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Hey there folks,
I have a little story to tell. I recently met and have been hanging out with a Japanese guy, and it’s been a pleasure becoming familiar with Japanese people and culture (they’re so polite!). He answers my questions about Japanese, and I try to help him with learning French (being Canadian, I know enough to get by, so I can help him a little, given that he’s a beginner). He told me of a place that he found where you can drink coffee and tea and read manga for free. I assumed that this meant that it was some sort of book store slash café where they don’t mind if you sit and read the material instead of buying. But no, when we went this Tuesday, I learned that this is literally a place with bookshelves full of manga that you can read as much as you like and drink the free tea and coffee that they provide. It is, my friends, a magical place.
But here’s the problem: I don’t understand any manga! My knowledge of kanji is minimal at best (I only know what’s provided up to and including Season 5 here on TF), and I have no idea what manga is at a good starting reading level.
My inclination is to find a simple-ish manga, then read it with my laptop next to me so that I may look up the (many) words that I don’t know, possibly adding some of the more common ones to Anki to help me remember them. However I don’t know if this is the best way to go about doing this.
So here are my questions to you:
1. What manga is at a good, beginner-ish level? That is, it may certainly contain words that I don’t know, but the language is fairly non-slangy, and the grammar is not terribly complex on the whole.
2. How do I best use manga to practice and learn Japanese? Are there techniques that you use or have used that you found to be effective?
I welcome and appreciate all input. Thanks so much!
–Ben
P.S. I live in Toronto, so if anyone else here does too, I’d be happy to teach you how to navigate the enchanted forest that leads you to the free manga room.
Anything designed for elementary school kids, though I’d be a little surprised if you could find anything like that in a manga cafe. Failing that, manga whose main characters ARE elementary school kids (or younger) will generally have the main character speak only in kana – Yotsubato is one good example.
Alternately, shounen manga (Bleach, Dragon Ball, Fairy Tail, Negima, et cetera) generally have furigana for every kanji, though keep in mind that furigana is occasionally used for linguistic tricks.
As for techniques, I reckon it’s worth modifying Koichi’s Evernote-based method for studying newspapers. I bought myself a copy of Weekly Shounen Jump from Kinokuniya, and I’ve been working my way through it like that.
http://www.tofugu.com/2010/03/09/how-to-use-evernote-to-study-japanese-or-any-other-language/
> What manga is at a good, beginner-ish level? That is, it may certainly contain words that I don’t know, but the language is fairly non-slangy, and the grammar is not terribly complex on the whole.
You *want* slangy. You want dialogue that represents how people actually talk. Look at what you just wrote. Is “beginner-ish” a real word? Well, maybe. But it’s definitely not the kind of thing you would find in a textbook. If you were learning English, you would want to find out what it means when you append “-ish” to a word, because people do things like that when they speak and write English.
I suggest you ignore how slangy the language is and focus on how realistic the setting is. If the setting is mostly realistic, you will see what Japanese people eat for breakfast, and what their houses look like, and what they say when they arrive home, and what people say to them when they arrive. You get all of that knowledge for free, because it’s happening on each page as you are reading.
I am reading Bakuman and Hikaru no Go. The first is about some kids who become manga artists. The second is about a kid who plays the game Go with help from, well, a ghost from ancient Japan. Except for the ghost thing, the settings are more or less realistic. There are furigana on all the kanji in the dialogue. Both are available in English.
> How do I best use manga to practice and learn Japanese? Are there techniques that you use or have used that you found to be effective?
Buy a translation. Looking up words takes too long, and there are too many little words that mean too many things that you can’t really look up. And besides that, there is slang, and contractions, and all sorts of other things you can’t look up either. Since it is a physically separate book, you can look at the translation as little or as much as you like.
And besides all that, looking things up, or stopping to make flash cards, or doing other types of “studious” things absolutely ruins the fun of reading. To my way of thinking, reading comics (and also watching TV shows) is the fun part of language learning. It’s the part where you just enjoy what you are doing and don’t worry about all the words you don’t know.
The one I see most recommended by people online is Yotsuba and its the one I started on, however it’s like JKL says. It is simple is its lack of kanji but the style of talking is incredibly slang or a more vocal style and because it has children and adults it switchs back in and out of different styles. It basically has speech which is like “Pwease Mistah!” sounding in Japanese. Yotsuba is still a good recommendation but that is good to keep in mind.
Besides that I always recommend hunkering down on kanji anyway as in most cases it’ll help you way more in the beginner stages to know some decent amounts of basic kanji (just enough to get an impression can be good).
Also Bakuman was suggested. I’ve got the first 10 or so volumes and it’s a completely different style, MUCH more kanji use and less slangy but also some artist/manga specific vocabulary, but it’s not super advanced either.
Azumanga Daioh from the author of Yotsuba is not too bad either! In terms of its light sometimes slangy but not very kanji dense writing. As long as you keep in mind that some stuff is meant to be weird and sometimes the characters say things that don’t make sense even to the other characters lol.
Ben, I live near Toronto. This magical place is a thing that exists outside of Japan?! Really?! I need to know your secrets.
It would appear that I never responded to you folks for your help. First of all, thanks for your responses: I read and digested them, but never responded. Sorry!
I’ve decided that I prefer to use anime for my fun Japanese learning resource, and would rather use reading as a more intentional, rigorous activity. In time, as my reading, grammar, and vocab improve, I’ll be able to read things more for pleasure, but for now I’ll use the methods mentioned on Tofugu (thanks Joel). Ideally I’d like to have an English translation on hand to help with meaning, but if nothing else I figure it’d be good for learning vocab.
Maggie, I would be happy to tell you! It’s on Isabella St, off of Yonge, and is open M-F, 9-17. It’s tucked into the second floor + attic of 14 Isabella Street: in this Google Street View image, it’s in the same building as Pace Pharmacy, but is the door on the right, with the green sign on it. You just head upstairs, there’s an anteroom where you put your shoes, and then the next door opens into what must be some sort of cultural centre or something. I’m going to be honest, I have no idea what this place is all about, but it has something to do with Japan. To your left and ahead is a stairway that leads up to the (cozy, sunlit) attic, which is where all the manga is. You just need to sign your name and the time into the guestbook to the right of the stairs.
Maybe the person at the computer speaks English and will be able to help you? If not, don’t be afraid to be bold and just go for it. Upstairs there’s quite a selection of manga, and you’re welcome to drink the tea, coffee, and juice in the fridge. There are couches, and a Wii you can use too, but I think you need to ask the staff before using it.
I know, I know, this sounds kind of srange. Honestly, I would have felt totally weird going in there by myself, but thankfully I had my Japanese friend to make sense of things for me. It’s brightly lit and has a welcome atmosphere, so you’ll get over the discomfort soon, I’m sure.
I haven’t been back since my first time, since it’s only open during the day on weekdays: although I’m a grad student and can set my own hours, I work best during daytime hours, so it’s not ideal. But I’d like to spend more time there, so maybe I’ll go there on my days off.
Good luck! Perhaps I’ll see you there!
Cough. Maybe it’s just that it’s acting differently on the iPad, but that “Google Street View” link instead appears to be directions from someone’s house to IBM.
Ha! Whoops. I realized that before I posted, in fact, then forgot to change the link. Bah.
The image it shows is correct, but it also happens to be directions from an apartment I’m looking at an IBM, yes. Apparently I can’t edit my post, though.
Well that’s silly. Sorry! :S
This is it for realsies, sans the personal touch. http://goo.gl/maps/Qf3HC
Also, doing this actual search helped me to find the name of the place. It’s called Brand New Way.
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This reply was modified 11 years, 9 months ago by
Ben Reilly.
Wish I lived somewhere that had such crazy things. My closest Japanese language study group/club is over an hours drive away. Maybe I should move to London XD.
T-the-there are manga cafés? Life only gets better.
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This reply was modified 11 years, 9 months ago by
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