Let's learn Japanese!

Either way, you can't know one without knowing the other.

Can anyone recommend any websites or books on kanji?

Ummm... You can read the huge post I typed above all about that. The book there would be Heisig's "Remembering the Kanji".

cmertb wrote:Ummm... You can read the huge post I typed above all about that. The book there would be Heisig's "Remembering the Kanji".

... I think the problem is that it's in a labyrinth of text.

It's all important. Not just resources, but how to use them efficiently.

^^; I knew that...*forgot*

Laurel wrote:That would be amazing. XD Kanji is pretty much the only thing keeping me from really perfecting my Japanese (as speaking it and putting the katakana/hiragana together isn't that hart).

I'm actually quite surprised at some grammar parts of the japanese. Even if kanji really are the most difficult part for me too (I guess most people used to only alphabet would feel a hurdle there), the grammar has lots of variations (that I would like to think are useless some time, like some overpolite form that you may never use on some verbs, but well)
At least, I can still please myself by thinking that french may be much more a hell than that to learn for a foreigner

Though, I'm still impressed at learning the 2000+kanji in such few days. I've been living in Japan since about 3 months now, and I still now about barely...200 kanji, ahah >.> (I guess I should train myself reading more, I haven't finished even the first volumes of Binbougamiga! and I have quite a number of doujin on my desk waiting to be open, sigh...)

Oh, you're living in Japan? Where, exactly? I count myself lucky just going on a tour there next year...*sigh*

I also strongly recommend Anki. But instead of Heisig I like to use Kanji Damage -- http://kanjidamage.com/

It's a similar method, using stories and stuff. But this one actually teaches you the on and kun readings and the radicals and stuff. While being funny and entertaining.

Warning, it is very heavy on foul language and sexual context. So if you're offended by those things, avoid.

I make my own Anki decks with the kanji damage version of each of the kyoiku kanji levels -- what the Japanese learn by grade level. They're all here -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ky%C5%8Diku_kanji. Then I type each one back into the Kanji Damage dictionary while I'm reviewing it on Anki, to go over the radicals and stuff. The radicals are clickable on the Kanji Damage site now.

Also, I love http://www.alc.co.jp/ It gives a bunch of passages translated in Japanese and English. If there's a grammar part that's bugging you, type it in there and it will give you a bunch of translations. That helps me the most with tricky grammar parts.

Sweet!! Thanks!

cmertb wrote:...As for why there are so many -- ask the Chinese. They invented them. ...

Chinese here >>

Well, from what I know, if you already dont, each Chinese kanji, alphabet, character, whichever you like, originated from an older set of character of which I am not sure what to call in english and have forgotten in chinese >>

These older set of characters originated from philosophers, thinker, scholars (not too sure but yeeah) alike creating them based on what an object look like,

E.G. 人 (Rén, person) looks like a human on two legs or (大 Dà, big) looks like a human spreading his limbs wide, like a man expressing big in a very... caveman like way xD. Pretty sure this is still the same now and then.

Basically, for Chinese, there isnt something called the alphabet If anything, strokes are the chinese/japanese alphabets and kanjis are the word, so asking why there are so many equates to asking why there are so many words ^^ Like I have asked in another thread.

But in later on people kinda just piece stuff together using what they have, minimizing the vocab used since no sane human would spend 10 years of his life remembering every Kanji and use them. >>" Thus you dont have to learn that much characters anymore, but its still quite a handful ^^"

P.S. ^ This is somewhat accurate, but not entirely true in every word. Point is characters were created based on pictures and somehow... the dictionary got overpopulated so to speak :3

P.S.S. Oo I hope that helped in any way possible lol, learning how to use Anki is gonna be so helpful to make me pass my chinese XD(Yes I fail it and I am chinese ;(, its ridiculously hard since the teachers here are soo bad ><)

Wolves wrote:

cmertb wrote:...As for why there are so many -- ask the Chinese. They invented them. ...

Chinese here >>

Well, from what I know, if you already dont, each Chinese kanji, alphabet, character, whichever you like, originated from an older set of character of which I am not sure what to call in english and have forgotten in chinese >>

These older set of characters originated from philosophers, thinker, scholars (not too sure but yeeah) alike creating them based on what an object look like,

E.G. 人 (Rén, person) looks like a human on two legs or (大 Dà, big) looks like a human spreading his limbs wide, like a man expressing big in a very... caveman like way xD. Pretty sure this is still the same now and then.

Basically, for Chinese, there isnt something called the alphabet If anything, strokes are the chinese/japanese alphabets and kanjis are the word, so asking why there are so many equates to asking why there are so many words ^^ Like I have asked in another thread.

But in later on people kinda just piece stuff together using what they have, minimizing the vocab used since no sane human would spend 10 years of his life remembering every Kanji and use them. >>" Thus you dont have to learn that much characters anymore, but its still quite a handful ^^"

P.S. ^ This is somewhat accurate, but not entirely true in every word. Point is characters were created based on pictures and somehow... the dictionary got overpopulated so to speak :3

P.S.S. Oo I hope that helped in any way possible lol, learning how to use Anki is gonna be so helpful to make me pass my chinese XD(Yes I fail it and I am chinese ;(, its ridiculously hard since the teachers here are soo bad ><)

That's really interesting! I didn't know any of that, and it makes a lot of sense. Thanks!

As an additional note, only a small minority of simplest Chinese characters are pictograms, i.e. representations of a physical object. For the vast majority of characters, the Chinese started cheating and derived them phonetically.

For example, they needed new characters for body, copper, and the paulownia tree. In modern Chinese the pronunciations of these words are dong4, tong2, tong2 respectively, but back then they were probably all the same (btw, the number at the end indicates the tone). So what do they do? They find a word pronounced tong2 for which they already have a character, in this case 同 meaning "same", and create three new characters. So for copper they combine 金 (gold) with 同 to produce 銅, meaning "metal pronounced tong2", or "copper". For the paulownia, it's 木 (tree) + 同 = 桐, meaning "tree pronounced tong2". For body, 月 or 肉 (meat, flesh) + 同 = 胴. There's also 水 (water) + 同 = 洞 (cave). Not sure why cave is indicated by water, but I guess it made sense to the Chinese. This way of forming characters probably accounts for more than 90% of them. Basically, kanji are intrinsically linked to Chinese phonetics. For that reason, it shouldn't be surprising that all of the characters above have the same on-yomi reading in Japanese -- "dou". It also means that it's much harder for the Japanese to learn kanji than for the Chinese, because they don't have the added help of phonetics.

Disclaimer: I don't know any Chinese, so I might be wrong on some details, but the general idea is there.

wow,you guys are such enthusiasm
Thanks

i can read katakana and some hiragana, kanji is hell.

That's what makes reading Japanese such fun.

Yay! I finally found a Japanese teacher! Starting next week I'm gonna be taking lessons. ^^; That sounds really bad for someone supposedly able to translate mangas...

Kanji IS hell... But, no pain no gain right? (Says the guy who only knows thirty characters outta the basic 2500...)

You just have to learn kanji quickly to minimize your time in hell.