Learning Japanese |
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Oral Japanese
Podcasts
(for old-timers: "Podcasting
is the distribution of audio or video files, such as radio programs or music
videos, over the Internet using either RSS or Atom syndication for listening
on mobile devices and personal computers.")
Online radio
One neat solution is to listen to online Internet radio stations like NHK,
record streaming audio from the Net into a file using Total
Recorder, and listen to it at slower speed using CoolEdit
(Transform | Time/Pitch | Stretch... | Slow Down). Other applications to slow down and/or repeat segments are available
at Ronin (Musician's CD Player or Amazing
Slow Downer.) If you are using WinAmp, you can download the Slow
Me Down plug-in. Other utilities are available here.
DVDs
Made-in-Japan DVDs come with the soundtrack and sub-titles in Japanese
Grammar books
Word dictionaries
Note: I'm peeved by most Japanese dictionaries, because they..
- Are typically edited with Japanese readers in mind, so do not provide
information that could be interesting to foreigner learning Japanese,
and expect you to be able to read Japanese at a native level, which is mutually
exclusive with learning the language in the first place
- Mix fundamental, spoken vocabulary with words that you will only find
in high-level writings (if ever); The result is that you may end up learning
complicated Chinese compounds that people just don't use in everyday life,
and not learn indispensable words and expressions that people actually use
around you
- Do not indicate the language realm in which a word is used (eg. slang,
colloquial, formal, antiquated), forcing students to adjust their vocabulary
through trial and error
That said, here are dictionaries I would recommend:
- The
AOTS Nihongo Dictionary for Practical Use, ed. AOTS ISBN 4-906224-95-4
(about 3,000 fundamental words, with lots of examples)
- Diko français-japonais, japonais-français,
ed. Kotoba
- Daily
Concise, ed. Sanseidô (monolingual; printed horizontally)
- Kodansha's
Furigana : Japanese-English Dictionary by Paul C. Hulbert (Editor)
- Kodansha's
Furigana English-Japanese Dictionary by Masatoshi Yoshida, Yoshikatsu
Nakamura (Contributor)
- Kodansha's
Furigana Japanese Dictionary : Japanese-English English-Japanese (Combines
Kodansha's Furigana Japanese-English Dictionary and Kodansha's Furigana
English-Japanese Dictionary in one door-stop)
- Kodansha's
Pocket Romanized Japanese-English Dictionary by Masatoshi Yoshida, Timothy
Vance (Contributor), Yoshikatsu Nakamura (Contributor)
- Kodansha's
Romanized Japanese-English Dictionary by Masatoshi Yoshida (Contributor),
Yoshikatsu Nakamura (Contributor), Timothy J. Vance
- Kodansha's
Basic English-Japanese Dictionary by Seiichi Makino (Editor), Seiichi
Nakada (Editor), Mieko Ohso (Editor), Wesley M. Jacobsen (Editor)
- Kodansha
Japanese-English Dictionary by Edmund Wilkes
- Kodansha's
Concise Romanized Japanese-English Dictionary by Masatoshi Yoshida,
Yoshikatsu Nakamura
- Japanese
Names : A Comprehensive Index by Characters by P.G. O'Neill
- Kenkyusha's
New Japanese-English Dictionary by Masuda Koh (very expensive... but
very thorough)
- Kenkyusha's
New English-Japanese Dictionary by Koh Masuda
- Nihongo
Pera Pera! : A User's Guide to Japanese Onomatopoeia by Susan Millington
(Tuttle Language Library)
- Making
Out in Japanese by T. Geers, E. Geers
- More
Making Out in Japanese by Todd Geers
- Kodansha's Pocket Compact Kanji Guide - Out of print
- Outrageous
Japanese : Slang, Curses & Epithets by Jack Seward
- Zakennayo!
: The Real Japanese You Were Never Taught in School by Philipj. Cunningham,
Kim Wilson Brandt (Illustrator), Kim Wilson Eversz, Phillip J. Cunningham,
Philip J. Cunningham
- Beyond
Polite Japanese : A Dictionary of Japanese Slang and Colloquialisms
by Akihiko Yonekawa, Jeff Garrison (Translator)
- Using
Japanese Slang : A Comprehensive Guide by Anne Kasschau, Susumu Eguchi
(Contributor)
- Gems
of Japanized English by Miranda Kenrick, Motomi Naito (Illustrator)
- More
Gems of Japanized English by Miranda Kenrick, Herbie Naumann (Illustrator)
- The
complete Japanese expression guide by Mizue Sasaki
Kanji Dictionaries
Andrew Nelson
Jack Halpern
Spahn-Hadamitzky
Kodansha
Miscellaneous
Resources