I consider myself a true devot of the AJATT method. But recently I had a relapse and started watching this one anime with subs(Hitman Reborn..if you must know). Mind you I had been on a role with no eng subs for several several months. I have been living in japan for about a year now and doing ajatt for 6months. Ok backstory done and on to the subject title:

Recently when watching anime(with subs) I will pick up so many new words that are completely unforgettable after seeing it. I find it very odd since watching anime with subs is not supposed to help you. I even learn the correct usage of the word too hehe. I am just wondering if this happens to anyone else and if they got something they want to say about it. What is cool is realizing how far u have come by noticing japanese doesn't sound like mindless babble anymore..just a bunch of words you dont know.

discuss...

p.s. i have all intentions of going back to subless anime ...after this series

I am watching Samurai Champloo with English subtitles - usually I don't learn new words this way, but it's helpful when I come across grammar usage or vocabulary that I have seen before.

Hearing and seeing it "in context" helps me retain better.

IMHO, some ideas behind AJATT are very good, but there's no need to take it as gospel. So don't feel guilty about using subs... ...do whatever works well for you!!!

I think what a lot of people do is this: Watch the anime once with subtitles, don't worry about listening yet. Then after that, watch it again without subtitles. The reason people say watching with subtitles doesn't help is because you are mostly paying attention to the subtitles and it's not a word for word translation. However, if you do it this way, the second time you will be able to focus a lot more on what's being said and already have a general gist of what it means.

I don't do it very often, but I do pick up a lot of vocabulary when I watch subbed anime; as I read rather quickly, I've typically finished reading before they've even really started talking, which gives me plenty of time to listen afterward. However, it doesn't really do jack for my listening comprehension, since I already know what they're going to say. Nevertheless, it gets my mind in a more Japanese-y set. There are benefits. It doesn't necessarily merit the blanket condemnation.

But... I do say this as a person who actively focuses on what the actors are saying and, again, is capable of reading the subtitles fast enough to do this. If you spend all of your time focusing on the subtitles, either simply because of a general focus issue (I know I can't NOT pay at least SOME attention to subtitles if they're there, even if they're written in Italian or Chinese or something, and I can imagine others find them even more distracting) or because you don't have enough time not to, I think it's kinda obvious that whatever small gain could be gotten won't be.

cracky Wrote:I think what a lot of people do is this: Watch the anime once with subtitles, don't worry about listening yet. Then after that, watch it again without subtitles. The reason people say watching with subtitles doesn't help is because you are mostly paying attention to the subtitles and it's not a word for word translation. However, if you do it this way, the second time you will be able to focus a lot more on what's being said and already have a general gist of what it means.

Yeah i have been doing this with "My boss My hero" it does wonders on the comprehension if you have already seen it or...erm read it lol.

If I really want to see a show, I'll watch through it once with subtitles, then watch it a lot without.

Actually, that's already been said. Beat me to it.

I cant watch the same thing twice within a period of a month at least, I find it to be so boring...
Also, using subtitles means you're putting your learning in the hands of the translator, and sometimes they can be pretty "poetic" or "lame".

I definitely need the subtitles. My Japanese listening skills are not that good. What I've been doing is reading the subs while listening and trying to back-translate to figure out words they actually said.

Whether you want to argue if it's good or bad is academic. I do what works for me. I tried listening without subs and it's hopeless. With subs, I'm actually getting to pick out words, getting used to how they're used (at least in anime), and getting used to listening to Japanese.

Two big problems are that (1) I don't have the vocab to understand everything, and (2) some character styles speak in a style that I can't understand (that big muscly 少佐 in FMA is terrible). I'm gradually improving with problem (1), but I doubt I'll ever solve (2), so I think for me I'll be needing subs for a long time.

I think I'll give listenting a second time without subs a try, though. Yeah, I agree it's boring, but at least it's practice.

I would actually argue that it's better to first watch the show without subtitles, and THEN watch it with them on. This way you are forced to try and figure out words through context, understand meaning without any type of crutch, and force yourself to listen attentively throughout the entire episode.

The second time around you can confirm your guesses on the words based on the context of the dialog/storyline, and the words (IMHO) will stick much better.

samesong Wrote:I would actually argue that it's better to first watch the show without subtitles, and THEN watch it with them on. This way you are forced to try and figure out words through context, understand meaning without any type of crutch, and force yourself to listen attentively throughout the entire episode.

The second time around you can confirm your guesses on the words based on the context of the dialog/storyline, and the words (IMHO) will stick much better.

That makes sense to me actually.

I don't use anime for anything but entertainment really. I like it when I understand whats going on when I look away from the screen for a moment or two, but I don't really enjoy watching a show without subtitles.

I watched anime with subtitles for about 10 years before I decided to learn Japanese. I learned enough vocab from that to know then things were translated 'wrong' or 'poetically' quite a lot of the time.

I noticed someone above said they read really fast and are ahead of the speech. I'm in the same boat, and I can hold the English in my head while I listen to what they say in Japanese. That helps quite a bit because I can try to fit all the English pieces into the sentence.

This works best on fan-subbed anime because they generally don't spend any time trying to pretty things up... They tend towards a pretty literal translation, compared to the big studios who tend to try to make it sound cool or like US English.

Now that I'm learning vocab actively, the subs help reinforce what I have recently learned. I might pick out the word without the subs... But with them, I'm practically guaranteed to pick it out.

Short form: If watching with subs helps you, don't feel bad about it!

wccrawford Wrote:I noticed someone above said they read really fast and are ahead of the speech. I'm in the same boat, and I can hold the English in my head while I listen to what they say in Japanese. That helps quite a bit because I can try to fit all the English pieces into the sentence.

This works best on fan-subbed anime because they generally don't spend any time trying to pretty things up... They tend towards a pretty literal translation, compared to the big studios who tend to try to make it sound cool or like US English.

Now that I'm learning vocab actively, the subs help reinforce what I have recently learned. I might pick out the word without the subs... But with them, I'm practically guaranteed to pick it out.

Short form: If watching with subs helps you, don't feel bad about it!

That's actually a really good explanation. When I watch with subs, all I gotta do is glance at them, and then I pay attention to the Japanese mostly. Maybe the reason people keep bashing subs is cause they pay most of their attention to the English.

What's really fun is 'making fun' of the translations in my head when I notice some differences/mistakes.

I generally watch anime without subs, but occasionally turn them on for individual scenes when I want to confirm that I understood the dialogue. I have friends who (claim to) pick up vocabulary even with the subtitles turned on, but I certainly don't.

saizen Wrote:I find it very odd since watching anime with subs is not supposed to help you.

Says who? Khatzumoto? Oh it must be an universal truth then!

Except he's the first to say it's important to find out what works *for you*.

Personally I find it extremely helpful to watch Japanese anime and dorama WITH the subtitles. At my level, it's easier to pick up new words and understand their meanings if I have a translation I can compare the spoken Japanese to.

The "danger" of subtitles is that you could stop trying to understand the Japanese. In my experience, this doesn't happen to me if I'm motivated to learn.

And also that doesn't mean I never watch unsubbed shows. I do that too, it's a different experience, it can be motivating when I realize that I just understood all those things by myself but it can also be discouraging when I realize how much I don't understand. It depends on my mood at the time I guess.

Anyway to conclude, try both. It doesn't matter what you heard: there is no right or wrong here. No shame in using subtitles and it doesn't matter if Khatzumoto and the Pope don't approve. See what's best for you and make your own decisions based on that.

Another little story along this vein:

I was watching a JP movie the other day with subs. It was some disease movie where everyone gets infected. I was really getting into the movie, and about halfway in... I realized for about 2-3 minutes, I hadn't been reading the subs. And I understood!

Granted, the scene only had easy stuff like 'Sensei!' and such, but I got a bit thrill out of it. Unfortunately, realizing it dropped me back out of that zone and I started reading the subs again.

I just had to share.

alyks Wrote:If I really want to see a show, I'll watch through it once with subtitles, then watch it a lot without.

I like doing this too! ^^

I would say that pronounciation will be helped and if you're actually concentrating on the speech, you might learn a word or two. The biggest problem is indeed putting the understanding in the hands of the translator since most fansub translaters are pretty bad at Japanese and use their knowledge of anime more than their knowledge of Japanese.

I used to hang out with fansubbers quite a bit, as a distro etc, and I know for a fact that some BIG translaters have studied japanese for like... 1 year in Japan tops, which isn't enough to understand everything in even such simple anime as bleach and naruto. They understand maybe 80% then use common sense to fill the gaps.

I don't think that those translation inaccuracies are a big problem for learning. First, if I need the subtitles, it's because I'm far from understanding 80% (when you understand that much you should start to think that the subtitles are an annoyance). So the things I need to learn are probably in that translator's comfort zone and reasonably accurate.

Even if they aren't, if I think I have understood something from the context or translation, I always look it up in the dictionary. It's crucial to validate such a guess.

Codexus Wrote:(when you understand that much you should start to think that the subtitles are an annoyance).

Not at all, I easily understand 80% or more of the anime and drama I watch, I still don't want to watch them without subtitles. It's not that I don't understand enough to enjoy it, it's that every line containing a word I do not know, makes me irritated and mad. Even if that one line I didn't understand really doesn't matter to the overall story, it still feels like I missed something important. I understand probably 99.9% of everything in even the most complicated English movies and series etc, but I still like to have subtitles if there's a chance I might not hear something properly. Could be just me who is a perfectionist though.

OK then, but in those (albeit rare) cases in which Japanese subs/scripts are also available what do you do? You still watch them in English? I'm simply curious

nac_est Wrote:OK then, but in those (albeit rare) cases in which Japanese subs/scripts are also available what do you do? You still watch them in English? I'm simply curious

Well, a script would be slightly annoying i think. I've also never found anything with real Japanese subs -- other than a few news clips -- and surprisingly, the Japanese subs boosted my comprehension a whole lot. Perhaps I just have sucky listening comprehension.

Tobberoth Wrote:The biggest problem is indeed putting the understanding in the hands of the translator since most fansub translaters are pretty bad at Japanese and use their knowledge of anime more than their knowledge of Japanese.

I watched something (Bokurano) where the subtitles has a girl in tears worried that they (this group of kids) might get put on a game show.

I know Japanese game shows get a bad rep, but it seems a little over the top.

But that was because she was actually worried about going to 刑務所（けいむしょ） rather than on a ゲームショー. Game show just seems so out there, it's a wonder no one pointed it out before they released it.

Then of course, you've got stuff like like this or people translating from a translation (Chinese, Korean, etc.) which leads to more chance of errors.

As long as you take it with a grain of salt and try to confirm it yourself (which is probably what people wanting to learn would be doing anyway), it shouldn't be that much of a problem.

Besides, bitching about the lousy job the fansubbers did is one of the pleasures of watching subbed anime -- why deprive yourself of it by watching the raws? :-)

(Some of the less QC-inclined don't even seem to have a decent grasp of English...)

nac_est Wrote:OK then, but in those (albeit rare) cases in which Japanese subs/scripts are also available what do you do? You still watch them in English? I'm simply curious

That depends on just how much I want to see the show. For example, I found a script for My Boss My Hero just after watching about half of the series, but there was NO way I was going to ditch subtitles at that point because I really loved the series and just wanted to see it. While I could understand almost all of it using script etc, that would make it into too much of a chore and studies, I wanted to enjoy the show for what it was.

I do watch shows without subs from time to time though, series which i find enjoyable but not "Best stuff I've ever seen". For example, I've watched most of Yama Onna Kabe Onna without subs or the use of scripts and I enjoy the show. I would say I understand between 75-85% of it, and if I thought the series was amazing, I would probably start watching with subs instead. Right now though, it's a series I picked for studies, not for enjoying, so it's all good

Heh, yeah, fan translations keep irritating me quite a bit because they tend to be wrong so incredibly often. Usually it's minor, but sometimes it's a scene-changing mistake that really drives me wild..
But, oh well. I still find them more useful in general, simple because they don't try to pretend the show is set in America, purposely destroying all cultural references.

Tobberoth Wrote:I do watch shows without subs from time to time though, series which i find enjoyable but not "Best stuff I've ever seen".

This is something I haven't been able to do, and it's been driving me a little wild. Apparently, if a show isn't so interesting that I feel like I must understand everything, it's also so uninteresting that watching it puts me to sleep. I haven't been able to strike a happy medium at all. I've only ever managed to get a few episodes into something before either a) I was so bored I couldn't stand watching it anymore, or b) the plot would take off and I couldn't stand missing things anymore. Out of frustration, I really just don't watch much of anything at all anymore, which obviously isn't the best solution.