01-28
Sounds like it's ripe for entering into iKnow...
