nicknack28 Wrote:

Serge Wrote:Sometimes I feel like I'm the only student of Japanese who doesn't care about anime, hates manga and fails to see the attraction of video games... :-)

While I can respect one's interest originating from exposure to the culture itself, what honestly is so bad about becoming interested through media? There has to be something about a country that you are introduced to before you can actually foster an interest for it, whether it be hearing the language, seeing the language, having lived there for a little while, reading about culture some, ethnic background, media, etc. This suggestion is assuming a person doesn't wake up some random day with no previous knowledge of a country and blurts out "[Subject country] is awesome!" For most people, their introduction to Japan will obviously be through games, anime, manga, J-pop and the like because those are the Japanese products that are so easily internationally shared. Once a connection is made between a person and the country (and through media is definitely the easiest and most likely way), that person will probably begin exploring all the other aspects of that culture as well. From this a love of the country can be formed.

It's just bothering to hear someone speaking of other people's interests like their an inferior way of initiating a love for another country. Even small connections can spark worthwhile fascinations.

Not sure why you're suggesting there might be anything inferior in any of the points mentioned above. As for me, I'm just surprised by the amazing UNIFORMITY exhibited in the contributions to this thread (and to the forum in general, although I continue to believe it is the most informative one out there).

Where are posts from those people who were attracted to Japan (and the language) by practising martial arts? By Kabuki or Noh plays? By enka? By Japanese jazz or Sakamoto? By reading Murakami's books (both authors)? Movies by Kurosawa or Ozu? Or Kitano Takeshi, for that matter? Where are those who first got interested in the country through fascination with Rei Kawakubo's brand or Yohji Yamamoto, or even Evisu?! Or through studying Chinese or Korean and wishing to expand their knowledge of Asian languages? By Zen-Buddhism? Or through contracting 'yellow fever'?

Once again, there is nothing inherently superior about any of the above. It's just surprising that all that gets mentioned is anime, manga and videogames. Or is this just a reflection of the demographics of this forum?

radical_tyro Wrote:For me it was mainly a fascination with the writing system and the urge to learn a language vastly different from English.

plumage Wrote:4.)I love the visual qualities of the written language (I'm an artist)
6.)I like learning, generally.

Good points!.. Oh, and Chinese kind of grows on you, from what I have noticed...

Serge Wrote:Once again, there is nothing inherently superior about any of the above. It's just surprising that all that gets mentioned is anime, manga and videogames. Or is this just a reflection of the demographics of this forum?

Of course, the demographics may play a part in it... but you also have to keep in mind the various probabilities of being influenced by the things you mentioned. How many % of young westerners have ever watched even one Noh or Kabuki play? 0.1%? 0.0001%? I have no idea, but I know that a LOT more young westerners have played videogames from Japan or seen anime, especially with the huge boom in Japanese pop-culture in the west in recent years.

I guess it can also be a matter of what interests certain people. Maybe the people who go out of their way to view special plays (like Noh etc) are not the same people who are inclined to learn a new language. Personally I trained Southern Shaolin Kung-Fu, but I never really got the idea that I should study Chinese... maybe because you don't need to know Chinese to train Kung-Fu, but you do need to know Japanese to play japanese-only videogames?

I love to draw and one of my biggest dream is to work for Miyazaki-san in Studio Ghibli, but I need to know Japanese
I'm fascinated by Japanese culture and mentality (I did some Yoga, Zen meditation, Reiki, ...).
I read a lot of translated-from-Japanese books, from myths and legends to novels, and I would like to be able to read a Japanese book in its original language.
I like both traditional music (koto, shamisen, shakuhachi, ...) and J-Pop.
And, yes, I too watch anime (mostly movies: Miyazaki, Takahata and Satoshi Kon), but I'm also a fan of Takeshi Kitano's movies.

Many reasons for me, my family has always had Japanese friends, I love Japanese music (yes, particularly Enka), I did watch anime on TV when I was a kid. Though I had never read a single manga before starting Japanese I find myself reading some now and enjoying it (both for practice and because some are really fun to read...)

The biggest trigger however was a more pragmatic reason. I had to take 2 languages at my univ and the English classes were pathetic, the German teachers awful... so I hesitated between Japanese and Italian. I ended up choosing Japanese telling myself "you'll never do it yourself, so take the opportunity that you have now... you can learn Italian later". A few months later I spent a month in Japan and fell in love with the country :-)

Serge Wrote:By Japanese jazz or Sakamoto?

I totally forgot. my 7th grade history teacher played "ue o muite arukou" for us and i went out and bought the cd and listened to it for like 3 days strait. Definitely an in inspiration. I have always really loved jazz, but I never really researched japanese jazz beyond The Seatbelts and their contribution in Cowboy Bebop.

But you can't count out the anime/manga watchers/readers just because that it is 1 art form. If you examine it there are many parts to an anime which are all taken from other things.

Take for example one of my favorite animes: Samurai Champloo.
Now not only does this anime feature music, history, and other things that come from old periods of japan (which are amazing and really interesting to me), but also fuses that with some things that are new in japan (I really cannot believe that they tagged back then). Also the music in it contains both Japanese instruments (forget what the 3,4,or5 string guitar lute thingy is called) and new Japanese music in the form of beats and song.

So before you go around throwing the idea that anime is a bland and artless form such as american reality tv, i suggest that you take a deeper look into what the actual makings are.

I'm not saying that all anime/manga is beautiful and artistic (not even close), but to people like me who enjoy mostly the ones that are, the comments you made feel somewhat degrading =/.

But that's just my 2 cents.

Many reasons... nowadays it is mainly to be able to read the wealth of untranslated books for my various hobbies and also to be able to communicate with my in-laws directly.

Why learn a new language?

I like learning, and have been learning things by myself for a long time. A new language seemed like an interesting challenge. I speak Portuguese (native language) and English, but had never actually studied any of these. I wanted to see what it felt like to learn a language from scratch, with actual, focused, study.

If this experiment works well, I'll probably learn a few more languages in the next years.

Why Japanese?

It's by far the most interesting language around. It is totally different from any other language I know (not even the characters are the same); it is regarded as one of the most difficult languages one can choose to learn (although now I know that may not be true); and it's the primary language for a lot of interesting works (books, manga and anime).

So, why not?

Jon_B Wrote:So before you go around throwing the idea that anime is a bland and artless form such as american reality tv, i suggest that you take a deeper look into what the actual makings are.

Agreed. Anime and manga are media, not genres. They vary wildly in style, tone and quality, just like books and movies do. If you dig deep enough, you can find quite a few gems.

Never cared for Japan or Japanese back in highschool. I loved HK films, but didn't care about videogames or animes. Things changed when I saw my first Japanese film: Hana-Bi by Kitano Takeshi. Add other directors like Ozu, Iwai Shunji, Tsukamoto Shinya or Miike and you can imagine my fascination with Japanese films. That was no reason for me to study Japanese though.

Some of my friends decided to take Japanese classes and dragged me along. We all dropped out after two months, but I just couldn't stop studying Japanese. I also got to know some real life Japanese people from Japan. And began to study Karate (and Japanese Martial Arts books).

I don't know why I'm studying Japanese. I guess it just happened somehow.

Reasons given for the huge numbers of high schoolers who take French are probably equally mundane: they like Monet (and probably think Van Gogh was french, too), think the Eiffel Tower is really cool, want to go to Paris someday, think the language is (for some vague reason) "romantic," and...that's probably about it.

Obscure Japanese cultural points (from our perspective and exposure as Americans) are unlikely to spawn interest in Japanese. I never saw a noh play til I visited Japan. I've read some Haruki Murakami, but only after starting to learn Japanese (am reading his new book on running at the moment--in english still). It's like asking why students don't study German after hearing about to Martin Luther. Mainly, because they don't.

I'm willing to bet the reasons many Japanese want to learn English (besides it being in the curriculum) include: Hollywood movies, pop stars, they like hamburgers, they think western girls are hot, and they have some vague sense that English is "cool."

@ plumage - Man you summed up my own thoughts! I just couldn't agree more with you on this one. I started to study English a long time ago (I'm a native Portuguese speaker) because I thought the language sounded "cool", liked American movies and everybody was telling me the language was useful. Nowadays, I love it!

Answering the OP, I was first exposed to Japanese culture through Portuguese dubbed anime and tokusatsu when I was a child (probably around 5-8, and don't remember exactly. I was a fan of shows like Yu Yu Hakusho, Saint Seiya and Tokkei Winspector. Sometimes they would air some songs or segments subbed, and I liked the sound of the language very much, so I said to myself that I would learn it someday. In 2001 was when I started learning English. Back in 2005, I watched a few anime that were airing on TV here (namely, Love Hina, Ranma 1/2, Trigun and others), but stopped after a while because of the terrible time they used to air (starting at 1:00 a.m.? You must be kidding me...)

Then, by August 2007, my friend started to download a subbed version of Rurouni Kenshin, which I had never watched before. I fell in love with the show, and was watching it a lot. It was the show that re-sparkled my curiosity for anime. I started to look around the net for other anime I liked, started to become interested in J-music, started to research Japanese culture on the net... See the pattern? I was spending most of my time at home on things Japanese, so I figured I should put it to some good use and learn the language. So around the end of January 2008, I decided it was the right time to start learning Japanese, because my English was at a good enough level that I could keep studying and practicing it while devoting a bigger part of my time to another language without being afraid of forgetting it.

I then found thejapanesepage.com, through which I learned hiragana and katakana using rote, which worked terribly. Then I saw the need for an improved approach to learn the kanji (they are so many - OMG! I can't memorize 92 simple symbols well, imagine about a "minimum" of 2000 complex ones), then I found this site, RTK, AJATT, KO, a bunch of other useful books, resources, methods and as they say, the rest is history.

I'm a little backwards here in that I came to enjoy manga and anime AFTER I developed an interest in Japanese. I've always enjoyed language and languages - I'm an editor by profession, I speak passable intermediate french and rusty cantonese, and I'd seen many Japanese movies (kurosawa) and books (Mishima, Kawabata), and often thought the language seemed cool, but never did anything about it.

Then one day I saw a sign here downtown that said Free Japanese Lessons. WHAT?!! So I checked it out. It's actually a language exchange school where, if I teach an hour of english, I get one hour of japanese in exchange. OK, I thought, I'll give it a try. It was fun. I went back. Still more fun ... soon I was hooked. It was like finding the mother lode. Even though I don't live in Japan, I can hang out and chat with all sorts of native Japanese speakers, any day of the week - and it's all free.

I then realized if I seriously wanted to learn the language I'd have to abandon romaji and learn the kana and kanji. That's when I discovered this site ... from there I stumbled across manga and anime and realized what a great resource they are for learning Japanese. Now I pick up a new manga every week at my local Book Off, watch even more Japanese movies, talk with friends in Japanese, and just generally have a lot of fun with the language.

Serge Wrote:Where did I say I didn't care about the culture?

That's a misunderstanding on my part. You wrote 'the Japanese lifestyle' and I read 'culture'.

As for plays, music, etc... I'm not exposed to that. In fact, I have trouble finding it when I'm looking for it. I suspect that I'm not alone in this, and that's why it fails to attract people. Anime and manga are a -lot- more readily available.

QuackingShoe Wrote:

kokeshidoll17 Wrote:There are so many reasons, but the first time I heard Japanese my ears squealed with delight. It sounded so beautiful. It's been a love affair ever since.

Heheh, I've heard a number of people cite this as their first interest in a language, but it's always confused/amused me, especially with the two I've happened to hear it the most with (Japanese and Korean). I really enjoy the sound of Japanese now, but I found it pretty awful and abrasive through quite a lot of my initial exposure. And Korean still causes me to be actively annoyed when I have to listen to it. I used to just take it as a fact of life that languages that different were obnoxious until you could understand them, so it's funny to hear the opposite.

Maybe I just happen to stumble on really obnoxious speakers. Like, say, politicians...

Hehe, I did feel that way about Chinese for a while, but after taking the time to actually listen to it, I don't find it harsh anymore. I really love those sounds (and wish I was able to produce them)...maybe when I'm further a long in Japanese...

But yea, different people hear/see/feel/enjoy etc. different things

Serge Wrote:Where are posts from those people who were attracted to Japan (and the language) by practising martial arts? By Kabuki or Noh plays? By enka? By Japanese jazz or Sakamoto? By reading Murakami's books (both authors)? Movies by Kurosawa or Ozu? Or Kitano Takeshi, for that matter? Where are those who first got interested in the country through fascination with Rei Kawakubo's brand or Yohji Yamamoto, or even Evisu?! Or through studying Chinese or Korean and wishing to expand their knowledge of Asian languages? By Zen-Buddhism? Or through contracting 'yellow fever'?

Once again, there is nothing inherently superior about any of the above. It's just surprising that all that gets mentioned is anime, manga and videogames. Or is this just a reflection of the demographics of this forum?

This site being a part of the internet, and our discussions being here on an internet forum, probably does tend to attract a demographic of those into anime, games, and the likes.

Thinking this over for a bit, I think it has to primarily do with the gain you actually get related to your activity from learning the language and then other personal factors like free time and willingness to adopt another's culture. Some of those reasons you also mentioned are likely to be things people learn about after they have developed an interest in Japan -- how many people are first going to learn about Japan from Noh plays? How many people are going to enjoy Noh even after they gain an interest in Japan?

Like you said, it really doesn't matter, but it is kind of interesting. Japanese probably has the most amount of people who, if not self-studying, consciously decided they wanted to learn the language for some reason or interest in the country. Can't say the same for most of the people I remember in high school taking Spanish "because it's easy."

Edit: Another why Japanese that I forgot to mention in my original post, but I totally love the sound of Japanese. Everything from the grunts, to guys mumbling, to girls high pitched voices, to the over the top enthusiastic announcers, and the soft spoken heartfelt moments in dramas. The only sounds I probably don't enjoy are some anime voices. English or Japanese, some anime just sounds plain stupid.

Initially it was cultural curiosity like film, animation, history. Teaching in schools made it a matter of communication. Now it's so I can speak with my fiancee's family freely. Ultimately learning a foreign language is a great way to exercise your brain. It's better than slumping down in a recliner and watching TV all the time.

Well, this thread certainly sees more diversity as it grows longer! And I guess the forum demographics do play a large role in people's responses...

Jon_B Wrote:So before you go around throwing the idea that anime is a bland and artless form such as american reality tv, i suggest that you take a deeper look into what the actual makings are.

I'm not saying that all anime/manga is beautiful and artistic (not even close), but to people like me who enjoy mostly the ones that are, the comments you made feel somewhat degrading =/.

I guess the above is directed to me and I'm somewhat confused as to where and how I could have compared anime to American reality TV, not having seen one American reality TV show in my entire life. But if you believe some of that stuff is similar, so be it. Actually, I don't care about anime in the vast majority of its incarnations but I do acknowledge that there are hidden gems. Thus I stumbled upon 「涼宮ハルヒの憂鬱」 quite by chance, weeks before Tae Kim publically endorsed it and it has become one of my favourite productions ever: it is IRONIC and that's a quality not often found in Japanese culture. (If Minna san know(s) any other artworks exhibiting this quality, 教えてくれ.)

Serge Wrote:Well, this thread certainly sees more diversity as it grows longer! And I guess the forum demographics do play a large role in people's responses...

Jon_B Wrote:So before you go around throwing the idea that anime is a bland and artless form such as american reality tv, i suggest that you take a deeper look into what the actual makings are.

I'm not saying that all anime/manga is beautiful and artistic (not even close), but to people like me who enjoy mostly the ones that are, the comments you made feel somewhat degrading =/.

I guess the above is directed to me and I'm somewhat confused as to where and how I could have compared anime to American reality TV, not having seen one American reality TV show in my entire life. But if you believe some of that stuff is similar, so be it. Actually, I don't care about anime in the vast majority of its incarnations but I do acknowledge that there are hidden gems. Thus I stumbled upon 「涼宮ハルヒの憂鬱」 quite by chance, weeks before Tae Kim publically endorsed it and it has become one of my favourite productions ever: it is IRONIC and that's a quality not often found in Japanese culture. (If Minna san know(s) any other artworks exhibiting this quality, 教えてくれ.)

Hmm I guess you missed my point. Mine was simply a response to:

Serge Wrote:As for me, I'm just surprised by the amazing UNIFORMITY exhibited in the contributions to this thread (and to the forum in general, although I continue to believe it is the most informative one out there).

And what I took from that is that you think that anime is something that shouldn't be liked in

Serge Wrote:UNIFORMITY

. When you said that I thought, that you thought, that anime is something stupid that people should not take seriously or like on an artistic level such as Jazz, Noh, Ukiyoe, or any of the other fine art forms of Japanese heritage. I was simply trying to say that anime too is an art form of Japanese heritage, and simply people liking it shouldn't make it something that everyone can not positively respond to.

This makes me think if there was a time where ukiyoe was big, way back in like the 1800s or something where there was a boom in people learning japanese to go see ukiyoe, but others said that they were suprised that everyone wants to go over just to see that, even though that one thing might mean alot to them.

Again, not trying to flame or anything, just trying to peacefully get my point across, sorry if my tone seems kind of blatant, but I like to use the words that can properly express my thoughts.

But on to more people telling us WHY they want to learn japanese. And for the sake of saving future misunderstandings and whatnot, if you like anime and manga and jrock and jpop, please give a detailed story if possible. Because i know that for those of you that like J-rock, it wasn't simply "I herd jrawk so i liek to lern japaneez nuff seyd".

O and lately i've been getting into Jdoramas. I never really liked dramas, but when I figured out that in japan a ドラマ can mean anything from romance to mystery, I started watching them. I'm currently hoping to watch のだめ　カンタビーレ　and ガリレオ. Both of which seem pretty interesting. I've also heard nothing but good things about GTO and Gokusen, which I might start watching with my girlfriend (shes korean and doesn't like the idea of me learning japanese over korean, but maybe I can ease her in with dramas haha).

Serge Wrote:it is IRONIC and that's a quality not often found in Japanese culture. (If Minna san know(s) any other artworks exhibiting this quality, 教えてくれ.)

Ouran High School Host Club mocks and playfully subverts genre tropes (as well as gender norms and social class) in a similar way, while also playing them straight and making them work, which is something I really admire. I'd compare it vaguely to The Incredibles or Shawn of the Dead that way. A lot of tropes it satirizes stem from the admittedly creepy shoujo genre though, so it might not be for those who aren't familiar enough with them to really get it. Regardless, I found it totally hilarious, and for most of the same reasons I liked Haruhi. (Speaking of which, the protagonist of Ouran is named Haruhi as well. Hmm.) They pretty much make up my two favourite anime.

I keep hearing good things about さよなら絶望先生, which supposedly satirizes just about every singular aspect of Japan, and the art style is kindof delicious, so that sounds good. I haven't, personally, watched it yet.

I only seen one episode of さよなら絶望先生, but did have the theme song stuck in my head for a while afterwards.

On topic:

When I was a kid my parents bought me an atlus, and I thought Japan's page was the most interesting and later on decided I wanted to learn Japanese. (I didn't follow through with it until years later, though).

Although I do occationally watch anime/read manga, at first it was more because I wanted to watch things in Japanese (along with films, or just shows about Japan). Most of the stuff played on TV (since I didn't have the money to buy much as a youngest... or now, really) was in English though, but sometimes there was be a subtitled one on. But back then I didn't have the internet connection for downloading things, and didn't even know you could get live action drama or the like (if that was even around back then). I was a bit more indiscriminate at first, but as time when on I wouldn't want it if I wasn't interested in watching it (I don't care much for all this mo? stuff that's going around nowadays).

Video games, though, was a hobby that I developed independently. But I thought, as I started learning Japanese, that I might as well tie it in with Japanese since a lot of what I liked came from Japan anyway. First by watching videos (commercials, trailers, etc.) or reading, then by actually playing them in Japanese. Despite the amount of time I've been dabbling in Japanese, I haven't been as studious as I could have been. But at least they gave me something to keep doing so I didn't completely lose what I'd learnt.

I just gotta say, I'm impressed there are so many people on this site learning Japanese just for the heck of it or to enjoy anime or manga in the original or because it is a challenge. I started learning Japanese the day I found out I was moving to Japan because of my husband's job. I find being illiterate and incoherent more than adequate motivation to learn a language. Plus I think it is rude to visit or much worse live in a foreign country and not at least try to learn some of the language. Plus, once I started on kanji I was hooked But it is a challenge and my hat is off to all of you who are teaching yourselves without the daily motivation of actually living here, or trying to get a job.

I guess I'm also in the minority that does not like anime or manga and has only seen one or two in my life. I started learning Japanese in college. My university offers the standard Indo-European ones, but I didn't want to learn any of those. They didn't seem like they'd be a challenge plus anyone who takes language classes in college takes Spainish, French, German, etc. So that left me with a choice between Arabic and Japanese, the Arabic program was brand new and I'd heard somewhat disappointing and Japanese sounded like it'd be cool. I took the class, had a great teacher, from Sapporo area, and met some of the Japanese exchange students. So now I'm getting ready to leave for Tokyo for almost 11 months as an exchange student. The circumstances surrounding my studying Japanese were somewhat random, especially considering my only exposure to anything Japanese before was American sushi.

Now, the more I study and learn Japanese and about Japan the more I like it. Nihongo is a language intertwined with its culture so as they're inseparable. I suppose all languages are like this but maybe not to the degree that Japanese is. I think this is one of the main reasons I enjoy studying Japanese so much is that it's more than just learning to express yourself using different sounds.

Jon_B Wrote:This makes me think if there was a time where ukiyoe was big, way back in like the 1800s or something where there was a boom in people learning japanese to go see ukiyoe, but others said that they were suprised that everyone wants to go over just to see that, even though that one thing might mean alot to them.

Speaking of Ukiyo-E, actually, a lot of parallels are being drawn between the work of that time and today's manga. I guess that's when it all started. For those who are interested to see for themselves this book is a good start:

http://www.amazon.com/Hokusai-First-Mast...0810993414


@QuackingShoe

Thanks for the tips! I'll check them out.

At my high school we had to take a foreign language: Spanish, French, or Japanese. I was sick of Spanish and afraid I couldn't pronounce French
I stumbled through 4 years of that and a home stay in Japan, and probably would have dropped it if I hadn't found this site and AJATT.

I started Japanese back in 02'. You know, before it was cool, jk. It was some software that was half thought up. It would have been good if they had me test it. Then I abandoned Japanese for long long while.

Then I started to study Korean in December last year. I loved how the language sounded. Especially when the chicks said 'mianhae.' The problem was, I couldn't hear what they were saying no matter how much I tried. So, I gave up a started learning Japanese in January. I found RTK and did if for like 2 weeks then stopped.

Then in June or July I started finding good resources on learning languages. I have no interest in French, despite my being at an advanced level. The amount of resources on Japanese far out weighted, those of Korean, so I decided to give RTK a chance again.

I'll give Korean a chance again in a couple years. Hopefully it should be as easier to learn the language by then. Then I'll learn Chinese. Then I'll hit Thai, then Spanish, then Russian.

Maybe I'm aiming a little too high...?

It's the only place I know how to aim 8)