Read Real Japanese!

[Jailbreak5150]

@DongripO he died of pancreitous? If thats how you spell it

[maddyK17]

Thank you so much! This is much more realistic!

[MrAndy4587]

ok my question is how can i get some of theese books cos i certainly cant go 2 japan to get them sumone reply plzzz im really interested in learning japanese i pretty much have hiragana down but im not 100% yet soo any help wud be great

[gohanDaniel1]

@MrAndy4587 i have heard of this My Japanese Coach it a great way to help your Japanese go to amazon and get yourself one

[steva30]

RIP buddy wow

[TheFiremaster131]

Oh my god. I am so sorry. He looked so young.

[TheFiremaster131]

Hey I was wondering what are the names of those textbooks you got from Keio university?

[EMPERORMIKI]

@TheFiremaster131 Rodger died January 2010, sadly, so he won't be answering your question.

[donGripo]

@EMPERORMIKI Did you know him? What happened? Very sad he was way too young to die. RIP and thank you for this informative video

[EMPERORMIKI]

@donGripo no I did not know him personally but found his videos (esp. the tokyoswan and iwateswan series) to be quite enjoyable and began watching his videos in late 2008. They are well made and very interesting I think and you should watch the videos when you can. He also posted many reviews of Japanese horror films and literature FYI. It is very sad what happened of course but his videos are still up and I'm sure he'd be quite glad about that.

[ticklebug]

アメリカに住んでいますが、どこでときめきメモリアルを買えます­か？宜しくお願いします。

[LifeFirst]

By the way....I would recommend reading a Japanese novel immediately. Even if at first you can't understand a thing. Just get through a page a first...or a sentence. Cuz by the time you get to the halfway point. You will have learned more from that book alone than all the 4 years of nonsense classes and Genki put together.

[shounenbat510]

@LifeFirst That's what I did. I bought the ICO novel because I already was familiar with the characters and story, and just looked up pretty much every word and every grammar point as I went through it. Vocab came easier than the grammar, I'd say, but it was worth it.

[LifeFirst]

Did Rodger ever put out a video of him speaking Japanese?

Is he even fluent?

Because all he does is speak English in his vids.

R.I.P....he's a great guy.

[olleryokel]

Try the Kanji Wordsearch iPhone app! Fun, and it tracks your progress.

[MrWillager]

great video, thank you

[fellbeast17]

RIP rodger........

[MattyxX]

How do you study to remember each character/whole words?

[MyHugestFan]

you have a funny head (i'm drunk)

[superninjaducky]

Blech I hate Genki! My teacher used to use it but then he wrote his own book called "Beginning Japanese". Genki is very good I just don't like it because Sensei's book is set up differently and it works for me a bit better.

[StormWolf01]

Nice vid.

I hate the fact that you are dead.

[gortex1us]

Missing you Roger.. Great to see these videos.

[guhimura]

This vid shows a real feeling from you to help others. I have around 7 months learning intensive japanese, hope to be someday like you with kanji, hehe. Rest in peace

[djdoc70]

what books did you use after genki ?

[okinawaskate]

あの電子辞書はいくらですか

[Jehosh27]

Holy cow.... I'm taking a japanese class this year at college, and was going through my subs for advice. Of course, Rodger, even now, after all this time, he still provides great advice. I am so glad they kept his account active.

[VibeRibbon]

Ha ha , you look like a character from beetle juice

[freakinchauncyjones]

@BaCoNiZHOT well japanese isn't hard except for the kanji. In fact age doesn't matter in languages.

[davisfontanes]

juss love the smile..LOL kawaii desu!!... =^_^=

[dreamchaser171]

This guys is amazing. Cant believe hes gone

[colonm65]

@dreamchaser171 he's gone? u mean like dead? o.O

[dreamchaser171]

@colonm65 Yes... he died. look on his profile =[

[colonm65]

@dreamchaser171 yea just did deleted my comment im so crushed do u knw how he died :(

[dreamchaser171]

@colonm65 pancreas infection i think. its all on his profile

[colonm65]

@dreamchaser171 awww dito im so sad now T-T 

[gogetareeljob]

Haruhi Suzumiya!!

[tophearthgrl]

oh my gosh, i am at that level. thank you so much, rodger. rip.

[dannidandannikins]

Looks like exactly the kind of book i need

[Asthegrave]

i am REALLY interested in learning how to read japanese books. but i cant take classes or hire tutors. How can i learn to read Japanese? Someone help pleeze. THNX!

[freakinchauncyjones]

@Asthegrave CLASSES ARE SLOW the best way to learn is on your own. DONT focus on GRAMMAR. just listen to japanese, accumulate vocabulary, and read real text with a dictionary/translation over and over again until you understand. Its the fast, fun, and natural way to learn way to learn!

[keyinregulus3]

I hate this kind of thing. I bought one by Kodansha called "Breaking into Japanese literature" and it had the most dry boring old stories from 100 years ago. I'd rather learn from a good contemporary manga and a dictionary.

[Asthegrave]

learn the joyo kanji

[Draidic]

RIP Rodger Swan, you were an inspiration, and will continue to be.

[tissuepaperpet]

RIP! :( You seemed like a sweet guy and will be missed dearly.

[kimmyworth]

omg! i hav that book! except its not the fiction one its actual literature, it does help w/ real stuff and not stupid basics , i also want to go to japan my junior year too. im only 14 right now

[buzzausa]

Hey, just stumbled upon your channel by chance.

This video was very informative, but what would you suggest to somebody like me that's just starting with Japanese and, at the moment is just freaked out!

I'm sorry if you addressed this in a previous video, but hey....I'm new here.

[Manskeeeee]

I have my mom to thank for getting me Read Real Japanese for Christmas. I had no idea a book like that was out there, and it has been a very helpful tool for learning Japanese. I recommend it for everyone.

[dansam39]

hey,i'm going to buy one.

[FelineFantsy]

ooo, I'd read that book! Yeah it's massive but at least I'd learn something ^-^

[rickyruffle]

thank you so much for the recommendation!

[FrostMofo]

this was helpful, when I buy my textbooks, I'll order Read Real Japanese too.

[dickbradleyg]

This guy sounds like he's from WisCANsin.

[d245470k]

@dickbradleyg He was from Michigan.

[Grophrane1337]

Woot, haruhi manga has furigana, OMFG I'm gonna get that shizzle nao.

[djdoc70]

what was the book that u used after genki ?

[AgentBO]

Even though the language is pretty systematical and by those means pretty easy.

I wonder why in god's name someone ever thought of creating over 2000 characters to read, why not just use Hirigana(is that right?) that only at least has like 100 characters?

I'm sorry Swan but learning to read is waaayyy harder in Oriental language's then it is in Western ones.

We only got like 26 characters..

[freakinchauncyjones]

@AgentBO oriental?

really?

[omarct]

godamit fuck japanese, i just want to learn to be able to read raw manga, but i aint paying no money for this shit.

[JeiiEra]

damn, looks difficult but im interested

[tsukinomagic]

What are the names of the books you got from Keio?

[davidscloud]

you should create a show like japanese horror reviews but it wiil be you teaching japanese for us... 10 min classes or something like that....

[NMZero]

日本語の読み方が難しよ。僕は今テンプル大学で取っているけど、­あまり諸説の漢字とか、テレビゲームの漢字の読み方が分かりませ­ん。ネルソンの漢字辞書を持っていますが、Radicalのこと­も分かりません。来学期東京でTUJに行くつもりです。おすすめ­の本を買うかもしれません。

[koningvandelach]

黙れちび！！

[davidscloud]

I'm Learning Japanese with Japanese video classes (it's really for free NOT PIRACY), they are very good, but they are in Portuguese/Japanese because I'm Portuguese and some day I want to go to live in Japan...

[1heartless1]

omg, you can kill someone with that huge book O_O

[Robodib]

Domo arigato gozaimasu

Thank you!

Robodib

[CyborgNinja7]

シャツを見ている～　「George Michael」が好き？いい歌集ね。

[koningvandelach]

George Michael is not a good kashuu because he is not a book. I think you are trying to say he is a good kashu which also is a lie. So I am not sure what kind of message you are trying to communicate here but I am convinced that it is a message that contains a high percentage of BS.

[CyborgNinja7]

@koningvandelach If you have trouble understanding a comment, you shouldn't reply to it. Rodgerswan likes George Michael, and GM is an excellent singer. My comment was for him. You might be trying to flame GM, but really you just sound like you're not good at English.

[kensan0809]

私は日本人ですが、あなたの日本語を習得するための努力に感動し­ました。私も、英語の勉強をしていますが、まだまだ努力が足りな­いと思いました。がんばってください。

[kaithechocobo]

A good programme is Anki ! its basically just a do your own flash card programme

ALSO

Kanji on the DS!!

[beanio12]

I just started with Anki, it's pretty cool!

[dmlol]

Very informative...too bad I am terrible at studying...for those lucky enough, do what I did..just find yourself a english speaking japanese gf and let her do the translating for you! =D

[1heartless1]

Or in my case a friend whose currently studying in Japan xD

[kourin2688]

Great video (:

I used one of those plain colored books (pink, titled 「上級　日本語」) in one of my Japanese courses at UC Berkeley.

On a random note.. I totally guessed right (i hope?) that you were from the Michigan area! haha, i could tell from your vowels. Just excited cause I've only heard one other person from there before.

[loki2504]

It's so helpful ! thanks a lot !

[loczster]

your thoughs on Rosetta Stone

[joebear80]

In my opinion, having studied some of the psycholinguistic theories behind learning kanji, I'd say 300 kanji is the platform for learning the rest. At 300, you get a good sense of the building blocks of kanji, and you have trained your eye and mental lexicon to store kanji in a more structured way.

[joebear80]

The bad news is... it is NOT enough to be able to read 2000 kanji, or even 3000! You also have to learn the compound words called "jukugo". Just because you know the word "inter" and the word "change" doesn't mean you understand the word interchange.

This is my problem now,

[Ninensei18]

ありがとうございました。

Rodgerくんの本がほしいです。＞＜

Read Real Japanese を買いたいと思います。

けいお大学の本はどこで買えますか。(Is there any way I could buy the same books that you got from your Keio University? They looked really helpful).

~Izumi

[icefall1793]

the best way is to actually have a friend or tutor to help you xD and gives you some style of homework so you can focus xd since many ppl just forget to keep studying by their selves

[mistymorning119]

This video is inspiring me, and encouraging me, to be very serious about my studying...I believe those learning for fun won't get far...But if you love Japanese and are taking to it ok you should definitely work on doing something with it!! I can testify that it is hard as you say! I won't give up! Thanks for the vid. ^_^

[mistymorning119]

This was a very very good video on japanese resources that touch on some items I have never heard referenced before. Like most commenters I am also studying Japanese and have surpassed the beginner stage and working on the transition into the next... I will definitely be picking up some of these items along the way and I'm working on planning my 1st trip to Japan within the next year or so!

[Kukijiro]

Watching this video makes me want to learn Japanese even more. I'm already thinking about buying these books you mentioned. + It'll give me something to do with all this horrible boring free time I have.

[bluesheeft]

Nice vid. I hope I get good enough to make use of the advice contained in it..

[0xbubblegumXpsychox0]

I bought this book called "essential kanji" by P.G.O'Neil

it gives you 2,000 kanji, so I think it's pretty good

[LoveHateHeroAmity]

Hey Rodger, I'm going to college next year and am signed up for a beginner Japanese class.. I see that you study A LOT of the language but... what was/is your major haha?

[rodgerswan]

it was an english major with japanese minor.

[LoveHateHeroAmity]

I know this is somewhat personal but does the pay satisfy you?.. lol, don't answer if you don't want to haha

[HitomiNoRyu]

My mom is japanese and she has been teaching me using the genki books along various short story japanese books.

Good news: I know to how speak fluent japanese. (with a bit of Osaka dialect because my Mom's from Osaka)

Bad news: I only remember 60 kanjis at heart. I'm depended on furigana in order to read and I read at a snail pace. ;(

[spleenbreaker09]

watch films in japanese with japanese subtitles because then you can learn to read and say at the same time.

if your starting off then watch a kids film but if your at a higher level then watch higher age rating

[nintendorascal]

im missing one thing in learning this, patience

[luke4liverpool]

wow...me too XD

[tenricefieldsglue]

Thank you for giving us an insight in your studying. Your book recommendation seems very interesting. I'll might come back to it in the future. First I have to climb the mountain, though.

[Prayforthewolf]

piccard1976, you can go your own way. I learned that through Fleetwood mac. ;) And I think geeks are exceedingly hot, fact.

***

This is a very nice video. Thanks! I'll see if I can try out all different ways. I'll see what I dig and what I don't. I think music is also a good way to learn. That is, the language in general. I'm not exclusively referring to reading in Japanese. I know that... But it's a really nice method and I recommend it. =D

[TheJapanboy]

to study my 4th year japanese i use flashcards to study kanji they work very well

[piccard1976]

The deeper you get into japanese the less appealing you are to your local females though :-)

(women don't like geeks, fact)

The video is nice and I found it insightful though

[naz4k56]

THANK u very much!

[johnwelshmorris5]

hey roger,how fluent are you?

[Sh0gu]

I mean, the textbooks! Those with 日本語 on the cover.

[Sh0gu]

Swan, could you please name you showcased shortly after Genki? I happen to be quite fond of textbooks mostly for their grammar explanations (even tho I know most of my grammar will come via living the language). And yeah, I agree on the games part! I'm keen on japanese RPGs, so there's sure a whole lot of work ahead of me!

[ultranordic]

I decided to trust you and ordered the book from amazon. :D I am at the level you described you see. Also I could mention that Heisig worked wonders for me in terms of learning all the kanji's writing and one basic meaning in less than a month, also it made japanese texts less frightening even if I didn't understand them. :p A lot of people bash the heisig method though, but I am living proof it works for at least some people. Made life easier.

[Renegademoustache]

Arigatou gozaimasu! kono bideo wa watashi ga taskute imasu!

[cheta1985]

great vid, im currently going thru rosetta. I will get heavy into the kanji as soon as im done with it

[HotPocketEXE]

Visual Novels huh.... My brother! I haven't studied in a long long time but I'm going to try using Light Novels and some Visual novels for practice, beats waiting for things to get translated.

[rodgerswan]

was that a comic party reference haha?

If so.... awesome heh.

[HotPocketEXE]

Indeed it was, that had to be one of my first Anime.

[KPKasumiP]

Thanks so much i will try all of the ways but unlike a lot of videos where they touched on this topic yours was very informative thanks again

[RoseSlayer]

Interesting. My school used Nakama I and II for the first 2.5 years, and then for the last semester (out of 6) we hit up Miura's Intermediate textbook, which was kind of a killer. 12 out of 15 chapters were covered, with all the vocab and such in about 11-12 weeks. Very insane.

Currently, I translate manga for groups, and it's enhanced my grammar, vocab, and kanji counts by far. Unfortunately, I like reading the difficult manga. <.<

Good to see this video. I'll check that book out sometime.

[torukumakuma]

By the way, the special product of Iwate is beef.

The name is "Maesawa gyu(前沢牛)".

You please eat beef by all means in Iwate.

[torukumakuma]

I am a Japanese.

You are glad to come to Japan again.

We Japanese is the same as you, too.

As for me, English learning is difficult.

Your effort is very good.

Because there are many people who cannot speak English at the place that left the city.

[elsamuraiguapo]

torukumakuma, I think learning Japanese is harder! You have multiple alphabets, each with dozens and dozens of characters. In English we just use the simple roman alphabet with 26 characters.

That being said, you type really well in English. I wish I knew as much Japanese as you know English. Urayamashii!

[itsharleyquinn]

Believe it or not, I use flashcards. Total old school. I just find do that I can learn a lot faster than just by reading.

[sgis]

Hey rodger

It'z minsi,

i've got one of those 'read real japanese', but it's green, with a dog on the cover, it'z really good

looking forward to your iwate swan videos

have fun in japan again =D

[rodgerswan]

minsi, good to hear from you! i know the book you are talking about, that one is on my list of books to buy soon haha. You planning on making any appearances in japan anytime? Hope you're doing well!

[hatakekakashi87]

i just ordered that book because of you ;)

[rodgerswan]

brilliant! let me know what you think of it when it arrives.

[hatakekakashi87]

i received it today, it's kind of hard (jlpt lvl3) but nevertheless just brilliant. have you read all the stories yet?

[rodgerswan]

not yet. i am jumping around in the book, because i thought the otsu ichi story was much easier than the first one haha.

[yusuke2005]

Chinese is much harder to learn than Japanese, especially to read. But as said above if you've studied one its easy to apply that knowledge into studying another language. Its just a matter of getting used to techniques to learn. But Just started learning Japanese seriously and it is pretty tough ^_^

[nickmasterx]

Reading wise yeah and pronunciation wise. It's grammar is a lot simpler than Japanese though.

[trizbizkit]

私も元気きょうかしょうがもっています。いいきょうかしょうです­ね。私は日本の文学を読みたい。日本に行きたい！！！私は日本で­はかぞくがいます。スーワンさん、日本のりょうりが好きですか。­私は日本の食べ物が大好きです。よくカレーライスやそばやラーメ­ンをたべますが、すしがいちばん好きです。すみません、私は日本­語が下手です。

[nickmasterx]

It's　きょうかしょ.

[rodgerswan]

i miss japanese food so much.... found out there's a matsuya in iwate so that got me excited. I didn't like sushi when I was living in Japan, but now I love it (strange). Keep up the japanese work!

[Shirokai]

けっこう上手ですよ。　もっと自信持っていいと思います。

[bitchslap1994]

i translated this and thats what i got lol: The ministry has also increased my energy. I hope civilized nature. I want to read the literature of Japan. I want to go to Japan! ! ! I am a rather mundane things in Japan. Mr. SUWAN, What is your favorite restaurant in Japan. I love Japanese food. TABEMASU is a good curry rice and ramen noodles and I like the best sushi. Sorry, my Spanish is poor Japan.

[he1ianthus]

Your shirt says George Micheal and that makes me smile. Does it say anything below his name? I've been learning Japanese for just over a year now, I don't think I'm ready for books just yet but I'll look into Read real Japanese Fiction when I am thanks ^^, So..much..to memorise.. I was about to blather on about what Sam suggested when I noticed that this was a video response to his "how to learn Japanese" video! Good thing I noticed xD Thankee again Rodger :]

[rodgerswan]

haha, nope it just has his name and then a pic of him. Got it at the concert when I saw him last year :)

[SindsygLolita]

THANK YOU SO MUCH! I having hard time learing japanese, and this helped me alot! :)

[cheesegirlchu]

c: I'd go and get that book as soon as I learn some sort of kanji c:

[happyinthedark]

I bought this book a couple months ago. I love it!

[swordsman1600]

Anyone here may be interested in the book "How to Learn Any Language - Quickly, Easily, Inexpensively, Enjoyably and On Your Own" by Barry Farber. It's an older book (no computer software approach) but other than that I've found it extremely helpful in my beginning studies of both Japanese and Indonesian.

[Foramen1259]

I think I will never learn the Japanese language even though I'd love to....the Chinese language already gave me one hell of a nosebleed, but in the end it was worth it....LOL!

[hyperhyperhyper14]

chinese i heard is harder than Japanese, so if your able to climb one mountain, it shouldnt be too too hard to climb another.. right?

[Foramen1259]

I didn't know that....from looking at the Japanese language, it looks harder than the Chinese one, but thanks for the info. (^_^)

[Psypomp]

Have you studied any other languages prior to Japanese? (in high school, perhaps?)

[rodgerswan]

i took spanish for a year in jr.high. Don't really remember much sadly.

[CaptainJudithSparrow]

I'll be graduating high school in about a year and a half (I'm homeschooled) and I want to be a translator. Of course, when I go to university, I'll be taking the Japanese classes there but I'd like to get a headstart. I've read a few Japanese learning books, and I'm to the point where I can almost make out whole sentences in undubbed anime. What would you say about programs like Rosetta Stone, or the Nintendo DS games that teach you Japanese?

[rodgerswan]

i know friends that have some import DS kanji games, and those look useful. Not sure on the stuff released in the states though...

[maverick9900]

I've heard nothing but fantastic things about the DS Kanji game, Kanji Sonomama Rakubiki Jiten.

[ProfessorLaFey]

One thing that helps me is watching Subbed Anime and Movies, because you get to hear the pronouncement as people would normally say it.

That helps a lot, hearing the words in action.

[dondons1987]

#i have thowe Genki books! but i dont think ill ever be able to remember 2000 kanji :s

[deemon710]

THANK YOU!

I am precisely in the position where your advice is most appreciated. I also used the same 2 Genki books.

I've seen the Read Real Japanese books before and now that you've spoken so highly of the Fiction book, I know they're worth buying.

Again, thank you!

[ElevenColors]

You need Eleanor Harz Jordan books and a love of PAIN!!!!

[smoffelol]

Video games made me fluent in English before i was 10 :P

I remember just sitting there and playing the games and trying to translate what they were saying :P

[TokyoBrando]

great info, i'll look for some of them text books..i keep looking on ebay dont have any luck lol

[jam724]

you should pick up my japanese coach it has 12000 words in it 1000 sentances and 2000 (i think) kanji its level base its actualy AMAZING but its on the ds so you will have to get a ds to play it or an emulator

[funkyrockdude]

Hey from London,

I'm going to pick up Japanese next year at university thanks for the info !

[browneyez1012]

can you actually speak the language atleast a lil bit lol. Because readin and writing can come easy after a while, but when you r put on the spot to speak, sometimes one could go blank and be like ' what was the word for that again?' and one can forget how to even form the sentences from straight out their mind, without having anything to read off of. learning a different langauge is really hard.

[klynik]

Thanks for the info Swan!

[ikbenslet]

very informative swan. i've always wanted to learn japanese, but as you mentioned it's pretty intimidating with so many kanji. like you said it consumes a lot of time learning Japanese, i used to play "my japanese coach" on the gba to learn basic sentences and hiragana and some kanji. I find it very hard to learn japanese myself, i probably should go follow a course or something:D

keep up the great videos and greetings from the netherlands.

[bluegemini]

Wow! Thanks for the information. I once wanted to learn Japanese but I got so lazy I didn't actually proceed on it...

Yeah, before, I used to think that learning Japanese would be easy but guess it takes more than that...

Nice vid! Its really informative. Thanks!

[jumbocrunk]

Hey, thanks for the video, I wasn't aware at all about that book. I am also in that intermediate stage, I know around 1000 kanji, a pretty decent vocabulary but sometimes find reading books difficult. I'll make sure to give it a look.

[ayiz1990]

hey swan!! i''ve been following your videos from your Tokyo Swan's Show'. Most of my methods are the same as yours. I prefer to use online dictionary because it's seems to be easier for me. Another method that i used is watching Japanese drama or anime without subtitle.

[deathcrunch]

Epic beard man.

[factorychip]

Great video! Still really want to see you speak some japanese :)... but yeah very helpful video. I am still in my early stages of learning.. but found everything you mentioned very helpful.. also japanese music can help too...

[ArgentoDude24]

Im really not very interested on reading or writing japanese. I happy just speaking it.

[BlackDreadBoy]

good stuff my dude

[starsandsea]

Did you buy the paper dictionary in Japan? I'm worried about packing a dictionary that heavy.

[rodgerswan]

got that one here, ordered it from barnes and noble.