Most of what I read comes from elementary school texts and deals with stories, biographies or lessons about science, nature, etc. All that is pretty good stuff and I intend to keep on reading material like this and improving, however my oral skills are extremely low. I am convinced I have been passively building up my speaking potential but I am stubbornly impatient and always thinking about what I can do to improve my situation.

Here is what I realized, I need to add a new flavor to my reading, something that resembles more the spoken language, something with more casual dialogs and conversation, something inside speech bubbles, you get the idea. I will start reading some manga in order to acquire some more casual speaking patterns, etc., and see how it goes.

Any suggestions as to what manga titles that use real everyday language I could start with?. Or do you have a better idea?.

You can learn conversation from reading Japanese subtitles for Japanese TV Dramas.

Get them here:
http://www.d-addicts.com/forum/subtitles.php#Japanese

They are exact subtitles, which means they are the exact words that actors are saying.

Unfortunately no scripted TV show or manga will have dialogue that matches real conversation. The only way you can learn that is to practice real conversation. Some may be better than others, but the artificial nature of writing a script always prevents the dialogue from being exactly like what normal people would speak in their day.

yudantaiteki Wrote:Unfortunately no scripted TV show or manga will have dialogue that matches real conversation. The only way you can learn that is to practice real conversation. Some may be better than others, but the artificial nature of writing a script always prevents the dialogue from being exactly like what normal people would speak in their day.

That's not entirely true. In modern day acting, lots of scenes are improvised (in terms of the dialogue). Not every scene is scripted. And even when it is scripted, it's nothing like the scripted conversation in textbooks.

I would even go as far to say that most "real" conversations I encounter are like the ones I see in drama (and I've seen a lot of dramas and conversations).

Most of the dialogue in drama is very relevant. It can be used immediately in conversation that you have with Japanese people. This is because all of the dialogue is used (unlike manga) by real people speaking to each other. There are so many useful words that you can find in drama that you won't find in textbooks. So much of what I use in conversation is from drama, that I can't imagine not using it.

A key advantage is that you have the full script and can study the dialogue. You can actually make out all the words and find out which grammar points native Japanese use in certain situations.

A trick that I often use is that sometimes I encounter a situation that I've seen before in a Japanese drama. When I realized that, in my mind I pretend to be one of the actors, and try to imagine what would they say. It's sounds silly, but it words really well.

The only warning I have is that sometimes drama dialogue is TOO casual.
So be mindful of the proper level of politeness.

But yes, not only can you can building up your reading skills, you'll get access to words and phrases that you can use in daily conversation. Drama is also great for improving your listening while you're not with your Japanese friends.

I'll second learning from drama. As long as you're careful about how you apply your newly-found phrases you'll be okay. If you're in a formal situation then don't use words you haven't ran by your language partners or friends already. It could get you in trouble.

One of the really neat games to play while watching is to see if you can guess what the person on TV is going to say. In a lot of the stock life situations depicted in drama it's not very difficult to do it, and your snap Japanese in real conversations will become better.

Japanese people will tell you not to learn from drama because "you shouldn't mimic it," but they don't understand that what you're trying to learn is more nuanced than the kind of phrase-book way they're probably going about learning English.

There's a lot of very common sentence structures and patterns that can help you improve a lot.

I agree with yudantaiteki. The type of speech you hear in dramas and the type of speech you hear in real everyday life is often very different. But that's not to say that dramas won't help you with real conversations. The kind of conversations that occur in drama also occasionally occur in real life.

In my opinion, if you want to learn real conversation, variety/talk shows are better. I've recently been watching ameta-lk, and a lot of the conversations in it sound very "natural". That is to say, I could easily imagine my friends having conversations exactly like that. Conversations from drama feel more contrived (but again, that's not to say they are not good to learn from).

partner55083777 Wrote:I agree with yudantaiteki. The type of speech you hear in dramas and the type of speech you hear in real everyday life is often very different. But that's not to say that dramas won't help you with real conversations. The kind of conversations that occur in drama also occasionally occur in real life.

In my opinion, if you want to learn real conversation, variety/talk shows are better. I've recently been watching ameta-lk, and a lot of the conversations in it sound very "natural". That is to say, I could easily imagine my friends having conversations exactly like that. Conversations from drama feel more contrived (but again, that's not to say they are not good to learn from).

These most of the time don't actually have subs though, and are in my opinion also harder to understand than drama and anime. Unfortunately, finding intersting drama is balls to the walls hard, and trying to get japanese subs for anime, well its not hard it just is a) Shows gibberish text b) is mistimed and takes too much work to get working c) Once in 20 tries it might work.

The day I find an interesting drama with subs ill probably already be fluent :/

Some "interesting" dramas (IMHO):

Fumo Chitai
Nodame Cantabile
Karei Naru Ichizoku
Nanase Futatabi
Koi ni Ochitara
Slow Dance
Liar Game

Every season there's at least a few good dramas.
Often, just reading the summary is not enough to know if it's good.

FYI, "Fumo Chitai" and "Karei Naru Ichizoku" are based off of novels by the
same author.

partner55083777 Wrote:In my opinion, if you want to learn real conversation, variety/talk shows are better. I've recently been watching ameta-lk, and a lot of the conversations in it sound very "natural". That is to say, I could easily imagine my friends having conversations exactly like that. Conversations from drama feel more contrived (but again, that's not to say they are not good to learn from).

Have you found any talk shows with subs (in Japanese)?
Because, I think a major advantage of dramas is the subbs (my oral comprehension sucks right now)

there is for london hearts. check out the torrent file listing on d-addicts.

but talk shows have lots of subtitles anyway... the big text everwyerehs so it's not like you're left completely in the dark.

p.s. I love ame talk too!

well also the thing with drama is they also do the unnatural pausing/distancing of self from the other individuial... so maybe that addds to the unnaturalness too lol.

One of the problems I had with using dramas/variety shows to learn conversation was that you can get by without knowing exactly what everyone says. You can piece together some things from context based on how people react, or what reply is given, etc. But in a conversation setting, you usually don't have that context because they're asking YOU the question and it's your turn to react.

The other thing is that what people talk about on variety shows and dramas may not be what you talk about...

kainzero Wrote:One of the problems I had with using dramas/variety shows to learn conversation was that you can get by without knowing exactly what everyone says. You can piece together some things from context based on how people react, or what reply is given, etc. But in a conversation setting, you usually don't have that context because they're asking YOU the question and it's your turn to react.

The other thing is that what people talk about on variety shows and dramas may not be what you talk about...

I don't really think it's a problem inherent with drama or variety shows, but rather
the way people are using the subtitles. Most people are passive and just listen, but
they really should try to take a more active role.

Instead of just getting by listening to drama, try to become part of the drama's world and use the subtitles to your advantage.

Something I like to do is that I occasionally pause the drama and they try to think
about what I would say in Japanese. Then I compare it to what the character said.

Also, you should try to put yourself in the character's shoes.
What is the environment like?
What are their relations with people?
How did they get the message across?
In the end, what did he/she say?
More importantly, what DIDN'T he/she say?

Sometimes, it's the things that you DON'T say that make you sound like a native.

Also, something you can do is to try using drama scripts like a screenplay and act out the scenes yourself. This really puts you in the character's frame of mind and helps you to understand why they say things the way they did.