I learned French and Japanese in very similar ways (immersion), however did not use the same type of immersion at all. For Japanese, I learned entirely through anime or "unnatural immersion", while with French, I learned entirely through RU-vid/Twitch which would be considering completely "natural immersion". Because I have experience learning through both ways, I can say what each type of immersion can do to your output and at what stages. I'm just going to say that adjusting to "normal" Japanese after becoming fluent through anime is not hard at all. Yes, maybe the first few days アニメっぽい喋り方があるかもしれないけど, your brain is very good at distinguishing what's normal and what's not. So, learning entirely through anime is not going to have negative consequences as long as you don't output early. One of the reasons why Matt recommends anime, is because there is so much of it out there and it's also rich in vocabulary unlike RU-vid. My vocab is not that high in French because I only immerse with RU-vid, but my vocab in Japanese is so much higher cause I immerse in things like anime. The goal in the beginning is to learn how to understand the language, so it does not matter what you use because your goal is just comprehension. And once it is time to output, you can switch "normal" Japanese immersion in order to adjust your speech. But what you use to reach max comprehension does not matter too much in my experience. By the way, can I get some Japanese RU-vid recommendations because the only person I watch is Daigo-San. Si t'es pas d'accord je te bute
If you only watched anime you prolly just dont realise how much your output mimics anime. Also i wish people would stop mentioning matt like hes some kind of japanese god in terms of speaking we're on roughly on the same level and i completely disagree with him on this topic. Thats really interesting how you have experiences learning languages in both ways tho
All the people from this vid ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-8n0d9_A5q_s.html Also heres the list of the kansai youtubers docs.google.com/document/d/1bRBN1OiFoJ4R3PkZFqnfQ9GgrjPqQQdTrIVTVBF9Mm8/edit?usp=drivesdk
Also just to be clear im not disregarding what you said. Like since you are just saying this its not really enough to change my opinion on anything but say if we spoke for 10mins in Japanese and you sounded extremely natural id have to rethink my opinion on this haha
@@oojiman First of all thank you for replying and sorry if I mentioned matt as if he was some god because he is not in every aspect of Japanese. I'm actually half Japanese half French so I actually have a native accent in Japanese because "baby infant powers", but even I can hear some faults with Matt's Japanese in terms of pronunciation and I can say that your pronunciation would 上回る his a little. But it's interesting that you learned Japanese only through RU-vid, because the majority of people use anime.
I think the biggest killer with learning solely from anime is not learning things like conversational cues and body language. Even early on, learning how to 'read the air' should probably be a priority if you ever want to talk to Japanese people, even though the barrier to comprehending youtube input is higher than anime. As you mentioned the most important thing is to enjoy what you're immersing in, personally I wouldn't have and didn't really enjoy Japanese youtube like a year and a half ago when I could only comprehend about 70% of it on average, but I've been binging it recently since I could understand much more of it, and since I actually found youtubers that I liked. Good video as always 👍
Aye legit people forget how big of a thing that kind of stuff is too. Thats also true tho youtube can be realllyy dry when you dont fully understand whats going on
In my case I have trouble reading the air, social ques and body language in my native language so for me it doesn't matter if I watch RU-vid or anime I'll still have that trouble, autism spectrum disorder is what I'm diagnosed with and I hope Japanese people have an understanding of that seeing how in the mental health field they have 自閉症スペクトラム障害 as a medical word. In the far past they used to have strong prejudices against both mental and physical disabilities but now they're getting better at accommodating disabilities in school and work places so I hope it's not too big of an issue, I can emulate social skills but in reality I'll always be inept.
Really enjoying the energy and no nonsense you bring in this video. I’ll be honest. I’m procrastinating before I start my full immersion. I’m lucky in that I can passive immerse almost all day while working or walking the dog. In the evenings I practice guitar for an hour. But the rest of the time is just video games, TV or reading. About 3-4 hours of that in the evening. Even if I did 2 hours active listening in eve alongside my guitar practice. I’d still have 2 hours for a movie or video games. My issue = being a lazy shit Thanks for the video.
Honestly hiroyuki and condensed audio tools changed my passive listening life 😄. Sending this over to a friend who's interested in applying for Jet later this year. I'm sure he can make some solid gains in a year and a half or so. Thanks so much man 👍🏻
I think discouraging people from learning the language based on time constraints isn't helpful. Even spending an hour a day on the language can make you progress, and sometimes that foot-in-the-door can progress into something more substantial at a later point. If I'm studying for 1 hour per day, I'm not making ZERO progress. You might not end up fluent in a year or 2, but you will still be learning something that can be contributed at a later point if you decide to commit more time.
Agreed. Let’s get some perspective. For example people play instruments as a hobby. They generally don’t start learning to play an instrument with the express goal of being able to play in a philharmonic orchestra in 18 months to two years. Many people start learning an instrument for the joy of learning. Learning at a pace that suits them. Whether that’s a half hour a day or two hours a day. If you enjoy something who cares how much time is or isn’t taken up by the hobby. To tell people they need to do a minimum of X is not helpful. In fact it’s the opposite, you’re actually serving only to discourage.
He knows this, the guide is tailored for people specifically looking to become as fluent as possible, as quick as possible. I'm pretty sure he even mentions that in the video.
@@iwack he comes across preachy and opinionated and like someone who doesn’t have too many other significant nor serious life commitments I.e. a family, ailing parents, a high pressure job etc etc.... not a great look.
@@peteski5201 he's a uni student and a professional fighter so he does, also the method outlined is not moderate, he says as much several times. It's not for people with barely any free time, it's a guide to get good in 1 or 2 years at most and that time commitment requires sacrifice. He is simply being realistic. There is no point in saying 'maybe' you can get good if you really try if you simply don't have the hours to put in, it's better you start with a realistic mindset rather than getting discouraged years down the road because you're not where you thought you'd be.
I'm going to start with active immersion in Anime and passive with podcasts however I totally agree with what you are saying. I will definitely swap to full "natural" content after my first few weeks. Your videos are very enjoyable and informative, please never change your style. It really feels like a friend giving me honest advice and I think that's because essentially that is what it is.
I think when someone puts any amount of time in a language Especially Japanese will give you the progress you need and discouraging people about how much time they put time into learning a language ins"t really fair too say. I think even one,two or even 3 hours a day is a amazing progress for someone learning Japanese. Just remember as we age it gets harder and harder to find time for hobbies, Learning a language and have any sort of free time for these sort of things. However I DO think there so some good advice but I do think its fair to believe that diminishing results don't equal fast results unless you have something dire that you have to learner super fast or some ridiculously goal but yet again I think the best way is to do this whole japanese language learning thing at a pace(Exp 1hour) that works for you. With all of this rambling said its putting in my 2 cents on what I think.
I don't even know how I landed on this awesome channel. Not even studying Japanese these days. I do watch videos from Language coaches though. Anyway, this content is excellent and is helping me tons with my Mandarin studies. Surprised I landed on this small channel, but very glad I did.
"Take how someone talks in say Ben10 and times that by 100 and that's how anime characters speak" 😂 im not even learning japanese but that shit had me dying bro
24:46 I watched this video and it happened to me! Now I can only speak English with an Aussie accent, and I also refer to some people as "stupid c*nts" much more often. Please help! 😅 More seriously, good video mate. I strongly believe the principles you put out here remain valid and applicable to learners who can't do 4h of immersion per day, as long as they are ok with the whole process taking a bit longer. I would encourage people in that situation to still give it a try, as it works! Being an アラフォー, my immersion time is a more limited (2 to 3h/day), so I just adjusted my expectations in terms of timeline/achievable proficiency accordingly. But after nearly a year and a half, I am very happy with my progress. I know that my Japanese is still very bad, and my output is clumsy, but that's ok. And I am sure that it's much better than if I had spent an equivalent time using a traditional language learning method. Prioritizing immersion in unscripted native content (and having some fun while doing it) is in my view the only way to properly learn a foreign language... I wish I had know that 25 years ago... learning english would have been quicker and much more fun. I am looking forward to your tips on how to find new content on RU-vid, as I am struggling a bit on that front. Cheers!
Im gonna start adding japanese youtubers to my reccomended channels i reckon so its easy for people to see haha. But yeah i think i didnt put that right when i said 4 hours i think i shouldve said 2 hours active is minimum for quick results but yeah definitely everything still works either way just takes more time haha
Yes, more youtuber recommendations please! I like going onto twitch, finding people with a low amount of views and just chatting with them. They speak in Japanese, I type in Japanese.
Ill hit you up bro! Haha Yooo aye legit tho thats the best thing idk if you saw my other vid but if you didn't search up 大阪太郎 on youtube hes my fav small streamer
Great vid as usual. Looking forward to the rest of the series. Also do you have any podcast recommendations ? I don't think I've seen you mention any before.
Thank u for this video bro, I really needed to hear that. Nihon go is being my third language and my longest dream. I'm Brazilian actually, and I got fluency on English about ten years ago. Nowadays English is more relaxing for me than my own native language, and immersion on Japanese is being really painful. For real. But I know that's a need and a wall to be surpass. Thanks again. Cheers.
I agree that RU-vid is a great source for immersing in natural Japanese but there are two big downsides for me of using RU-vid: 1) lack of Japanese subtitles on most Japanese RU-vid videos. Unless you already have a really big vocabulary, most of what they’re saying is going to be hard to understand or to figure out what they’re saying without subtitles making it pretty challenging to use for sentence mining, and 2) it’s very difficult to find female RU-vidrs that actually have conversation based podcasts rather than just like makeup tutorials. Listening to men is fine for building comprehension, of course, but as a woman I wish there were more female Japanese RU-vidrs out there to learn Japanese from so I don’t sound like a man when I speak Japanese. Of course I’m not saying this makes RU-vid worse than anime or Netflix dramas, which are going to have more dramatized Japanese, but it is a downside that makes RU-vid kind of frustrating as an immersion source. Because of this, I have been switching it up between RU-vidr and Netflix (mostly aim for reality TV and documentaries with real interviews because they have a lot of unscripted talking). I would be thrilled if someone had suggestions for female youtubers or channels with subtitles that aren’t autogenerated (besides all the channels aimed at Japanese learners like Sayuri and Akaneteki na nihongo etc… which I do find useful for shadowing their non scripted conversation videos)
I try to do passive immersion as soon as I wake up. Then, I study grammar taught by Japanese for 1 hour, then 1 hour of active immersion while writing down the words/phrases I don't understand; and 1 hour of reviewing what I've written and using anki cards, I use the Core 2k/6k which has the sentences (although the sentences are really simple and I don't know if that's good lol) with pronunciation. After I'm done with that, I'm basically just watching RU-vid or listening to podcasts. Do you think this is a good method? Btw, thanks for all the info, man! 🤝
I was so relieved to learn that I don't have to indulge in reading Japanese, and only focus on listening. Since the Japanese writing system is such a pain in the ass. I withdrew from my university's Japanese classes because they were too writing and grammar focused. And since acquiring English as a second language to high fluency, I knew their method is just not how it works. I am going all in on immersion. Especially since I'm already in Tokyo for the next 5 years and want to actually acquire the language as efficiently as possible.
I thought I was the only Japanese learner who was watching ヒカル、Raphael and that wrestling guy. I used to watch their stuff all the time, great for immersion. I would recommend avoid looking at the subtitles as much as possible. But I thought it was weird how you recommend anime the least for immersion....I mean, those 3 guys talk ridiculous just like...anime characters. They just speak faster and slur their speech more. Just my opinion. I would also recommend ガチンコファイトクラブ, that's a good one for immersion too. RU-vid took down a bunch of videos but they should still be up on dailymotion.
Are there any youtube channels that break down unscripted speach? Or have lessons using speach? I think it wpuld be cool if therr were videos breaking down every piece of movies or shows
This ain't my main account I'm on, I have made comments using another account of mine on your videos so if my writing seems familiar then that's the reason. 3:30 This I always have noticed from Japanese people who've learned English during a time when RU-vid wasn't a thing just yet; they read English books without any knowledge of how the words sound and with that their accent develops, I've watched bilingual RU-vidrs and some of them have a strong, noticable Japanese accent. I enjoy accents and I also understand accents quiet easily however so it's not a negative experience for me at least. Though I completely understand why you should listen how it sounds first, I agree with that.
"4 hours bare minimum or you shouldnt learn japanese" is a shitty take. Also animes are fine. I dont speak like a superhero in English even though I immersed in such stuff a lot while I was getting good in English. As long as animes arent your ONLY source, its totally fine.
You brought up that you were learning another language right now too. How do you balance between the two? Like how much time per one language and how much for the other.
How many hours of Anki/grammar did you do at the beginning? Does that count towards the four hours or do I need to be doing more? Also, did you do any lookups during your immersion, or are you doing "free flow" mostly?
ive been teaching English for 20 years and I would concur with everything you are saying. question if i may. how do you deal with the different pronunciations of kanji? im guessing they exist in context so, again, immersion. do you write them on your anki cards and how do you review all those pronunciations? thanks! Geoff
Well words are written with Kanji just like English is written with letters. You don't really have to learn the different pronunciations of kanji, you just learn the vocabulary, and the kanji along with the vocabulary. E.g. 食べる (TA-beru) 食う (KU-u) 食事 (SHOKU-ji). The actual readings of the kanji aren't as important as learning the vocab
But what about a combination of anime and youtube? and you didn't talk much about reading. Many people also like learning through reading light novels or playing visual novels, I'm quite interested in your opinion about that. And about learning through games in general Sorry for so many questions :D
These are some good questions! Ill answer properly in another vid but i reckon combination of youtube and anime is completely fine if you are still wanting to watch anime! I was tryna reference that thing when i said like dont worry too much about the finer details of it all! The light novels and stuff a great ya know like you can still get fluent from that ofc but i feel like youtube gives you a better outcome in terms of speaking. Im actually really not sure about games tho since ive never really tried. I guess it would depend on the game too
Alright, for a beginner, how would you recommend consuming media such as movies, should I watch Japanese with English subs first or should I just dive in and watch with Japanese subs whilst learning?
Hey thanks for the recommendation in terms of inputting. I dont want to watch anime to immerse and I have been using youtube for a bit. I was wondering what your thoughts is on Terrance house would this be ok for me to immerse in?
All good! Yeah I reckon terrace house is a great source of immersion. Probably some of the best you can ever get. As long as its not the most recent season with a bunch of non native speakers in it haha
When I immerse watching videos should I use subtitles or not? I noticed that I’m at point where I started to understand a bit more but this is only because I read subtitles. If I switch them off I can’t always grasp what they are saying and I understand way less…
I have a little different opinion. By completely relying on subtitles they become a crutch. But I think they are very valuable if used correctly. What I do is if I am watching say a YT vid with soft-subs or a Japanese drama on Neflix with subs available, I'll watch a ~5 min block with subs off. If there was anything I couldn't catch, I'll go back and find the part, turn subs on, and listen to that small part over and over until I can hear what they're saying no problem. If its actually a new word or phrase I might then make an Anki card for it. Also for Japanese dramas, animes, and movies, if you can find a subtitle file (usually ends in .srt) online, you can download it, open in a browser tab, and just use it to check the parts that you couldn't catch. Of course, I am talking about target language subtitles. I never used English subtitles anymore. However, if you are a beginner occasionally glancing at them might be helpful.
This video is great so much useful information. 1 thing I have a question on is, when immersing on RU-vid with no subs, no lookups, will that mean I am learning nothing? I mine words from my reading but don’t do lookups or use subs on youtube and it’s sounding like gibberish tbh, I have the will to power through but Im just wondering if it actually works without subs. What did you do?
Depends on your level. If you are beginner, probably nothing. But if you are upper beginner/intermediate you should pick up stuff here and there. And the more you listen the more you will be able to pick up stuff
@@KillerArmyStyleA year late, but I disagree that even in the beginning, you'll pick up nothing. Obviously, you can use a grammar guide and Anki for vocab and grammar to make it easier, but you will always pick up little bits at least. This can serve as a small base for comprehension, which can slowly be expanded.
No specific reason other than I guess most people will be more busy in the mornings getting ready for work/school and then in the evenings people tend to have more free time to actually be able to sit down and watch something. But thats purely the reason if your schedule allows it theres nothing wrong with changing up when you do passive and active immersion! Glad to hear your enjoyed the video!
what do you consider active immersion? is watching youtube full focus without subtitles enough (to qualify as active immersion)? or do you need to be watching with Japanese subtitles and making flashcards from those subtitles before you would count it as 'active immersion'?
Take notes! No English subs. Either watch it with Japanese subtitles but preferably no subtitles at all. I use anki when I come across a word I don’t know. I recommend Japanese RU-vid, niconico, Japanese Twitter etc. also lower level manga with furigana.
But I just can't pay attention to something I don't understand. It is like trying to pay attention to noise. My mind always drifst off and replaces this noise with "worries"/ "things that are more important", which is basically anything if compared to noise.
Yeah thats why I say passove immersion is so good at the start since you can do it for a long time without having to focus. But even if you dont understand im sure you can focus for at least 10 mins. If you watched for 10mins 6 times a day thatd be an hour so theres still ways around stuff haha
also what about learning the culture? should this be learned before or after immersion? like ik learning about culture can help you bette r understand why certain people do thinks and why they are the way they are etc. when did you start learning about Japanese culture and did you ever learn about it? How important do you think it is?
@@oojiman just some younger people talking teppei and noriko was not exciting at all and i listened to like 200 episodes hahah after watching ur video it dawned on me i should be hearing people my own age banter rather than people twice my age
You learn vocab from just listening, yes. If the videos have subtitles, you can transcribe a word that you hear into a dictionary to look it up (or if you have something that allows you to select subtitles like ASBPlayer, use Yomichan), but you also learn words from listening a bunch in context. The more you hear the same words being used in context, the more you can understand what they mean. So like, say that I hear the word "run", but I don't know what it means, I can use context to infer the meaning. I can then listen to the word being used in different contexts to build understanding.
Soon I'm gonna be doing a video on vocab so I'll discuss it more there but I would say only look up something you feel like you have heard multiple times in your immersion. Also try not to look things up very often just let it play
All the people from this vid ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-8n0d9_A5q_s.html Also heres the list of the kansai youtubers docs.google.com/document/d/1bRBN1OiFoJ4R3PkZFqnfQ9GgrjPqQQdTrIVTVBF9Mm8/edit?usp=drivesdk
potentially dumb comment incoming. but is active immersion really just... paying attention to native media (in this case youtubers)? no lookups, captions etc? i currently have ~1500 words under my belt, so i guess i can do it, but doesn't that mean im kinda not doing comprehensible input..? I know you kinda covered it, in Tolerating Ambigiuity section. sorry for the ignorance, its just diving into this is somewhat overwhelming, haha
I disagree, I think learning to read Japanese from the start is a good idea. Just don't expect sentences to make sense, it takes a long time to understand kanji.
I agree with most things in your video, besides your "times spend" on learning. "You dont have 4 hours in a day to learn japanese? Dont even bother" is what you say. This is complete nonsense, you are extremly young and probably have your goal set MUCH closer and want to learn the language very fast than most people. I agree that spending more times equals better and faster progress, but this view on time is a pretty weird. You dont have to learn the language very well in 3-5 years, you can literally learn 60-90 minutes for 5-7 days a week and be "just okay" at the language withing 3-5 years and than later get your big time invest once you can comprehend alot more and quickly learn alot more.
Depends if you actually wanna learn it or just wanna enjoy learning it i reckon. If you actually wanna learn it properly and not be mid in 5 years time 4hrs a day at least of passive listening is pretty necessary imo
