[note to others: long response to an earlier post, so nothing new or interesting ]

To Kazelee: I can't tell whether you're serious or not. This will be my last response.

Again, my aim is not to criticize K's Japanese. You misrepresented what I wrote by quoting only the first part of my sentence. The omitted part is italicized: "The fellow still isn't "fluent" after 5 years, so hopefully this 18 month stuff can be put to rest and people won't be frustrated by unrealizable expectations."

For me, his current abilities are useful as a means to an end. If someone who has lived, studied and worked in Japanese for 3.5 years makes errors, then it's not a stretch to conclude he was not fluent when he arrived. The grammar comment was a bratty reference to the recent grammar (non-)debate. My main part of my post was criticism of AJATT. I also answered your question and tried to explained something that wasn't clear (anecdote about approaches to production).

In short, I'm more interested in what K says in English than in Japanese.

No, I don't feel any senpai-duty and I don't think a more detailed critique of someone's efforts is either cool or necessary. My time would be better spent sending K a bit of feedback on the AJATT site for his consideration, don't you think? I believe he is receptive to feedback. If you are serious in your request, why don't you treat it as a learning opportunity and try to identify some of the things I mentioned?

Quote:If this guy isn't fluent, why even bother posting videos about him?

I don't understand what K's fluency has to do with the video or the site. I think the video provides many people with a rare opportunity to hear a foreigner speaking Japanese well. That's highly motivating. I doubt it was intended as a study tool (the use you mentioned). I'd recommend you continue learning from native Japanese speakers (rather than trying to find fluent foreigners). Also, K's fluency doesn't affect his ability to teach people about the methods (now or 3.5 years ago). My initial idea was to toss this focus on fluency.

Quote:Why even bother posting about him at all? If it's done to celebrate an accomplishment that makes sense, otherwise, you're just being a neener-neener.

I wanted to posted reasonable criticisms of AJATT, not of his video or language skills. If offering my opinion make me a "neener-neener", I'm fine with that. It doesn't take away from K's accomplishments in any way.

P.S. Asking for someone's help while seemingly trying to mock them is an unusual combination. I hope I didn't spend time on what was just some weird amusement for you.

I would just like to point out that Khatzumoto has mentioned that he specifically reads this thread. So it seems only polite to phrase one's criticisms as you would if you were speaking to them directly, or rather ABOUT them directly in front of them. Some of the things written on this message board seem to be overly harsh due to the passionate opinions held by those contending their viewpoints. I can only speak for myself, but it would hurt my feelings to read such vehemently formulated posts.

This is just a call for civility. Ignor it or don't, but there's no nead to respond to it.

esgrove Wrote:I would just like to point out that Khatzumoto has mentioned that he specifically reads this thread. So it seems only polite to phrase one's criticisms as you would if you were speaking to them directly, or rather ABOUT them directly in front of them. Some of the things written on this message board seem to be overly harsh due to the passionate opinions held by those contending their viewpoints. I can only speak for myself, but it would hurt my feelings to read such vehemently formulated posts.

This is just a call for civility. Ignor it or don't, but there's no nead to respond to it.

Who isn't being civil? I must have missed a comment (other than a certain mischaracterizing rant against 'unbelievers'). Where are the vehement formulations? Also, I don't think anyone here requires an imaginary Khatzumoto, weeping softly and looking on powerlessly, to present their thoughts in a mature fashion.

If he calls all those who disagree with him "losers", I think civility has already gone out the window.

Thora Wrote:[note to others: long response to an earlier post, so nothing new or interesting ]

To Kazelee: I can't tell whether you're serious or not. This will be my last response.

Again, my aim is not to criticize K's Japanese. You misrepresented what I wrote by quoting only the first part of my sentence. The omitted part is italicized: "The fellow still isn't "fluent" after 5 years, so hopefully this 18 month stuff can be put to rest and people won't be frustrated by unrealizable expectations."

For me, his current abilities are useful as a means to an end. If someone who has lived, studied and worked in Japanese for 3.5 years makes errors, then it's not a stretch to conclude he was not fluent when he arrived. The grammar comment was a bratty reference to the recent grammar (non-)debate. My main part of my post was criticism of AJATT. I also answered your question and tried to explained something that wasn't clear (anecdote about approaches to production).

In short, I'm more interested in what K says in English than in Japanese.

No, I don't feel any senpai-duty and I don't think a more detailed critique of someone's efforts is either cool or necessary. My time would be better spent sending K a bit of feedback on the AJATT site for his consideration, don't you think? I believe he is receptive to feedback. If you are serious in your request, why don't you treat it as a learning opportunity and try to identify some of the things I mentioned?

Quote:If this guy isn't fluent, why even bother posting videos about him?

I don't understand what K's fluency has to do with the video or the site. I think the video provides many people with a rare opportunity to hear a foreigner speaking Japanese well. That's highly motivating. I doubt it was intended as a study tool (the use you mentioned). I'd recommend you continue learning from native Japanese speakers (rather than trying to find fluent foreigners). Also, K's fluency doesn't affect his ability to teach people about the methods (now or 3.5 years ago). My initial idea was to toss this focus on fluency.

Quote:Why even bother posting about him at all? If it's done to celebrate an accomplishment that makes sense, otherwise, you're just being a neener-neener.

I wanted to posted reasonable criticisms of AJATT, not of his video or language skills. If offering my opinion make me a "neener-neener", I'm fine with that. It doesn't take away from K's accomplishments in any way.

P.S. Asking for someone's help while seemingly trying to mock them is an unusual combination. I hope I didn't spend time on what was just some weird amusement for you.

Wow that was a few days ago so even I'm not totally sure.

The whole top portion was me expressing my confusion in understanding you. I joke. You joke. We all joke.

Ignoring the part where you seconded Mr. Tobberoth, the purpose of your post may not have been to criticize the individual, but saying he is not fluent is a critique. I just assumed this meant you had knowledge on the subject of fluency. I wanted more details about the types of things that make an individual fluent, or info on people who are fluent to model. I've already stated I'm serious in this request.

Quote:There's some mixing of polite form and written/spoken style (and some heavy kanji use) in his Japanese. It's on his site. If a reader doesn't assume the writer is Japanese, then he's probably not fluent.

.... doesn't really help considering the site is mostly in English.

You then proceeded to defend your stance that you were not judging him even though at this point it doesn't really matter. It just makes me more confused. I just want some info.

The last portion about the neener-neener wasn't specifically directed at you, but at the idea, itself, of posting about someone with the purpose to trash talk him/her. Perhaps I should have used "one" instead of "you."

I must restate: Opinions on Khatzumoto irrelevant. Trash talk bad. Grammer Gud. I just want some info.

I don't think it's fair to say "trash talk bad". The individual known as Khatzumoto promotes certain actions and certain expectations as to possible results based on certain credentials. Since the activities are difficult to test and evaluate individually (taking, as they do, sustained and dedicated effort), the credentials become key. I have no reason to believe he doesn't actually possess them, but the question of whether or not he does certainly does have relevance.

I tell you that you can, like me, learn how to play master-level chess in six months by following a rigorous training schedule. Is the possibility that I might not actually be able to play master-level chess of no consequence to those following my schedule?

~J, who again has no reason to actually question Khatzumoto, but is concerned with the soundness of arguments against evaluation of his competence

woodwojr Wrote:I don't think it's fair to say "trash talk bad". The individual known as Khatzumoto promotes certain actions and certain expectations as to possible results based on certain credentials. Since the activities are difficult to test and evaluate individually (taking, as they do, sustained and dedicated effort), the credentials become key. I have no reason to believe he doesn't actually possess them, but the question of whether or not he does certainly does have relevance.

Critique - He has a tendency to use "a" where he should use "the."

Trash talk - this guy isn't much better than I am.

Quote:I tell you that you can, like me, learn how to play master-level chess in six months by following a rigorous training schedule. Is the possibility that I might not actually be able to play master-level chess of no consequence to those following my schedule?

First you'd need an established guideline for what master level actually is. If master level was considered being taken under the wing of one of the greats, and that's what happened, if was interested in chess, I'd take a look at your method, as well as others and modify them to suit my needs.

If there were no accomplishment to back up the claims, taking shots would be more understandable.

This is why I keep asking what is fluency.

I have many foreigns friend who speak with a bit of an accent, but can hold a conversation and a job. Until a few days ago I was under the impression that they were fluent.

If you were interested in chess, you'd also know that master level is fairly well-defined (ELO rating >2200) but let's not stretch my analogy all out of proportion, especially since the first one I thought of involved levitating bowling balls.

The key point you're missing, though, is that being able to usefully "modify [a method] to suit [your] needs" requires you to know what your needs are in the first place. That is a nontrivial hurdle; there are an awful lot of things that look like progress. Actually, it's really "identification of needs" that is the method in the first place.

And when I'm refining the definition of my terms mid-paragraph, that's a sign I need sleep.

Edit: >2200 is only candidate master, master status is generally >2300. Not that this matters.

~J

woodwojr Wrote:If you were interested in chess, you'd also know that master level is fairly well-defined (ELO rating >2200) but let's not stretch my analogy all out of proportion, especially since the first one I thought of involved levitating bowling balls.

The key point you're missing, though, is that being able to usefully "modify [a method] to suit [your] needs" requires you to know what your needs are in the first place. That is a nontrivial hurdle; there are an awful lot of things that look like progress. Actually, it's really "identification of needs" that is the method in the first place.

Edit: >2200 is only candidate master, master status is generally >2300. Not that this matters.

~J

Awesome. Didn't know that. Change "needs" to tastes, style, or any other words to your liking, in that sentence btw.

What I gather from your response is that fluency can't be taken as a whole but defined more... categorically. That is, conversational fluency, reading fluency, writing fluency, fluency in a business setting, etc. Either that or I'm seeing what I want to see.

Quote:And when I'm refining the definition of my terms mid-paragraph, that's a sign I need sleep.

That makes a little more sense.

woodwojr Wrote:If you were interested in chess, you'd also know that master level is fairly well-defined (ELO rating >2200) but let's not stretch my analogy all out of proportion, especially since the first one I thought of involved levitating bowling balls.

The key point you're missing, though, is that being able to usefully "modify [a method] to suit [your] needs" requires you to know what your needs are in the first place. That is a nontrivial hurdle; there are an awful lot of things that look like progress. Actually, it's really "identification of needs" that is the method in the first place.

And when I'm refining the definition of my terms mid-paragraph, that's a sign I need sleep.

Edit: >2200 is only candidate master, master status is generally >2300. Not that this matters.

~J

The beauty of linguistic self-study is that there is no universal measure of progress. There's only you and how well you're meeting the goals you set for yourself/have set for you in relation to the media ecology you need and wish to exist in. The best methods certainly have some essential defining characteristics to them, but ultimately you'll need to rely on multiple sources and your own experimentation to determine what works best. The merits of the ideas transcend a single method or learner, and thus the unverifiable, arbitrarily defined credentials of a specific autodidact on the Internet and his own ever-changing ideas are of little consequence, outside of whatever motivation you wish to glean from his claims and rhetoric.

And my god, I think it's time for another forum 'time out' for nest0r.

nest0r Wrote:The beauty of linguistic self-study is that there is no universal measure of progress.

So true. I could say "Let's use the average Japanese person's level of English as fluency", if this were the case, then my level of Japanese is fluent. Wait a minute...the average Japanese person says "Haaaaaaallllooooo" instead of "Hello"...I have Super Saiyjin fluency!

I will 元気球 your ass with my 敬語!!!!

Important point: This post has no point

Jarvik7 Wrote:If he calls all those who disagree with him "losers", I think civility has already gone out the window.

He also calls his supporters "dashingly handsome", but I don't think he's actually seen all of their faces yet. I treat that as humor, so I don't think anyone should feel offended/flattered.

Woah, I'm pretty surprised at the amount of people here that say they studied grammar in there native language, I'm a native English speaker and don't remember ever really studying grammar, I just remember reading books and writing things out but not specifically studying yeah the teacher would correct some things that i had wrote but not specifically say "oh you would use this for past tense etc" before Japanese I never really new the difference between a verb, noun, adjective and this is true for most people I know.

So I'll stay on the band wagon of you don't have to study grammar to learn a language you just need enough exposure, my English is much better than it ever was when I was at school and I never study anything new in English its just day to day experience.

I must admit I do like to read about grammar in Japanese to help clarify things but most of the things I've learned so far have been via exposure to many sentences studying grammar just helps things stick another source of input if you will.

* Native language class:
I went through 13 grades of school in America and starting with 1st grade we had an English class every single year all the way until I graduated high school in grade 12. They ranged from review of grammar rules and vocabulary to reading and writing. I still know what a gerund is because of this. (T.T) I think the reading and writing probably helped me more than the evil study of English linguistics.

* Khazu reads this thread:
I've never met the guy but I can guarantee he probably doesn't care about anything we say about him. He might comb threads like this for ideas and stuff, but he's not losing any sleep if we call him a loser.

I personally owe him a lot because he convinced me I wasn't a total language failure when I felt frustrated with my Japanese class. Now despite having spent several thousand dollars on Japanese classes I can agree whole-heartedly that they really do suck.

I only recall actual grammar in my 7th grade language class (conjugating verbs in 2nd grade, but that's minor). English class was always about reading: Short stories, questions about the stories, vocabulary, etc. Later on this became about plays, longer stories, essays, research, novels, etc. It seemed English class was about passing on appreciation of English literature to student.

Now the grammar class benefits were like what Khatz wrote about recently. It was learning about all these things after the fact. I remember my language class as it taught sentence diagramming. It led to appreciating how you put the description and clauses in the right places to get your point across.

Oddly enough, the best writing advice you can get has a bit to do with grammar, but more to do with style. It boils down to removing as many adverbs as you can and use active verbs.

Again, this was a language class for 7th grade students that were fluent in English. It just revealed common rules about the language that you instinctively may know but not why.

However, I do agree with Tobberoth that grammar, like Kanji via RTK, can be used as a short-cut for quicker learning. Just let the crutch fade with time and tons of exposure.

I'd say doing some grammar is useful: it speeds up the learning process, and it's a reliable and solid foundation when you're not sure anymore. Like when you hesitate between two structures, you just think of your good old grammar rules and you can clear any doubt. But I definitely agree, this is never going to make you fluent, it's too damn slow. Just useful for double-checking.

tibul Wrote:Woah, I'm pretty surprised at the amount of people here that say they studied grammar in there native language, I'm a native English speaker and don't remember ever really studying grammar, I just remember reading books and writing things out but not specifically studying yeah the teacher would correct some things that i had wrote but not specifically say "oh you would use this for past tense etc" before Japanese I never really new the difference between a verb, noun, adjective and this is true for most people I know.

In Brazil, by the first grade of the compulsory fundamental education, we already have grammar classes. By the eighth grade, we've read about pretty much every grammatical term there is - nouns, adjectives, adverbs, pronouns; subordinate clauses and the various types of conjunctions; verbs; grammatical tenses, aspects and moods; etc.

Portuguese is often considered one of the toughest subjects in fundamental school, even when every single student (in upper grades) is able to read classical literature and to write formal texts without making too many mistakes. Go figure. It's like it's a subject it's only there so they can grade the students, so they try their best to make it harder.

Note: We do have literature and composition classes too, though. These are piece of cake.

Tobberoth Wrote:I never said the method is bad. I said the cult of personality around Khazu is ridiculous. He learned good Japanese in 5 years. He brings up some good ideas which, while not his ideas from the start, are genuinly good. It just makes little sense to give him credit (and especially money) for something which overall is just common sense.

I totally agree!

10 years I watched tv5 (french television) all day - movies with french subtitles.
that seemed to be the best way to get into the language.
then I continued with Tintin - french comics.

As soon as you are really interested in a language you do things like that, naturally.

I second iSoron's testemonial. That's true. By 4th year, we were already taught everything he said. From 5th to 8th year that is only repeated. During the 9th to the 11th year we start preparation for the college admission exams, so you don't study anything really useful, you just train to pass these tests. We have 4-6 hours/week of this.

Meanwhile, you have to learn how to read and interpret texts by yourself, because there is not much sense on reading during classes. Once a week you'd get a chance to be humiliated in front of the class by showing your compositions.

I would say a school which doesn't teach native language and grammar is probably a pretty bad one. You need to understand your native language as a language, otherwise you will never learn to write well and you will probably start talking like an idiot eventually. Of course, I'm talking about discussing how sentences are formed etc while reading books in your language, not studying grammatical structures.

I'm not saying that just because you didn't learn native grammar in school you will seem stupid to everyone but that is probably what would happen to mankind eventually if they stopped teaching native grammar. It also helps a lot when you learn foreign languages in an academic sense, like latin. I suppose that is a pretty weak reason to support it however.

Hmm, maybe schools should teach native grammar, but I don't think it's essential.
Personally, like quite a few earlier posters, I was never taught anything about grammar (didn't even know what an adjective was before I started studying Japanese. Yes, really. >_<) at school (in England), but it hasn't stopped me taking a degree in English (focusing on the Literature side of things). When I started my degree, I asked my lecturer if this was likely to be a problem, and she assured me that my total cluelessness regarding grammar was not unusual, nor likely to cause any real difficulties (which it hasn't). I do, however, read a lot of books - I think most people who don't write well simply don't read enough.
Though I don't agree with everything Khatz says, I do think he has a point when he notes that grammar is an after the fact attempt to explain a language. Even intelligent native speakers may sometimes speak and write in a way which is incorrect according to grammatical rules. If this happens often enough, then the language, and the grammatical rules, will simply change. Eventually, it may well be fine to say 'should of' instead of 'should have', and I believe some studies suggest that the increasing number of non-native speakers of English may lead to simplification: 'I go to the shop', rather than: 'I'm going to the shops', for example.
Uh, that's going a little off-topic, sorry.

I would say that the situation is somewhat different when trying to learn a language, though. Grammar is likely to be of practical use then, and the AJATT method does allow for this, even if Khatz doesn't like verb conjugation tables much (and possibly sometimes expresses himself a little more strongly than he means on the subject of grammar in general?). Personally, I think, if you CAN memorize them, and use what you've learnt effectively, you might as well. I haven't had much luck that way so far myself, but having a (very) vague idea of the theory (just knowing roughly what a particle means, what is meant by the subject of a sentence) has certainly been useful thus far (I'm just at the beginning, so will see how I go, and may well trial this method once I finish Heisig, since at the very least I should learn a lot of new words).

With a highly-inflected language like Latin, I would again agree that grammar is useful, though it is perhaps interesting that learners used to learn large chunks of text by heart, as well as learning about the grammar used. An early version of the sentence method, minus a SRS and plus caning if you failed to remember? ; )

My 2 cents as someone who is as fluent in Japanese as the great Khatz.

Khatz is certainly fluent in Japanese but does not sound like a native speaker largely because of his accent.

I can whiz through books/newspapers etc without a dictionary and so can khatz. This is obvious from his writing ability.

If you want to be like this then you simply must get huge,huge,huge amounts of input every single day for at least a year (and usually more). If you are up to the challenge then the rewards are there (I'm reaping the benefits now).

It really is that simple.

james -current kanji count: around 5000

welcome James. Lots of reading and listening will surely develop those skills, but what advice would you give for developing advanced speaking skills? It's possible to ask native speakers for detailed feedback on compositions, but improving speech strikes me as a more difficult hurdle for self-studiers.

I've looked around a bit for methods and resources to possibly supplement AJATT in this regard with limited success (unless one can afford a private tutor). Most of what I've come up with involves fees and/or classes or groups of some kind. Any thoughts?

I'm also curious about your obvious love of kanji (5000!) Are you aiming for that kanji exam or do you feel you need it for your reading or work?

james Wrote:Khatz is certainly fluent in Japanese but does not sound like a native speaker largely because of his accent.0

His accent is probably the least bad thing about his speech. His inability to form natural sounding sentences (inconsistent politeness levels & dialects), frequent incorrect word usage, overuse/abuse of kanji, etc are larger problems. Granted I haven't bothered reading much of what he writes, but from my limited sample it was evident. One thing I read even had random Chinese words thrown in in place of the Japanese ones. (Why the hell did he write Shibuya in Chinese in the middle of a Japanese sentence?) Maybe he's trying to show off his range of knowledge, but it comes across as him only having superficial understanding of what he's saying.

It's a symptom of the AJATT study method I think. Constant consumption of anime, manga, novels, etc in place of person-to-person contact have produced an unnatural speech style. One person I know here has a similar unnatural speech style, in that he speaks like an academic paper (which he seems to spend much of his time reading).

Jarvik7 Wrote:

james Wrote:Khatz is certainly fluent in Japanese but does not sound like a native speaker largely because of his accent.0

His accent is probably the least bad thing about his speech. His inability to form natural sounding sentences (inconsistent politeness levels & dialects), frequent incorrect word usage, overuse/abuse of kanji, etc are larger problems. Granted I haven't bothered reading much of what he writes, but from my limited sample it was evident. One thing I read even had random Chinese words thrown in in place of the Japanese ones. (Why the hell did he write Shibuya in Chinese in the middle of a Japanese sentence?) Maybe he's trying to show off his range of knowledge, but it comes across as him only having superficial understanding of what he's saying.

It's a symptom of the AJATT study method I think. Constant consumption of anime, manga, novels, etc in place of person-to-person contact have produced an unnatural speech style. One person I know here has a similar unnatural speech style, in that he speaks like an academic paper (which he seems to spend much of his time reading).

This is something I was paranoid about at first, but I planned out my method and think I've got solutions around this. The inconsistencies, that is.