Japanese is one of the most difficult languages for English speakers to learn.[^fsi] This article provides an overview of the language and links to resources that I found useful. I'm not an expert,[^cartoons] but I have studied the language since 2014 and passed the [JLPT](https://www.jlpt.jp/e/) N1 in December of 2015. This article is a general overview; I also played with writing a [guide to grammar](https://jp.ftlsid.com) (incomplete). # Written language The written language consists of three separate character sets. **Hiragana** (commonly misspelled _hirigana_) and **katakana** are phonetic syllabaries in which each character represents one syllable.[^mora] Together, katakana and hiragana make up the native Japanese writing system known as **kana**. Visually, hiragana is squiggly (かすみ) and katakana is angular (ヤクザ). Native Japanese words tend to be written in hiragana, and foreign loanwords in katakana, but many exceptions exist. You should start by learning to read both hiragana and katakana. **Kanji** are characters imported to Japan from China over many centuries. Of the approximately six thousand kanji listed in exhaustive dictionaries, more than two thousand are in daily use.[^jouyou] Structurally, kanji are composed of simpler components known as radicals.[^radical] A single kanji may represent a word individually, be combined with other kanji to form a multi-character compound word, or have a hiragana suffix with some grammatical function. Most personal and place names are also written in kanji. Each kanji may have one or more borrowed Chinese readings, known as _onyomi_, and native Japanese readings, or _kunyomi_. The fact that kanji can be read in multiple ways depending on the context is a major gripe for beginners, but it's not that bad. For example, 生, meaning _life_, has a large number of common readings: - _i_ as in 生きる (_ikiru_) - _ha_ as in 生やす (_hayasu_) - _sei_ as in 人生 (_jinsei_) - _u_ as in 生まれる (_umareru_) - _shou_ as in 一生 (_isshou_) - _nama_ by itself However, take a look at the surrounding characters and convince yourself that there is essentially no ambiguity. Each pronunciation is clearly distinguishable through context. **Furigana**, sometimes called _ruby text_, is a hiragana reading aid placed over kanji characters to assist in pronunciation&mdash;for example, <ruby><rb>漢字</rb><rp>(</rp><rt>かんじ</rt><rp>)</rp></ruby>. Often used in material targeted towards children, with uncommon words or proper nouns, or in puns,[^furigana] furigana is found in nearly all native Japanese texts. The system of writing Japanese with English letters is called **rōmaji** (commonly misspelled _romanji_), from the words _rōma_ (Rome) and _ji_ (letter). The process of converting Japanese text into rōmaji is called **romanization**, and several different standards exist. Rōmaji is used when typing with an English keyboard, but not for reading or writing in any other form. An **IME** (input method extension) is a piece of software that converts typed rōmaji into Japanese text&mdash;you can install one through your operating system, or use the [Google IME](https://www.google.co.jp/ime/). Make sure that you have the correct fonts[^fonts] installed as well, since Chinese fonts will render Japanese characters incorrectly. On computers, Japanese is written left-to-right, like English. However, books are usually written vertically top-to-bottom, right-to-left, and are oriented with the spine on the right-hand side. There are no spaces between words in Japanese. You can pick apart un-spaced words easily in English, sowhynotinjapanesetoo? Finally, handwriting: each character has a fixed stroke order, which you have to memorize and follow. If you write fast using the wrong stroke order, your characters will be illegible. Rules for guessing stroke order exist, but each rule has its exceptions. Complex kanji may have more than twenty strokes (like in 憂鬱, "depression"). Whether you choose to learn handwriting depends on your needs&mdash;for example, will you have to fill out forms in Japanese? (probably not.) Even native speakers have trouble sometimes[^kanji_skill], in spite of intensive handwriting education throughout primary and secondary school. ## Learning kana You will need to learn the each of the 46 hiragana and 46 katakana. I used [realkana.com](https://realkana.com), but handmade flashcards will work fine. This should take less than a week or two. Be careful: - _shi_ し becomes _ji_ じ when you add the two small dashes known as a **dakuten**. Many other characters do something similar. - Understand the difference between small _tsu_ っ and big _tsu_ つ. Incidentally, the small _tsu_ produces a sound known as a _glottal stop_. - きょ is read _kyo_, not _kiyo_. Learn the use of the small _yo_, _ya_, and _yu_. - _ha_ は is sometimes read as _wa_, and you should learn when and why this happens. Once you have mastered recognition and pronunciation of kana, you will need to learn to read faster. The most effective method I have used for increasing reading speed is singing along to Japanese music on YouTube with lyrics in the video. Useful search terms include 歌詞つき (_kashitsuki_, lyrics included) and カラオケ (_karaoke_). As you should now know, karaoke is properly pronounced kah-rah-o-keh, not carry-o-key. # Vocabulary Don't study kanji individually. I recommend studying them as they appear in words, although there is a popular book called Remembering the Kanji (RtK) by Heisig which promotes the individual-kanji approach. This seems like a waste of time to me; after spending several months studying RtK, you can't actually read anything! Additionally, not learning words immediately will slow your understanding of example sentences and therefore grammar. An **SRS** (spaced repetition system) is an algorithm that determines when to display flashcards based on its estimation of when you are about to forget them, so you don’t waste time reviewing things you know well. **[Anki](https://apps.ankiweb.net/)** is the most popular SRS software; the desktop and web apps are free, but the iPhone app is $25. A popular flashcard deck is the **core10k**,[^core10k] which contains the 10,000 most frequent words in the language. There is a ton of information floating around on how to most effectively use Anki, but the default settings worked fine for me for many years. Japanese word dictionaries are organized in gojūon[^gojuuon] order, and kanji dictionaries are ordered by radical. Most people use Internet dictionaries such as the aptly-named [jisho.org](https://jisho.org). Many people recommend making your own Anki deck from new words you see when consuming content in Japanese. I found this to be very time consuming, especially early on when my vocabulary was small, so I preferred using pre-made Anki decks. Now that I have a larger vocabulary, creating my own Anki decks makes more sense. # Grammar The Internet usually recommends the textbooks Genki I and II. Other popular resources include [imabi.net](https://imabi.net) and [Tae Kim's guide](http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/). I learned from a mix of both, and picked up a good deal of grammar from reading and listening. Specifically, finding anime, manga, or music that you enjoy and breaking down the sentences is an excellent way to internalize grammar and understand how it's used in the wild. The important keyword for anime and manga is _raw_, meaning untranslated or un-subtitled. Both Japanese and English subtitles for most popular anime are [available online](https://kitsunekko.net), and watching anime with Japanese subtitles is useful at intermediate and higher levels. One of the best ways to internalize grammar is **immersion**, the practice of constantly exposing yourself to the target language in everyday life. Here are some interesting resources: - [Dogen](https://www.youtube.com/user/Dogen) is a YouTuber who creates extremely entertaining comedy videos in Japanese, and also has a [series](https://www.patreon.com/posts/16489306) of paid videos on Japanese phonetics. - [subs2srs](http://subs2srs.sourceforge.net) is a software that converts subtitle files into Anki decks. - [Miyachi](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhn2Thi3dRw) is a Japanese-American rapper who often subtitles his videos. - [Tofugu](https://www.tofugu.com) is a Japanese-themed blog with articles about the language and other cultural topics. They also run a paid online SRS software called [WaniKani](https://www.wanikani.com), which is generally recommended as a more streamlined alternative to Anki. - The [/r/learnjapanese](https://old.reddit.com/r/learnjapanese) subreddit is a large forum with members of all skill levels. - [Atsugiri Jason](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AqragQq63Js) is an American who does comedy in Japan that focuses on aspects of the language. His success can be attributed to matching the Japanese stereotype of Americans as loud and rude, rather than his comedic ability. # Speaking Spoken Japanese, like English, contains slang and contractions, which I recommend learning naturally through exposure to conversation and native material. Many words and phrases are gender-specific. **If your friends or instructors are not the same gender as you, be wary of mimicking their speech patterns**. In particular, Japanese has a large number of first-person pronouns and each carries unique connotations&mdash;be careful. For example, men generally don't say _atashi_. Japanese has several regional dialects that have different conjugation, slang, and pitch accent. The differences between dialects are often much more significant than the differences between, for example, British and American English. Two of the most popular are the Tokyo dialect and the Kansai (southwest) dialect. The Tokyo dialect, often called Standard Japanese, is used by the government and the vast majority of textbooks. You do not need to specifically study non-standard dialects unless you plan on visiting rural areas and want to fit in, since pretty much all Japanese people will understand the Tokyo dialect. Some notes: - **Shadowing** is the process of speaking words at the same time as a character in a movie or cartoon, and helps to improve intonation, pitch, and pacing. - Tokyo is actually Tōkyō. Learn to tell the difference between long and short vowels. - Pitch accent (the rising and falling pitch of your voice as you speak) distinguishes between homophones in the spoken language as different kanji do in writing. - The _r_ sound in _ra_ _ri_ _ru_ _re_ _ro_ is not an English _r_. Instead, it has been described as a mix of _r_, _d_, and _l_. Touch the tip of your tongue to the alveolar ridge (behind your top front teeth) very quickly. - The pronunciation of _fu_ is not as in the English word "fool." It is a mix of the English _f_ and _h_ sounds. - _Aidzuchi_ are short phrases indicating acknowledgement and understanding during conversion. Japanese people use them frequently, and you should too. # Proficiency tests The **JLPT** (Japanese Language Proficiency Test) tests reading comprehension, grammar, and listening ability. The levels of the test range, in increasing difficulty, from N5 to N1. There is no good reason to take levels N5, N4, or N3. On the other hand, N2, or occasionally N1, may be required for employment by a Japanese firm in Japan. I took and passed N1 in December of 2015. Less frequently discussed is the masochistic **Kanji Kentei**, a comprehensive kanji examination the highest level of which covers the correct stroke order, usage, and pronunciation of more than 6000 kanji. Even native speakers generally cannot pass higher levels of the Kentei without studying a lot. [This video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SxsOOt248bU) (no subtitles) is about the first non-Japanese person to pass the highest level of the Kentei. --- Hope this was helpful. Here's a relevant *yojijukugo* (a four-character compound word): **下学上達 (_kagaku jōtatsu_)**: starting from the basics but eventually standing atop a distant pillar of knowledge [^fsi]: The US Foreign Service Institute considers Japanese, Arabic, Korean, Cantonese, and Mandarin to be the five most difficult languages for English speakers to learn. See [this page](https://www.state.gov/key-topics-foreign-service-institute/foreign-language-training/) (scroll to the bottom). [^cartoons]: You are taking advice from someone who spent more than three thousand hours studying a complex language spoken on a distant volcanic archipelago in order to watch cartoons more effectively. [^mora]: Technically, each kana character represents one [mora](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mora_(linguistics)#Japanese), not one syllable. [^jouyou]: The 2136 kanji designated for daily use are known as the [jōyō kanji](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jōyō_kanji). [^radical]: Radicals can be used to look up kanji in a dictionary. [^furigana]: Furigana with a different pronunciation from the actual characters' reading can be used for puns or to imply a double meaning. See [here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furigana#Punning_and_double_meaning). [^fonts]: Due to [Han Unification](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_unification), the display of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean characters is decided by the font. [^kanji_skill]: [Character amnesia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Character_amnesia) [^core10k]: The core2k/6k/10k decks were removed from the Anki distribution server due to supposed copyright issues, but had been previously released under a permissive license which obviates any potential infringement. At the time of writing, the core10k is available [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/comments/829ylg/which_core_10k_deck_to_download/). [^gojuuon]: The two main kana ordering systems are [Gojūon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gojūon) and [Iroha](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroha).