IMO just trying to watch anime without subtitles isn't a good idea. If you don't understand anything then that's not good either. I'd recommend watching anime with Japanese subtitles. That way you can least look up words you don't know.
@@LemmingwayArk take a screenshot or a photo and put it in an OCR program to extract the text and look up things in a dictionary easier you can also use google translate's "see original" option to copy the text instead of an OCR program, just don't use it to see the translations of things too often because it gets them very wrong frequently, with a dictionary you can pick the definition that fits the context best and you won't be just fed mistakes with no alternatives
I’ve been watching Japanese language vlogs to learn everyday speech, and I kind of intuited this. I avoid videos with built-in English subtitles. I feel like my brain stops paying attention to the unfamiliar Japanese audio and solely focuses on the subtitles if they are there.
I watch anime subtitled in English along with Japanese Vtubers. Double Japanese. You know, a watchalong. I've watched Subaru's watchalong of Attack on Titan about 4 times.
Watching with Japanese subtitles should help even more, according to studies. It had a noticeable effect on Spanish speakers learning English through watching movies. Obviously, Japanese is a bit different, but as long as you know how to read Hiragana and know basic grammar, it should be better than no subs at all.
the problem with that is that not only spanish and english are really similar (I am a native spanish speaker and I learned english to a decent point by pure inmersion) but we all have obligatory english lessons since the age of 7 or 5 so to the age of 15 while most of us are really bad at least we have some basics that can help us do the jump, jappanese is a completly different beast since the grammar structure is completely different I would say before doing inmertion spend 1 or 2 months ONLY on learning grammar and basic vocabulary or 4 months to a year depending on how intensive you are only with kanji if you want to use jappanese subtittles, this is my personal opinion but is better to focus in either learning to listen or to read it since both are a pain in the ass, as for me I have right know I have 10 months of intensive studies only mostly in kanji and vocabulary but I cannot understand any show unless I have subtitles
@@BARDI77 I'm in the same situation as you, but no one is saying to jump directly into japanese media with absolutely zero preparation (you absolutely can do it if you feel comfortable with it though!). The commonly recommended path of an immersion method is (always at your own pace) first learning all kana, then learning the most basic grammar and vocabulary (kanji) and then jumping head first as soon as possible into japanese media. Kana + basic grammar + basic vocabulary should give you more than good enough foundations to understand simple japanese media and fill a lot of gaps yourself just by context, and THAT is the key to this method.
this is a really helpful video! i don't watch anime, but ive found some of the most interesting and fun parts of learning japanese has been listening to Japanese music (im a huge vocaloid fan), seeing what parts i understand, and afterwards i check the translation and i find it really /really/ cool when i can spot a mistranslation or a translation that veers more from the real lyrics like you said, you don't learn a language as a kid by sitting down with a textbook !! you just listen and repeat and make a lot of mistakes ! お疲れ様でした🙏
REAL (with the vocaloid music) bc matt vs japan says listening to jp music doesnt help at all but as a vocaloid addict i beg to differ bc literally whenever im listening to songs since i began ajatt, either words get reinforced in my brain which helps my memory or i find new words that are repeated a lot in japanese songs and add them to anki with the song lyrics as example sentences even tho u cant get pitch accent from this, associating a catchy tune in ur head with the word can 100% help u remember it. when i went to japan with my dad who didnt know any japanese at all, i taught him the words for thank you and goodbye just by showing him the line in ズルい女 by OnlyOneOf that says "bye bye ありがとう、さようなら" and it worked! (although i couldve used that one line in when the first love ends by supercell come to think of it xD)
I totally agree with this. I think it's especially good to watch Japanese native content with Japanese subtitles. Personally, I love to supplement this with Rikaikun, the browser add-on that gives you furigana pronunciations and different meanings for Kanji when you hover over them. Turns out it also works for subtitles on RUclips. You can fully immerse in the language, but still use it to learn new words and kanji or refresh your memory on them, on the fly. If you don't hover over something, you get no assistance whatsoever. Once you've hit a point where you're understanding some sentence structures and you know which words you DON'T understand, it's invaluable to have instant access to their pronunciation, meaning and kanji.
japanese is kinda just something i engage with on the side to help a friend feel more comfortable with her own studying, and my primary second language focus is korean which ive been learning since 2017. but even when studying that long i've struggled immensely with auditory processing and understanding. i always, logically, kinda knew this was one of the main things hindering me in the immersion and acquisition aspect, but having it put so simply actually helps with coming to terms with it a little more so thanks man
This is so true i watched simple anime without subs (The polar bear caffee). My brain kinda just absorbed what was said, while i didn't fully understood everything. I could from the context itself.
I kind of agree with this but feel like there is a middle ground to this learning. The main focus is as you say 'immersion'. So you say watch Anime in pure Japanese and no translation which does the job of acclimatising your ear and brain to the core concepts of Japanese. This is where you start initially noticing things and patterns. Second to this is then the notion of you 'studying'. So you would then learn in isolation, practise, find out the answers to questions you had or words and patterns you see. You then go back to immersion and bring your new knowledge to help the next level of you advancing in understanding and towards being comfortable. I say this as someone in England who is learning German, Japanese and Cebuano (a Filipino dialect) and I do not really have the full concept of immersion - i.e. not hearing and having to interact in that language. So my answer would be - watch an anime YOU LIKE in Japanese only, then with subtitles, then in Japanese and pick it apart and you then can take that to new anime. It is how I learned the word 'Bra' in swedish means good - thank you 'The Bridge'. :-)
I like to read Japanese comments on vids because I learn that way a more natural ways of speaking. What I like to do is, to try read and understand it, then turn on the auto translation to see if I was correct, then turn it off and re read it in Japanese. Helps a lot
idk if this is because i watched way too much anime or not, but there was a point when i start noticing translation error because the words just doesn't make sense in the context and that slowly turn into recognizing more nuance from they way the characters speak when the translation couldn't convey all of it, and after i start to seriously learn Japanese i start recognizing phrases and understand sentences here and there so i guess it could work but you need to really put effort into listening
In my case, I just learned japanese through memorizing hundreds of kanji with great interest as I love them. This gave me the vocab and even some grammar on the way as I would often look up every new interesting word used in sentences. Then the rest came from watching anime with subtitles, even if it "ruins" the immersion I literally was paying more attention to the japanese and using the subs as a support for confirming what I heard / understanding new things more efficiently without having to look them up directly. Currently, after 3 years of this, I can consume comfortably pretty much any content made for natives, including novels, manga, anime, news... Also just passed nouken N1 this year without any trouble :)
In my case I also love kanji too and wanted to learn as many as possible when I started. It never hurt me, it just allowed me to read text easier and pick up sounds along the way. Love this comment
You need to mostly watch in the target language and be able to translate when needed. As a beginner, this means constantly changing between Japanese and English subtitles to make every single word and sentence you've heard into flashcards --- but when you're more advanced it gets better. I'm experiencing both sides as someone who's ok at French but complete beginner in Japanese. Also, people hate this fact --- but you need to know how the language works as a whole as well as the specifics. You don't need to learn every tiny grammar rule, but you DO need to know about general sentence structure, tenses and how verbs change according to people (or, in the case of Japanese, that they _don't_ change). This makes it much easier to pick words out that you don't know while you use Japanese subtitles, especially when you're a beginner.
I recently started learning Japanese and have completed Hiragana and Katakana. I'm now working with the N5 vocab deck in Anki, but I'm encountering some issues. Since I am chinese and i can read most of the Kanji immediately and understand the meaning of the words, I'm finding it difficult when I only listen to the audio without seeing the Kanji. I'm confused about whether I should focus on improving my listening skills by closing my eyes and just listening, or if I should prioritize reading the Kanji to understand the words faster. Does recognizing words from listening come naturally over time, or should I focus more on listening practice now?
Focus on listening first, languages are spoken first and written second. Since you’re Chinese you know what a lot of words mean and you’ll be able to pick up a lot of the readings naturally. If you want to read, start with shounen manga because of the furigana. Good luck!
it's not cope having the mindset of "I'll turn off subtitles when I can understand somewhat on what is being said". If we take your "learning to swim" analogy; you don't jump into water without any practice. You use floaters to get a feel of floating and staying afloat. You use floaters to learn kicking in water, and the different strokes. Once you know that you can stay afloat at the shallow water can you start swimming without floaters for short distances. Subtitles are the same. They are your floaters. I agree with immersing being the best way to learn, but that doesn't mean to jump in without any word knowledge. My Japanese isn't bad at all. Sure, I have still a lot to learn, but since I've watched a lot of anime with subtitles I've picked up enough vocabulary that I can now listen to Japanese conversations (be it in anime, VTubers, vloggers etc) without subtitles and know what they are talking about. And since I now have enough vocabulary to understand let's say 60-80% of any given sentence, I can deduce what the words I don't know might mean due to context and the sentence that is being said. The best way to immerse and learn Japanese (or any language/skill) is to find a way to enjoy the process. Some might enjoy the challenge of going without subtitles from the get-go and be completely blind, but I feel that majority that want to learn doesn't have that motivation or drive. And for those people I'd argue that starting with subtitles is fine, as long as the mindset is to focus on repetitive words and what the corresponding subtitle for said word is. Once the learner feels comfortable to take the next step then at that point they should start looking into immersion where there aren't any subtitles/english subtitles. I'd say one of the better way to quickly increase one's vocabulary is playing video games. Best are games that have voice acting and the text is furigana (in my opinion) until you can read hiragana relatively smooth, then try playing with no furigana but has Kanji so that you can start really associate the kanjis to specific words. Many Kanjis I've learned has been through furigana from reading Manga or playing games in Japanese language. Another way would be to read Manga in Japanese. Some have furigana, some don't. Only downside with reading without listening is that you miss out on the pronunciation of said words. That's where video games can be better material.
This is a well written comment but the thing about using English subs is that Japanese and English are so different that they’re not even usually saying the same thing. The word order is completely different and some sentences aren’t accurately translated. Or even worse if there’s a sentence with a clause or 2 sentences, it’s very common to hear the Japanese first half of the sentence while the English sub has the back end of the sentence translated because the word order is different.
@@ryacw Everything you just said here is completely correct, and I agree. However, I don't think that's a reason to not use English subtitles. My suggestion for anyone doing it would be to watch the scene with the English subs, then *only use it as a guide to the meaning.* Because it's often wrong, you don't trust it but just get an idea. You then rewind the entire scene and listen to it with *no subs* (or just ignore the subs). This mainly works if you already know some Japanese, but I find that I understand a lot more when I do this. That way you're relying on your Japanese ear, and only using English as a guide. By the way, I do this even if I'm using Japanese subs because I've found that even Japanese subtitles can take you away from the audio. My reading ability is much better than my listening, so if I have J-subs, I often tune out the audio and read the subs. For this reason, I try to listen mostly and only glance at the J-subs. And if I didn't hear everything, I'll read the J-subs to know what I should hear, then I'll rewind the scene ignoring the subs and trying to hear everything.
If I'm immersing with anime I use dual sub, japanese subs and then blurred english subs that unblur when you hover over them, but I also want to understand the anime so I usually only do this if I'm rewatching something
what if you just wanna understand the anime right now, i usually consume japanese content like watching japanese streamers, youtube videos and japanese songs with japanese subtitles, do i really need to do it for anime also?
It's hard to learn with subs for me anyway because the sentences in my language (french) and in japanese are reversed, you hear the beginning of the sentence but the beginning of the subs is the end of the sentence so when I read the end I already forgot the beginning 😂
If I may ask more: 1) Yesterday i tried SatoriReader and sounds fun and encourages to read but there are English translations which you say to avoid. Should I just read whole page without checking translation and then check english to find where i misunderstood? 2) As u said with Wanikani it takes so long so i dropped this for more Anki focus: I'm doing recommended by you deck Heisigs RTK 6th - but it's different than typical desk. I should try to get visualisation of kanji before I check answer? Or I should also remember readings. 3) I'm passive/active listening to japanese tv, found it really fun to watch hope it's okay 🎉 Thanks for answers and your time
I don’t know your level but I’ll assume around middle beginner. SatoriReader isn’t bad but if you can, read the whole page first and don’t check the translation of the whole page, but rather just some of the words that you really can’t grasp from context. If it’s a little too hard then you might want to stick to anime and TV for a bit because it’s easier to learn in context. As for the Heisig deck, you have the keyword of the kanji and then you write it out. You don’t visualize it, you actually write it. Also keep up the passive listening! That’s easily the most powerful habit here. If you got any more questions, I’d be happy to hop on a call sometime
@@ryacw thank you:) I passed N5, ended Genki II now and i will study Tobira (with japanese teacher on italki). I understand ur suggestion that i shouldnt check whole meaning in english because i should drop english at all. I will try to read whole and just check some words. And of coure im keeping passive listening. Doing it at job with japanese tv (trying to be focused as much as i can) and some podcast for begginers at gym. It would be great to have possibility to contact with you
@@ryacw lmao it was so weird with this Heisig deck XD so i write it just on paper and check answer in Anki? sorry but its diffrent than usual anki deck for me Edit ok I checked - so probably i should just use Anki option "Draft" to write before answer Edit 2 OKAY THIS IS GREAT! and so funny to think that i totally know kanji but when I need to write this i cant. I think it will teach me kanji a lot
Read both of your comments, great that you passed N5! Keep reading and passive listening. If focus is a bit of an issue, sometimes I meditate before I immerse. I have a link in my channel bio if you wanna call sometime!
But but I can't read japanese subtitles fast enough, so I always fall behind and end up feeling unaccomplished :( I've been doing some reading practice with videos on youtube but I don't feel like I'm learning. WHat do I do?
if you ever felt like in school getting the answer first and figuring out the steps later helped, try more of a guess and check approach to learning the language
I'm now in intermediate stage and can understand way more through reading, but when I just listen, especially Japanese people speaking, it's still a bit blurry and bit of a struggle. Do I just keep on listening and it'll improve? I don't want to rely on Japanese subs anymore and want to transition towards listening and reading as separate activities and not listening and reading simultaneously.
Best thing I can recommend for this is passive listening, you’ll watch your comprehension go up a ton after around 2 weeks of just having some podcast on all day
I recommend looking for the right kind of anime you can watch without subtitles. It's hard to tell what will be hard before you try so you should try a few different shows. Easy going slice of life are a good bet. I recently started watching anime without subtitles and have found some shows I can understand pretty well: Ojamajo Doremi, Cardcaptor Sakura, Ichigo Mashimaro, and Azumanga Daioh
As @ryacw said, definitely listen to real, natural Japanese speech. A lot. Tolerating ambiguity is a point that's often brought up for a reason; at first you'll barely understand _anything,_ but that's okay. Trust your brain's natural ability to adapt to new languages, and give it weeks and months to start to find the patterns. You WILL start picking up more, you'll start actually hearing the words you "know" but never caught in real speech, and you'll start realizing which words you don't know because the structure and pronunciations are becoming more clear.
As many people have already said once you already got the reading down, using that and connecting it to the speech you’re listening. So what you can understand in a written format you use that as a building block with what you’re listening to.
So I’m going to start learning hiragana soon. I know nothing about Japanese. I should get an Anki deck and watch anime in Japanese with subtitles and the focus should be to look for words I recognized
No wonder I could focus more on the Japanese wording if I just ignore the subtitles. Subtitlesdo help at first but they help the same way training wheels help you ride a bike. They could only take you so far and the rest you have to do on your own. I think Rosetta Stone is great for this as it teaches language by simply showing which foreign language wording fits an image or situation instead of straight up how to translate it in English.
wow. im kinda floored that there are so many people who think they're studying japanese when they're reading english subtitles. sure, maybe you'll pick up some words as we all do over so many years of watching anime (なに、ばか etc) but a few words here and there will never get you very far if you actually want to comprehend a second language.
The wiser comment I've read here so far. It's OK to use your native language in the beginning, but as you get more used and reach a greater level in the language, you do need to start getting rid of your native language from your learning process.
While listening to your videos, I caught myself thinking that I am listening to you in English, which is not my first language. It feels so strange thinking about comprehending the meaning of your words, while realizing they are not in your native tongue. Luckily my English is good enough for me to not think of it, but it's still strange. I like the phrase "you don't learn the language, you get used to it". I guess it's how I learned English too.
It takes me a while to process hiragana and katakana when reading it and doesnt give me enough time. Im a slower reader, even in english i dont always have enough time to read it all.
Start off with the pause button or maybe the 0.5x speed option. Keep on trying to read the kana (never English subtitles 😬) , and your overall speed will pick up.
The biggest problems with English or any western language subtitles on Japanese are that they don’t follow the Japanese sequence of words, the way sentences are constructed and expressions are generally too much adapted. When learning other languages that have a similar type of sentences construction, subtitles in your own language can be more helpful because it’s easier to spot unknown vocabulary. With Japanese, it’s too difficult to identify those when words that appear written first in your language, like verbs, are only heard at the end of a Japanese sentence. What works best for me in general is to use the native language subtitles, though I highly recommend choosing the closed captions for hearing impaired rather than the normal subtitles, because sometimes normal subtitles are not always the faithful transcript of the spoken track (in some cases, you can even have native language subtitles that are translation of foreign subtitles). The problem with native Japanese subtitles is that new vocabulary may often use kanjis for which you can’t really decipher the pronunciation, that there are no spaces between words and that not many meanings of new words of vocabulary can be guessed from the way they are written (many western languages share common root words which you can identify even if the spelling is different and so extrapolate their meaning). I have yet to identify the best way to watch Japanese movies, dramas or animes to really progress. One way is to find fan subs that focus on making subtitles that are made for people who try to learn the language by writing the Japanese text with spaces between words and adding hiraganas and katakanas for kanjis, plus eventually the same line translated in your language. Another way is to watch a scene first dubbed in your language, then when the overall meaning of what is said is still fresh in your mind, watch it again in Japanese, with or without Japanese subtitles, concentrating on how the phrase is constructed in Japanese. I haven’t tried it, but it may even be a good exercise to try first to translate in Japanese the dubbed version, then listen to the correct original Japanese version of the sentence. As of now, for Japanese I feel like the character of Antonio Banderas in the movie « the 13th warrior ». For those who don’t know this movie from the 90s, Banderas character is an Arab poet more or less abducted by vikings who, after consulting an oracle, need a foreigner to be the 13th warrior in a quest to save their country from an evil menace. The Arab cannot understand at all the northern language, but the journey to the homeland of those Vikings is long and he listens to them speaking to each other, starts to identify little by little from context some words, and then day after day more and more words, until he is able to fully understand and talk to them at the end of their trip. The director of this movie, John McTiernan (the same that did the first two Die Hard movies), edited this passage of the movie in a very clever way : the Vikings speak in the beginning full Northern without even subtitles, then each word that the hero learns is spoken in English while the rest remains incomprehensible to the audience. As scenes go on, more and more words are spoken in English in the middle of Northern discussions until finally, at the end of the journey to their homeland, every character speak in English, showing that the main character has finally been able to acquire completely the northern language just by listening and watching the Vikings all this time. ruclips.net/video/aVVURiaVgG8/видео.htmlsi=8b4-xb3zSjnscRpO
Some Anime stuff with English subs is distracting, I have like a full movie of Pokemon Secrets of the Jungle KoKo but sense its locked to English Sub I tend to just look away. I try to mentally tune it out. I rather have Japanese subtitles instead. But Just have to grab one with Japanese subtitles if not then just with none.
What do u think about watching a show and then rewatching it with japanese subtitles not translating because you shouldnt learn the language to translate but to learn it how they understand it but couldnt it help with context ?
That’s a good way to do it but also if the content is out of your reach then it might be better to study a more comprehensible piece of media, like slice of life anime, etc
@@marxyy ya I’m now rethinking my whole language learning approach. There’s another language learning channel named Mikel hyperpolyglot and he says go straight into memorizing vocab with associative mnemonics and then hear enough native sentences and you’ll naturally pick up grammar. He also recommends shadowing so his methods have some overlap with ajatt. Ajatt probably won’t work for me cuz I’m not into anime, and I tried listening to Japanese of different levels and it’s just obvious to me that memorizing a word via mnemonics is way more effective than trying to parse something out of an anime.
Even tho I watched anime with subtitles, I am able to understand words I didnt even know I understood. I would turn around, hear a sentence or few words and understand it even though I dont know the meaning of the word.
So many people trying to help others learn fall into the same trap of thinking that what they did last and gave them a lot of progress is what actually made them learn, skipping that it would never work if they would not already know a lot before. Can't watch without subtitles when even understanding 1 word in a sentence is not common. And sadly even reaching 2k+ words it can be hard to find something to watch that isn't way above your level and isn't the most boring kid show possible. And imo hardest part usually is to just keep the motivation going, failing usually does not help with that.
Do you have any advice for being more confident in your understanding and not relying on translation? I find myself reading a sentence in japanese and thinking I understand it but still going to read the english translation just to make sure I was right. I feel like it's hindering me.
Ahhh I remember this stage, basically you need to make the monolingual switch. Start using monolingual dictionaries. Do more reading. You need to treat English like the plague. If you want more help, we can hop on a call or something
For now on, I am only using English subtitles if that is the only way I will know the characters are saying, speaking in another language. I did not enjoy reading subtitles and watching what's going on much anyway.
If you really love japanese media you'll have plenty of shows/movies that aren't translated. I personally am distracted by knowing that I'm not getting the best experience when watching shows I know have easily accessible subs I'm not using.
I don't think it's nearly as bad as you're making it out to be honestly, I feel that having watched a lot of subtitled anime did give me a large boost when I started taking Japanese lessons. I transitioned to Japanese subtitles eventually but I believe English subbed anime can be useful for beginner-intermediate learners. And every time I try to use Anki I end up quitting not long after because I get burnt out on it quickly. So I guess I committed both sins you mention in the video - eng subbed anime and not using anki Still got N1 tho
To be honest, I don't really agree with watching anime you haven't seen without subs. Priority should be to enjoy it, which is hard if you don't understand. Once you've enjoyed an anime you can go back and rewatch it, or rewatch less recent ones, preferably with Japanese subs. Familiarity with the lines can also make it easier to recognize the meaning of words
@Ryan No Koto I'm sorry, but I have to disagree with quite a bit of this. Not using English subtitles is exactly one of the mistakes I wish I hadn't made before. I spent years trying to do the listen to Japanese you don't understand for hours and hours, even with Japanese subtitles, and I made very little progress. Probably in part because I'm a slower learner than many. For certain people (Matt vs Japan's, Olly Richards of the world) maybe listening to stuff you can't understand for hours is fine because maybe they have high linguistic abilities and intuition. The unfortunate thing is when it is assumed that everyone can do that. But for many, if not most people, this isn't the case. I can't know for sure how good it is, but now that I use English subtitles, my comprehension is much higher. But I don't use them as you describe in the video. I'll explain that later There's a contradiction in something you said, and this has been addressed by other language teachers online. You say that *Comprehensible Input* is necessary for Japanese acquisition, and I would agree. But then you go on to say that beginners need to tolerate ambiguity and listen to things they barely understand. But that is *not* Comprehensible Input. Now I know you say they should use a 2k deck to get their words, but there is a huge difference between knowing words and hearing them. If you're a beginner, even with context, it can be very difficult to correctly hear words unless you know what should be said. I know of no better way to do this, for me at least, than subtitles. To be clear, if I have Japanese subtitles available, I will use them. But if I don't, then I will use English. And the way I do it is I will watch a scene (maybe 5-10 seconds or so) with English subs so I have an idea of what is being said (because English subs aren't perfect so you can't assume they're perfectly accurate). Then I rewind that scene from the beginning and listen *without looking at the subs.* I find that I comprehend far more when I do this. What I mean is, I discovered that there were a lot of Japanese words in the scene that I already knew, but I couldn't hear them. But once I knew what the sentence should be approximately saying, I could hear it. This sometimes makes the difference of 10% comprehension versus 80%, although it massively varies. That's Comprehensible versus incomprehensible input. However, lately I prefer to just look for simpler content rather than do the above too much. Because I believe comprehensible input should be the most important thing. In conclusion, I will always be skeptical of the claim that English subs will somehow ruin your Japanese until someone shows me good evidence. If there's a study that shows my method leads to worse outcomes, then I will reconsider it. But the experience of some successful learners is not proof because you don't know how it would have gone if you did it differently. You can't go back in time. I don't deny the success of AJATT learners, but not everyone is convinced of it and I doubt it actually works for everyone.
Very well written comment, I made this video a while ago and if you were to ask me now, I still think that you shouldn’t use English subs unless you need to check if you understood something. I think the main reason you shouldn’t is because even if you get the meaning, you’re not entirely in the flow of using only Japanese. But I do think they can be good for beginners looking to check their comprehension, but the real problem comes when you only ever watch content using English subs and pretend to be learning Japanese.
I kind of disagree with your point or see it more nuanced anyway. I am German and have been learning English and Chinese to fluency and am a beginner in Japanese. English-subbed Anime is better than English dubbed Anime, even better are Japanese subs if your Japanese is good enough. The problem is, that you need to know some 3000 words until you can understand easy Anime, so before you are JLPT N3 level and just want to enjoy Anime, I see no problem with English subs. Of course, watching Anime with Japanese subs at JLPT N5 or N4 level and pausing and translating after every sentence is more effective, but that's a very tiring study lesson and not just a chill activity for the evening. In my opinion, if you know less than 2000-3000 words, immersion works a lot better by reading graded content.
Yep they’ve done research on this, people who turned on native language subtitles while watching foreign language content retained nearly 0% of the words in said content. Essentially no effect. In my view, watching TL content with native language subs is a lot like playing the piano. You’re doing two things at once - reading English and listening to Japanese, much like pianos plays two parts using their hands. Our brain is just not designed for that type of parallel thinking, and it takes years for people to get good at piano. Expecting to do the same and actually learn with subtitles is unwise IMO. But TLDR even if my hypothesis isn’t correct as to why people don’t learn with native language subs, either way the result is the same. So I just don’t watch with native language subs
most animes are horrible source of japanese hearing material... specially shonen, if you watch the entire naruto series. you have hundred of words that no one uses in real life. cities, powers,towns, fake countries etc animes that worked for me where the ones based in "real life". of course it can have some fantasy elements. a good anime is parasyte for example. because its based mostly in tokyo. naruto, one piece etc are horrible in my opinion.
yea ur missing the point buddy🤦🏻♂️… youre supposed to do it to train your brain subconsciously as well as ryan mentioned “pattern-recognition”. looking at the subs might make u miss the nuance of the scene too. picture talking with someone and not focusing at his face/mouth but looking elsewhere
The worst thing you can do is to watch anime without subtitles when you're not fluent in Japanese. Because you'll get impression that you understand but in fact you'll learn wrong meanings and as they become a habit, you'll end up in the worst situation: you'll think you know while you don't really know or know wrong. This will hurt you much much more in the next steps of learning journey.
I disagree with you. If you read the English (or any other language) subtitles while you're learning, you're diverting focus from your listening to the speaker and you can't develop the Japanese (or any other language) Ear unless you listen to the speaker. You'll never understand the language until you develop the ear.
This might be the case if you only read or listen. But if you have visuals that accompany this than you can learn by context. Babies didn’t understand anything either, but they learned through this method.
That's why we use good methods to learn new vocabulary as we spend time consuming the language. It can sound completely impossible at first, but as you get used to it you then start to understand how it works.
Using subtitles is just another form of "leveraging adult knowledge". The only "bad" way to learn a language is the single, pure, ideological route. The best way is the multiple, mixed, practical route: watch and listen to many things, use subtitles or don't, target or home language, study grammar or don't, do rote repetition or don't, do shadowing or don't, talk to yourself in the shower or don't, take lessons or don't, get a language exchange or don't, read newspapers and books or don't... It just doesn't matter. Do as much as you can. Be curious. Make connections. Be consistent. Keep going. Make it everyday. Don't sweat it. Get real. The way immersionists talk about learning a native language makes it sound like they never learned a native language. Personally, I DID do English language questions, I DID learn English grammar, I DID do writing practices, rote memorization, textual analysis, reading comprehension, even speech therapy. There is no reason you can't ALSO use meta-linguistic methods, approaches and perspectives to facilitate your learning AHEM, i mean *acquisition*, of course... Immersion is also not suited for all neurotypes. The assumption that it's the method par excellence will inevitably leave many behind. Also, have you heard how most native speakers speak YOUR language? I mean, they're perfectly fluent, but they're generally terrible: vague, inaccurate, repetitive, dull, narrow... Native fluency is such a low, superficial, ostentatious standard. Joseph Conrad, one of the masters of English literature, spoke with a terrible, thick accent. I'd much rather sound like an erudite foreigner than just another native-alike wannabe.
IMO just trying to watch anime without subtitles isn't a good idea. If you don't understand anything then that's not good either.
I'd recommend watching anime with Japanese subtitles. That way you can least look up words you don't know.
What if you can't read Kanji?
@@LemmingwayArk Thats why you have JP subs, to learn them
@@LemmingwayArk take a screenshot or a photo and put it in an OCR program to extract the text and look up things in a dictionary easier
you can also use google translate's "see original" option to copy the text instead of an OCR program, just don't use it to see the translations of things too often because it gets them very wrong frequently, with a dictionary you can pick the definition that fits the context best and you won't be just fed mistakes with no alternatives
@@LemmingwayArkyou can also use language reactor to translate and copy subs
btw RTK is really helpful to learn Kanji, but you have to do it consistently for a few months straight for it to work
I’ve been watching Japanese language vlogs to learn everyday speech, and I kind of intuited this. I avoid videos with built-in English subtitles. I feel like my brain stops paying attention to the unfamiliar Japanese audio and solely focuses on the subtitles if they are there.
Honestly same.
Which vlogs did u watch?
I watch anime subtitled in English along with Japanese Vtubers. Double Japanese. You know, a watchalong. I've watched Subaru's watchalong of Attack on Titan about 4 times.
you could try not looking at the screen and just listen to them talk
Watching with Japanese subtitles should help even more, according to studies. It had a noticeable effect on Spanish speakers learning English through watching movies. Obviously, Japanese is a bit different, but as long as you know how to read Hiragana and know basic grammar, it should be better than no subs at all.
I actually highly recommend using Japanese subs at the start in my other videos, it’s one of the best things you can do as a beginner
the problem with that is that not only spanish and english are really similar (I am a native spanish speaker and I learned english to a decent point by pure inmersion) but we all have obligatory english lessons since the age of 7 or 5 so to the age of 15 while most of us are really bad at least we have some basics that can help us do the jump, jappanese is a completly different beast since the grammar structure is completely different I would say before doing inmertion spend 1 or 2 months ONLY on learning grammar and basic vocabulary or 4 months to a year depending on how intensive you are only with kanji if you want to use jappanese subtittles, this is my personal opinion but is better to focus in either learning to listen or to read it since both are a pain in the ass, as for me I have right know I have 10 months of intensive studies only mostly in kanji and vocabulary but I cannot understand any show unless I have subtitles
@@BARDI77 I'm in the same situation as you, but no one is saying to jump directly into japanese media with absolutely zero preparation (you absolutely can do it if you feel comfortable with it though!). The commonly recommended path of an immersion method is (always at your own pace) first learning all kana, then learning the most basic grammar and vocabulary (kanji) and then jumping head first as soon as possible into japanese media. Kana + basic grammar + basic vocabulary should give you more than good enough foundations to understand simple japanese media and fill a lot of gaps yourself just by context, and THAT is the key to this method.
this is a really helpful video! i don't watch anime, but ive found some of the most interesting and fun parts of learning japanese has been listening to Japanese music (im a huge vocaloid fan), seeing what parts i understand, and afterwards i check the translation and i find it really /really/ cool when i can spot a mistranslation or a translation that veers more from the real lyrics
like you said, you don't learn a language as a kid by sitting down with a textbook !! you just listen and repeat and make a lot of mistakes !
お疲れ様でした🙏
REAL (with the vocaloid music) bc matt vs japan says listening to jp music doesnt help at all but as a vocaloid addict i beg to differ bc literally whenever im listening to songs since i began ajatt, either words get reinforced in my brain which helps my memory or i find new words that are repeated a lot in japanese songs and add them to anki with the song lyrics as example sentences
even tho u cant get pitch accent from this, associating a catchy tune in ur head with the word can 100% help u remember it. when i went to japan with my dad who didnt know any japanese at all, i taught him the words for thank you and goodbye just by showing him the line in ズルい女 by OnlyOneOf that says "bye bye ありがとう、さようなら" and it worked! (although i couldve used that one line in when the first love ends by supercell come to think of it xD)
I totally agree with this. I think it's especially good to watch Japanese native content with Japanese subtitles. Personally, I love to supplement this with Rikaikun, the browser add-on that gives you furigana pronunciations and different meanings for Kanji when you hover over them. Turns out it also works for subtitles on RUclips. You can fully immerse in the language, but still use it to learn new words and kanji or refresh your memory on them, on the fly. If you don't hover over something, you get no assistance whatsoever. Once you've hit a point where you're understanding some sentence structures and you know which words you DON'T understand, it's invaluable to have instant access to their pronunciation, meaning and kanji.
japanese is kinda just something i engage with on the side to help a friend feel more comfortable with her own studying, and my primary second language focus is korean which ive been learning since 2017. but even when studying that long i've struggled immensely with auditory processing and understanding. i always, logically, kinda knew this was one of the main things hindering me in the immersion and acquisition aspect, but having it put so simply actually helps with coming to terms with it a little more so thanks man
If you're not doing so already. I recommend using Korean sources to learn Japanese as I'm sure you're aware of the commonalities.
This is so true i watched simple anime without subs (The polar bear caffee). My brain kinda just absorbed what was said, while i didn't fully understood everything. I could from the context itself.
I kind of agree with this but feel like there is a middle ground to this learning. The main focus is as you say 'immersion'. So you say watch Anime in pure Japanese and no translation which does the job of acclimatising your ear and brain to the core concepts of Japanese. This is where you start initially noticing things and patterns. Second to this is then the notion of you 'studying'. So you would then learn in isolation, practise, find out the answers to questions you had or words and patterns you see. You then go back to immersion and bring your new knowledge to help the next level of you advancing in understanding and towards being comfortable. I say this as someone in England who is learning German, Japanese and Cebuano (a Filipino dialect) and I do not really have the full concept of immersion - i.e. not hearing and having to interact in that language. So my answer would be - watch an anime YOU LIKE in Japanese only, then with subtitles, then in Japanese and pick it apart and you then can take that to new anime. It is how I learned the word 'Bra' in swedish means good - thank you 'The Bridge'. :-)
I like to read Japanese comments on vids because I learn that way a more natural ways of speaking. What I like to do is, to try read and understand it, then turn on the auto translation to see if I was correct, then turn it off and re read it in Japanese. Helps a lot
Good idea. I need to read more Japanese comments as well.
idk if this is because i watched way too much anime or not, but there was a point when i start noticing translation error because the words just doesn't make sense in the context and that slowly turn into recognizing more nuance from they way the characters speak when the translation couldn't convey all of it, and after i start to seriously learn Japanese i start recognizing phrases and understand sentences here and there
so i guess it could work but you need to really put effort into listening
In my case, I just learned japanese through memorizing hundreds of kanji with great interest as I love them. This gave me the vocab and even some grammar on the way as I would often look up every new interesting word used in sentences. Then the rest came from watching anime with subtitles, even if it "ruins" the immersion I literally was paying more attention to the japanese and using the subs as a support for confirming what I heard / understanding new things more efficiently without having to look them up directly. Currently, after 3 years of this, I can consume comfortably pretty much any content made for natives, including novels, manga, anime, news... Also just passed nouken N1 this year without any trouble :)
In my case I also love kanji too and wanted to learn as many as possible when I started. It never hurt me, it just allowed me to read text easier and pick up sounds along the way. Love this comment
@@ryacw Man, we must be kindred. I love Kanji too.
You need to mostly watch in the target language and be able to translate when needed.
As a beginner, this means constantly changing between Japanese and English subtitles to make every single word and sentence you've heard into flashcards --- but when you're more advanced it gets better. I'm experiencing both sides as someone who's ok at French but complete beginner in Japanese.
Also, people hate this fact --- but you need to know how the language works as a whole as well as the specifics. You don't need to learn every tiny grammar rule, but you DO need to know about general sentence structure, tenses and how verbs change according to people (or, in the case of Japanese, that they _don't_ change). This makes it much easier to pick words out that you don't know while you use Japanese subtitles, especially when you're a beginner.
RUclips has constantly been reccomending videos about learning Japanese to me. Now I feel interested in trying it, lol
I recently started learning Japanese and have completed Hiragana and Katakana. I'm now working with the N5 vocab deck in Anki, but I'm encountering some issues. Since I am chinese and i can read most of the Kanji immediately and understand the meaning of the words, I'm finding it difficult when I only listen to the audio without seeing the Kanji. I'm confused about whether I should focus on improving my listening skills by closing my eyes and just listening, or if I should prioritize reading the Kanji to understand the words faster. Does recognizing words from listening come naturally over time, or should I focus more on listening practice now?
Focus on listening first, languages are spoken first and written second. Since you’re Chinese you know what a lot of words mean and you’ll be able to pick up a lot of the readings naturally. If you want to read, start with shounen manga because of the furigana. Good luck!
it's not cope having the mindset of "I'll turn off subtitles when I can understand somewhat on what is being said".
If we take your "learning to swim" analogy; you don't jump into water without any practice. You use floaters to get a feel of floating and staying afloat. You use floaters to learn kicking in water, and the different strokes. Once you know that you can stay afloat at the shallow water can you start swimming without floaters for short distances.
Subtitles are the same. They are your floaters. I agree with immersing being the best way to learn, but that doesn't mean to jump in without any word knowledge.
My Japanese isn't bad at all. Sure, I have still a lot to learn, but since I've watched a lot of anime with subtitles I've picked up enough vocabulary that I can now listen to Japanese conversations (be it in anime, VTubers, vloggers etc) without subtitles and know what they are talking about. And since I now have enough vocabulary to understand let's say 60-80% of any given sentence, I can deduce what the words I don't know might mean due to context and the sentence that is being said.
The best way to immerse and learn Japanese (or any language/skill) is to find a way to enjoy the process. Some might enjoy the challenge of going without subtitles from the get-go and be completely blind, but I feel that majority that want to learn doesn't have that motivation or drive. And for those people I'd argue that starting with subtitles is fine, as long as the mindset is to focus on repetitive words and what the corresponding subtitle for said word is.
Once the learner feels comfortable to take the next step then at that point they should start looking into immersion where there aren't any subtitles/english subtitles.
I'd say one of the better way to quickly increase one's vocabulary is playing video games. Best are games that have voice acting and the text is furigana (in my opinion) until you can read hiragana relatively smooth, then try playing with no furigana but has Kanji so that you can start really associate the kanjis to specific words. Many Kanjis I've learned has been through furigana from reading Manga or playing games in Japanese language. Another way would be to read Manga in Japanese. Some have furigana, some don't. Only downside with reading without listening is that you miss out on the pronunciation of said words. That's where video games can be better material.
This is a well written comment but the thing about using English subs is that Japanese and English are so different that they’re not even usually saying the same thing. The word order is completely different and some sentences aren’t accurately translated. Or even worse if there’s a sentence with a clause or 2 sentences, it’s very common to hear the Japanese first half of the sentence while the English sub has the back end of the sentence translated because the word order is different.
@@ryacw Everything you just said here is completely correct, and I agree. However, I don't think that's a reason to not use English subtitles. My suggestion for anyone doing it would be to watch the scene with the English subs, then *only use it as a guide to the meaning.* Because it's often wrong, you don't trust it but just get an idea. You then rewind the entire scene and listen to it with *no subs* (or just ignore the subs). This mainly works if you already know some Japanese, but I find that I understand a lot more when I do this. That way you're relying on your Japanese ear, and only using English as a guide.
By the way, I do this even if I'm using Japanese subs because I've found that even Japanese subtitles can take you away from the audio. My reading ability is much better than my listening, so if I have J-subs, I often tune out the audio and read the subs. For this reason, I try to listen mostly and only glance at the J-subs. And if I didn't hear everything, I'll read the J-subs to know what I should hear, then I'll rewind the scene ignoring the subs and trying to hear everything.
If I'm immersing with anime I use dual sub, japanese subs and then blurred english subs that unblur when you hover over them, but I also want to understand the anime so I usually only do this if I'm rewatching something
what if you just wanna understand the anime right now, i usually consume japanese content like watching japanese streamers, youtube videos and japanese songs with japanese subtitles, do i really need to do it for anime also?
It's hard to learn with subs for me anyway because the sentences in my language (french) and in japanese are reversed, you hear the beginning of the sentence but the beginning of the subs is the end of the sentence so when I read the end I already forgot the beginning 😂
If I may ask more:
1) Yesterday i tried SatoriReader and sounds fun and encourages to read but there are English translations which you say to avoid. Should I just read whole page without checking translation and then check english to find where i misunderstood?
2) As u said with Wanikani it takes so long so i dropped this for more Anki focus: I'm doing recommended by you deck Heisigs RTK 6th - but it's different than typical desk. I should try to get visualisation of kanji before I check answer? Or I should also remember readings.
3) I'm passive/active listening to japanese tv, found it really fun to watch hope it's okay 🎉
Thanks for answers and your time
I don’t know your level but I’ll assume around middle beginner. SatoriReader isn’t bad but if you can, read the whole page first and don’t check the translation of the whole page, but rather just some of the words that you really can’t grasp from context. If it’s a little too hard then you might want to stick to anime and TV for a bit because it’s easier to learn in context. As for the Heisig deck, you have the keyword of the kanji and then you write it out. You don’t visualize it, you actually write it. Also keep up the passive listening! That’s easily the most powerful habit here. If you got any more questions, I’d be happy to hop on a call sometime
@@ryacw thank you:) I passed N5, ended Genki II now and i will study Tobira (with japanese teacher on italki). I understand ur suggestion that i shouldnt check whole meaning in english because i should drop english at all. I will try to read whole and just check some words. And of coure im keeping passive listening. Doing it at job with japanese tv (trying to be focused as much as i can) and some podcast for begginers at gym.
It would be great to have possibility to contact with you
@@ryacw lmao it was so weird with this Heisig deck XD so i write it just on paper and check answer in Anki? sorry but its diffrent than usual anki deck for me
Edit ok I checked - so probably i should just use Anki option "Draft" to write before answer
Edit 2 OKAY THIS IS GREAT! and so funny to think that i totally know kanji but when I need to write this i cant.
I think it will teach me kanji a lot
Read both of your comments, great that you passed N5! Keep reading and passive listening. If focus is a bit of an issue, sometimes I meditate before I immerse. I have a link in my channel bio if you wanna call sometime!
It's been a month I've learned over 130 words 👍 I'll keep going 🔥
6:26 - もしもしゆうすけ. You had it right.
But but I can't read japanese subtitles fast enough, so I always fall behind and end up feeling unaccomplished :( I've been doing some reading practice with videos on youtube but I don't feel like I'm learning. WHat do I do?
Pause for every subtitle then read it, then play. Eventually you’ll be able to read at normal speed.
if you ever felt like in school getting the answer first and figuring out the steps later helped, try more of a guess and check approach to learning the language
I'm now in intermediate stage and can understand way more through reading, but when I just listen, especially Japanese people speaking, it's still a bit blurry and bit of a struggle. Do I just keep on listening and it'll improve? I don't want to rely on Japanese subs anymore and want to transition towards listening and reading as separate activities and not listening and reading simultaneously.
Best thing I can recommend for this is passive listening, you’ll watch your comprehension go up a ton after around 2 weeks of just having some podcast on all day
I recommend looking for the right kind of anime you can watch without subtitles. It's hard to tell what will be hard before you try so you should try a few different shows. Easy going slice of life are a good bet. I recently started watching anime without subtitles and have found some shows I can understand pretty well: Ojamajo Doremi, Cardcaptor Sakura, Ichigo Mashimaro, and Azumanga Daioh
As @ryacw said, definitely listen to real, natural Japanese speech. A lot. Tolerating ambiguity is a point that's often brought up for a reason; at first you'll barely understand _anything,_ but that's okay. Trust your brain's natural ability to adapt to new languages, and give it weeks and months to start to find the patterns. You WILL start picking up more, you'll start actually hearing the words you "know" but never caught in real speech, and you'll start realizing which words you don't know because the structure and pronunciations are becoming more clear.
As many people have already said once you already got the reading down, using that and connecting it to the speech you’re listening. So what you can understand in a written format you use that as a building block with what you’re listening to.
If you don't understand much, try watching it once with subtitles, and then again without subtitles. It's a game changer.
So I’m going to start learning hiragana soon. I know nothing about Japanese. I should get an Anki deck and watch anime in Japanese with subtitles and the focus should be to look for words I recognized
Yes that’s exactly what you should do along with passive listening
No wonder I could focus more on the Japanese wording if I just ignore the subtitles.
Subtitlesdo help at first but they help the same way training wheels help you ride a bike. They could only take you so far and the rest you have to do on your own.
I think Rosetta Stone is great for this as it teaches language by simply showing which foreign language wording fits an image or situation instead of straight up how to translate it in English.
wow. im kinda floored that there are so many people who think they're studying japanese when they're reading english subtitles. sure, maybe you'll pick up some words as we all do over so many years of watching anime (なに、ばか etc) but a few words here and there will never get you very far if you actually want to comprehend a second language.
The wiser comment I've read here so far. It's OK to use your native language in the beginning, but as you get more used and reach a greater level in the language, you do need to start getting rid of your native language from your learning process.
While listening to your videos, I caught myself thinking that I am listening to you in English, which is not my first language. It feels so strange thinking about comprehending the meaning of your words, while realizing they are not in your native tongue. Luckily my English is good enough for me to not think of it, but it's still strange.
I like the phrase "you don't learn the language, you get used to it". I guess it's how I learned English too.
whats your opinion on using japanese subtitles vs using no subtitles to focus on the voice
If you’re still a true beginner (
It takes me a while to process hiragana and katakana when reading it and doesnt give me enough time. Im a slower reader, even in english i dont always have enough time to read it all.
Start off with the pause button or maybe the 0.5x speed option. Keep on trying to read the kana (never English subtitles 😬) , and your overall speed will pick up.
I wouldn't even bother trying to read it at full speed as a beginner. Just listening to the audio for words you do know is good enough.
What if I watch an anime I know from the dub w/o subtitles? Or would knowing it from an English standpoint cause the same problem?
The biggest problems with English or any western language subtitles on Japanese are that they don’t follow the Japanese sequence of words, the way sentences are constructed and expressions are generally too much adapted. When learning other languages that have a similar type of sentences construction, subtitles in your own language can be more helpful because it’s easier to spot unknown vocabulary. With Japanese, it’s too difficult to identify those when words that appear written first in your language, like verbs, are only heard at the end of a Japanese sentence.
What works best for me in general is to use the native language subtitles, though I highly recommend choosing the closed captions for hearing impaired rather than the normal subtitles, because sometimes normal subtitles are not always the faithful transcript of the spoken track (in some cases, you can even have native language subtitles that are translation of foreign subtitles). The problem with native Japanese subtitles is that new vocabulary may often use kanjis for which you can’t really decipher the pronunciation, that there are no spaces between words and that not many meanings of new words of vocabulary can be guessed from the way they are written (many western languages share common root words which you can identify even if the spelling is different and so extrapolate their meaning).
I have yet to identify the best way to watch Japanese movies, dramas or animes to really progress. One way is to find fan subs that focus on making subtitles that are made for people who try to learn the language by writing the Japanese text with spaces between words and adding hiraganas and katakanas for kanjis, plus eventually the same line translated in your language. Another way is to watch a scene first dubbed in your language, then when the overall meaning of what is said is still fresh in your mind, watch it again in Japanese, with or without Japanese subtitles, concentrating on how the phrase is constructed in Japanese. I haven’t tried it, but it may even be a good exercise to try first to translate in Japanese the dubbed version, then listen to the correct original Japanese version of the sentence.
As of now, for Japanese I feel like the character of Antonio Banderas in the movie « the 13th warrior ». For those who don’t know this movie from the 90s, Banderas character is an Arab poet more or less abducted by vikings who, after consulting an oracle, need a foreigner to be the 13th warrior in a quest to save their country from an evil menace. The Arab cannot understand at all the northern language, but the journey to the homeland of those Vikings is long and he listens to them speaking to each other, starts to identify little by little from context some words, and then day after day more and more words, until he is able to fully understand and talk to them at the end of their trip. The director of this movie, John McTiernan (the same that did the first two Die Hard movies), edited this passage of the movie in a very clever way : the Vikings speak in the beginning full Northern without even subtitles, then each word that the hero learns is spoken in English while the rest remains incomprehensible to the audience. As scenes go on, more and more words are spoken in English in the middle of Northern discussions until finally, at the end of the journey to their homeland, every character speak in English, showing that the main character has finally been able to acquire completely the northern language just by listening and watching the Vikings all this time.
ruclips.net/video/aVVURiaVgG8/видео.htmlsi=8b4-xb3zSjnscRpO
Some Anime stuff with English subs is distracting, I have like a full movie of Pokemon Secrets of the Jungle KoKo but sense its locked to English Sub I tend to just look away. I try to mentally tune it out. I rather have Japanese subtitles instead. But Just have to grab one with Japanese subtitles if not then just with none.
Also if I reading the subtitles, I can't enjoy the animation. This is why i just turning them off for slice of life animes.
been watching with japanese subs for about 2 years, heading towards 10k words in anki, still far from fluent though, it's a journey for sure.
Is it better to use japanese subtitles or no subtitles?
Japanese subs at the start
What do u think about watching a show and then rewatching it with japanese subtitles not translating because you shouldnt learn the language to translate but to learn it how they understand it but couldnt it help with context ?
Not bad and pretty helpful for beginners ngl
What if you take Native Japanese content, watch it with subtitles, study every word in the subtitles, then watch it again without subtitles?
That’s a good way to do it but also if the content is out of your reach then it might be better to study a more comprehensible piece of media, like slice of life anime, etc
time consuming and doesn’t help much
@@marxyy ya I’m now rethinking my whole language learning approach. There’s another language learning channel named Mikel hyperpolyglot and he says go straight into memorizing vocab with associative mnemonics and then hear enough native sentences and you’ll naturally pick up grammar. He also recommends shadowing so his methods have some overlap with ajatt. Ajatt probably won’t work for me cuz I’m not into anime, and I tried listening to Japanese of different levels and it’s just obvious to me that memorizing a word via mnemonics is way more effective than trying to parse something out of an anime.
Okay, but with japanese subs is okay? in anime/movie/youtube video etc
Yes please use Japanese subs!! They are amazing especially for the first year of learning
Japanese subs makes it feel like reading along to a picture book
Even tho I watched anime with subtitles, I am able to understand words I didnt even know I understood. I would turn around, hear a sentence or few words and understand it even though I dont know the meaning of the word.
thats learning for you !
@@mktwos yeah, but what Im trying to say is that even with subtitles my brain subconsciously picked up meanings of some words
So many people trying to help others learn fall into the same trap of thinking that what they did last and gave them a lot of progress is what actually made them learn, skipping that it would never work if they would not already know a lot before. Can't watch without subtitles when even understanding 1 word in a sentence is not common. And sadly even reaching 2k+ words it can be hard to find something to watch that isn't way above your level and isn't the most boring kid show possible.
And imo hardest part usually is to just keep the motivation going, failing usually does not help with that.
Is using Japanese subtitles helpful?
Yes they’re very helpful, especially if you do a lot of reading like me and want to comprehend the show while taking in the audio
Do you have any advice for being more confident in your understanding and not relying on translation? I find myself reading a sentence in japanese and thinking I understand it but still going to read the english translation just to make sure I was right. I feel like it's hindering me.
Ahhh I remember this stage, basically you need to make the monolingual switch. Start using monolingual dictionaries. Do more reading. You need to treat English like the plague. If you want more help, we can hop on a call or something
@@ryacw do you have any japanese podcasts to recommend? or know a good place to find them?
Read some picture book which also had images describing whatever the words are describing and it'll be easier.
For now on, I am only using English subtitles if that is the only way I will know the characters are saying, speaking in another language. I did not enjoy reading subtitles and watching what's going on much anyway.
I dunno how I got here, I'm learning french
It's helpful quand même
I'll instead recommend simply watching multiple shows. and only not using subtitles for the shows that have no subtitles.
If you really love japanese media you'll have plenty of shows/movies that aren't translated. I personally am distracted by knowing that I'm not getting the best experience when watching shows I know have easily accessible subs I'm not using.
I don't think it's nearly as bad as you're making it out to be honestly, I feel that having watched a lot of subtitled anime did give me a large boost when I started taking Japanese lessons. I transitioned to Japanese subtitles eventually but I believe English subbed anime can be useful for beginner-intermediate learners.
And every time I try to use Anki I end up quitting not long after because I get burnt out on it quickly.
So I guess I committed both sins you mention in the video - eng subbed anime and not using anki
Still got N1 tho
N1 is amazing, in the end it really just comes down to how long you stay at it - really the worst thing you can do is give up lol
To be honest, I don't really agree with watching anime you haven't seen without subs. Priority should be to enjoy it, which is hard if you don't understand. Once you've enjoyed an anime you can go back and rewatch it, or rewatch less recent ones, preferably with Japanese subs. Familiarity with the lines can also make it easier to recognize the meaning of words
@Ryan No Koto I'm sorry, but I have to disagree with quite a bit of this. Not using English subtitles is exactly one of the mistakes I wish I hadn't made before. I spent years trying to do the listen to Japanese you don't understand for hours and hours, even with Japanese subtitles, and I made very little progress. Probably in part because I'm a slower learner than many. For certain people (Matt vs Japan's, Olly Richards of the world) maybe listening to stuff you can't understand for hours is fine because maybe they have high linguistic abilities and intuition. The unfortunate thing is when it is assumed that everyone can do that. But for many, if not most people, this isn't the case. I can't know for sure how good it is, but now that I use English subtitles, my comprehension is much higher. But I don't use them as you describe in the video. I'll explain that later
There's a contradiction in something you said, and this has been addressed by other language teachers online. You say that *Comprehensible Input* is necessary for Japanese acquisition, and I would agree. But then you go on to say that beginners need to tolerate ambiguity and listen to things they barely understand. But that is *not* Comprehensible Input.
Now I know you say they should use a 2k deck to get their words, but there is a huge difference between knowing words and hearing them. If you're a beginner, even with context, it can be very difficult to correctly hear words unless you know what should be said. I know of no better way to do this, for me at least, than subtitles.
To be clear, if I have Japanese subtitles available, I will use them. But if I don't, then I will use English. And the way I do it is I will watch a scene (maybe 5-10 seconds or so) with English subs so I have an idea of what is being said (because English subs aren't perfect so you can't assume they're perfectly accurate). Then I rewind that scene from the beginning and listen *without looking at the subs.* I find that I comprehend far more when I do this. What I mean is, I discovered that there were a lot of Japanese words in the scene that I already knew, but I couldn't hear them. But once I knew what the sentence should be approximately saying, I could hear it. This sometimes makes the difference of 10% comprehension versus 80%, although it massively varies. That's Comprehensible versus incomprehensible input.
However, lately I prefer to just look for simpler content rather than do the above too much. Because I believe comprehensible input should be the most important thing.
In conclusion, I will always be skeptical of the claim that English subs will somehow ruin your Japanese until someone shows me good evidence. If there's a study that shows my method leads to worse outcomes, then I will reconsider it. But the experience of some successful learners is not proof because you don't know how it would have gone if you did it differently. You can't go back in time. I don't deny the success of AJATT learners, but not everyone is convinced of it and I doubt it actually works for everyone.
Very well written comment, I made this video a while ago and if you were to ask me now, I still think that you shouldn’t use English subs unless you need to check if you understood something. I think the main reason you shouldn’t is because even if you get the meaning, you’re not entirely in the flow of using only Japanese. But I do think they can be good for beginners looking to check their comprehension, but the real problem comes when you only ever watch content using English subs and pretend to be learning Japanese.
I kind of disagree with your point or see it more nuanced anyway.
I am German and have been learning English and Chinese to fluency and am a beginner in Japanese.
English-subbed Anime is better than English dubbed Anime, even better are Japanese subs if your Japanese is good enough.
The problem is, that you need to know some 3000 words until you can understand easy Anime, so before you are JLPT N3 level and just want to enjoy Anime, I see no problem with English subs.
Of course, watching Anime with Japanese subs at JLPT N5 or N4 level and pausing and translating after every sentence is more effective, but that's a very tiring study lesson and not just a chill activity for the evening.
In my opinion, if you know less than 2000-3000 words, immersion works a lot better by reading graded content.
Yep they’ve done research on this, people who turned on native language subtitles while watching foreign language content retained nearly 0% of the words in said content. Essentially no effect.
In my view, watching TL content with native language subs is a lot like playing the piano. You’re doing two things at once - reading English and listening to Japanese, much like pianos plays two parts using their hands. Our brain is just not designed for that type of parallel thinking, and it takes years for people to get good at piano. Expecting to do the same and actually learn with subtitles is unwise IMO.
But TLDR even if my hypothesis isn’t correct as to why people don’t learn with native language subs, either way the result is the same. So I just don’t watch with native language subs
most animes are horrible source of japanese hearing material...
specially shonen, if you watch the entire naruto series.
you have hundred of words that no one uses in real life.
cities, powers,towns, fake countries etc
animes that worked for me where the ones based in "real life".
of course it can have some fantasy elements.
a good anime is parasyte for example. because its based mostly in tokyo.
naruto, one piece etc are horrible in my opinion.
First thing u should do if u‘re actually serious is stop watching anime
It doesn’t matter what you use as long as it’s by natives and for natives
Before I listen to anything you say, do you know Japanese?
Edit: Ok just skimmed the video. Yeah obviously English subtitles are pointless lol 💀💀
You really start to better understand the language when you get rid of your native language in your studies to learn new vocabulary and whatnot
I can watch anime with English subs and tell you exactly what they're saying in Japanese. Sounds like a skill issue.
yea ur missing the point buddy🤦🏻♂️… youre supposed to do it to train your brain subconsciously as well as ryan mentioned “pattern-recognition”. looking at the subs might make u miss the nuance of the scene too. picture talking with someone and not focusing at his face/mouth but looking elsewhere
thats fair m8
The worst thing you can do is to watch anime without subtitles when you're not fluent in Japanese. Because you'll get impression that you understand but in fact you'll learn wrong meanings and as they become a habit, you'll end up in the worst situation: you'll think you know while you don't really know or know wrong. This will hurt you much much more in the next steps of learning journey.
I disagree. You can't learn what you can't understand.
I disagree with you. If you read the English (or any other language) subtitles while you're learning, you're diverting focus from your listening to the speaker and you can't develop the Japanese (or any other language) Ear unless you listen to the speaker. You'll never understand the language until you develop the ear.
This might be the case if you only read or listen. But if you have visuals that accompany this than you can learn by context.
Babies didn’t understand anything either, but they learned through this method.
That's why we use good methods to learn new vocabulary as we spend time consuming the language. It can sound completely impossible at first, but as you get used to it you then start to understand how it works.
@@もしもし-x9d You only start to understand the language once you start to consume only the language properly
Explain babies then
Using subtitles is just another form of "leveraging adult knowledge". The only "bad" way to learn a language is the single, pure, ideological route. The best way is the multiple, mixed, practical route: watch and listen to many things, use subtitles or don't, target or home language, study grammar or don't, do rote repetition or don't, do shadowing or don't, talk to yourself in the shower or don't, take lessons or don't, get a language exchange or don't, read newspapers and books or don't...
It just doesn't matter. Do as much as you can. Be curious. Make connections. Be consistent. Keep going. Make it everyday. Don't sweat it. Get real.
The way immersionists talk about learning a native language makes it sound like they never learned a native language. Personally, I DID do English language questions, I DID learn English grammar, I DID do writing practices, rote memorization, textual analysis, reading comprehension, even speech therapy.
There is no reason you can't ALSO use meta-linguistic methods, approaches and perspectives to facilitate your learning AHEM, i mean *acquisition*, of course...
Immersion is also not suited for all neurotypes. The assumption that it's the method par excellence will inevitably leave many behind.
Also, have you heard how most native speakers speak YOUR language? I mean, they're perfectly fluent, but they're generally terrible: vague, inaccurate, repetitive, dull, narrow... Native fluency is such a low, superficial, ostentatious standard. Joseph Conrad, one of the masters of English literature, spoke with a terrible, thick accent. I'd much rather sound like an erudite foreigner than just another native-alike wannabe.
I totally agree that the study method doesn't really matter. Important is consistency!