I'm sure someone can recommend you something. I've watched a few but never really got into any of them. The only dramas I ever finished watching are Trick and Hanayoridango. I personally don't think watching drama to be very good for practice unless you're already good enough to follow the plot and enjoy it. If it feels forced you won't continue. In my early days about 3 years ago I often tried and found it tedious. The problem was I just didn't know enough vocabulary to understand it enough for it to be enjoyable. I also found I could understand more if I just listened to it, attempting to sit still and watch it just made me get distracted. Your listening comprehension of authentic (non-learner) content is always going to be dependant on how much vocabulary and to a lesser extent grammar you know. You need to focus on increasing those (particularly vocabulary) through reading and vocabulary study. Listening practice is also crucial for vocabulary/grammar learning but it's important to accept that for a long time most authentic content is simply going to be incomprehensible to you unless you take steps to make it comprehensible, using transcripts/audiobooks or learner content so you can familiarise yourself with the vocabulary. Even then you won't catch all of it on the first listen. It takes a lot of listening to train the ear. For that reason, imo drama (though you may enjoy it once your level is high enough) is not that great a way to improve your listening ability because its density of speech is quite a bit lower compared to audiobooks, podcasts, documentaries and so on. Also if you're trying to do a lot of passive listening to authentic content, which I recommend, accept that complete comprehension isn't the goal and that repeat listening will likely be necessary. For these reasons pure audio content (podcasts etc) that you can listen to while doing other things (commute/cleaning) are more effective because it's just non-stop speech.

Last edited by nadiatims (2011 June 01, 10:09 am)

nadiatims wrote:

I'm sure someone can recommend you something. I've watched a few but never really got into any of them. The only dramas I ever finished watching are Trick and Hanayoridango. I personally don't think watching drama to be very good for practice unless you're already good enough to follow the plot and enjoy it. If it feels forced you won't continue. In my early days about 3 years ago I often tried and found it tedious. The problem was I just didn't know enough vocabulary to understand it enough for it to be enjoyable. I also found I could understand more if I just listened to it, attempting to sit still and watch it just made me get distracted. Your listening comprehension of authentic (non-learner) content is always going to be dependant on how much vocabulary and to a lesser extent grammar you know. You need to focus on increasing those (particularly vocabulary) through reading and vocabulary study. Listening practice is also crucial for vocabulary/grammar learning but it's important to accept that for a long time most authentic content is simply going to be incomprehensible to you unless you take steps to make it comprehensible, using transcripts/audiobooks or learner content so you can familiarise yourself with the vocabulary. Even then you won't catch all of it on the first listen. It takes a lot of listening to train the ear. For that reason, imo drama (though you may enjoy it once your level is high enough) is not that great a way to improve your listening ability because its density of speech is quite a bit lower compared to audiobooks, podcasts, documentaries and so on. Also if you're trying to do a lot of passive listening to authentic content, which I recommend, accept that complete comprehension isn't the goal and that repeat listening will likely be necessary. For these reasons pure audio content (podcasts etc) that you can listen to while doing other things (commute/cleaning) are more effective because it's just non-stop speech.

rite now i am at 1110 kanji in RTK what should i be doing for reading skills or just not focus on that right now?

@jordan
I don't know exactly what your level is now, whether you had studied Japanese prior to starting RTK or not, so I'm not sure exactly what's best but I would certainly recommend trying to get RTK done within the next 1-2 months. For listening practice, if you're a complete beginner, try a pimsleur or Teach Yourself audio course (torrents are your friend).

Last edited by nadiatims (2011 June 01, 10:46 am)

@nadiatims
Thanks for the help. You were right when you said that watching j-dramas becomes a chore because that whats happening right now. I was watching anime with no subtitles and I could understand most of the things being said. So i thought i should move on to J-dramas, but then I found it hard to understand them and i was not having any fun. I think i am going to stick with anime until i finish RTK and my japanese gets better ありがとう＝D

chamcham wrote:

Japanese dramas come with Japanese subtitles these days.

They are literal word-for-word scripts.
So they match what the actors are saying exactly.

So they're really good for learning conversational language.

I'm going to try to hijack this thread and redirect it a bit. chamcham says that most dramas come with subtitles and I guess that's true. So why don't we list the drama's that we like that HAVE japanese subtitles available so that it makes it easier for us who need a little help. Basically subs2srs is the best tool for this so check that out.

I enjoyed:

Nihonjin no shiranai nihongo
Rookies (only the first 4 and movie are Japanese subbed)
Jin 1 and 2 (on air now)


What do ya'll recommend?

kainzero wrote:

great teacher onizuka!

GTO is classic.

also check out this site, it's what I reference for ドラマ
http://www.jdorama.com/topdramas.htm

my japanese drama reviews:
http://choronghi.wordpress.com/?s=review

if there aren't japanese subs i recommend using korean subs!
http://choronghi.wordpress.com/2010/11/ … rean-subs/
it's better than watching some shitty drama just b.c. it has japanese subs. you shouldn't limit yourself like that. if it happens to be really good AND japanese subs are available that's awesome but you know not always the case.

there is nothing more time-wasting than forcing yourself to keep watching shitty Japanese dramas all because they have japanese subs.
Let's watch the good ones!!

Last edited by howtwosavealif3 (2011 July 03, 4:46 pm)

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

Could anyone give me any recommendations? Having in consideration the dramas with japanese subs. Preferably with women as the main characters so that I can talk like them.

Thank you so much.

Any genre is fine, excluding horror.

I just finished watching 名前を亡くした女神 which is about ママ友地獄 at nursery school and the pressure to get your child into a good primary school.  The main characters are all women and also has some pretty good child-acting The Japanese subs for that should be finished soon.

In 美しい隣人 the two main characters are women as well.  It's about a woman whose life starts to collapse when she gets a new neighbour.

Hmmm, also in Perfect Report the main character is a woman.  She's a reporter for a tv news channel who gets demoted from politcal reporting to some sort of minor local news section (I think, I can't quite remember exactly)...

CarolinaCG wrote:

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

Could anyone give me any recommendations? Having in consideration the dramas with japanese subs. Preferably with women as the main characters so that I can talk like them.

Thank you so much.

Any genre is fine, excluding horror.

Last Friends is really good. Celeb to Binbo Taro is pretty stupid but I enjoyed it I quite liked Mioka too.

d-addicts only has the last 3 episodes :p

Thanks caivano! I'll check them out for sure

I just started watching Shimokita Glory Days. Anyone know of other shows similar to this one?