Language Learner's Thread - Cunning Linguists Welcome. - General

[QUOTE=meek;52784203]Yep, trying to learn the local language and every time I try to say something in Norwegian I can only remember Japanese... even though I haven't spoken or even practised Japanese in years.[/QUOTE] Learn Norwegian in Japanese until you can learn Norwegian in Norwegian and it should work out better. 500 cards into monolingual and I'm finding a lot of the j-e 'definitions' I learnt are pretty far off. [editline]text is required[/editline] [URL="http://www.guidetojapanese.org/"]Also rip best Japanese resource of all time[/URL].

What's the best way to start learning a new language? I want to learn Latin from writing to speaking. Wil these apps help?

[QUOTE=nickx91;52784556]What's the best way to start learning a new language? I want to learn Latin from writing to speaking. Wil these apps help?[/QUOTE] I'd personally recommend Wheelock's Latin as it's the complete package and covers everything relating to classical Latin. You'll be able to find it off amazon or local bookstores, it's a very well known textbook. If you would prefer a pdf though, here's a link to the 2nd most recent edition. [url]http://www.marianhs.org/userfiles/1076/Classes/19465/Latin%20III%20and%20IV%20Grammar%20Book.pdf[/url] Though, learning Latin won't involve much speaking. It isn't used as a lingua franca basically anywhere, and most of the reosurces you'll find will be how to read classical texts and poems and such rather than what you'd learn in modern langauges (greeting yourself, holding conversations, talking about family or whatever). Definitely go for it if you're interested, though. It's a very interesting and cool language. If you'd like, you can head over to the r/latin discord (where I'm a mod, shameless plug). It's pretty active and you'll have any questions answered by people who know a few things about the language.

Learning German on Memrise.. love the app!

I need to take up Latin again... I'm starting to lose it now that it's been a year since I've spoken it

[QUOTE=WitheredGryphon;52778078]So I thought I'd share this pretty cool site that was recently founded called "Bunpro." It's a free SRS site for Japanese Grammar and has manual input similar to WaniKani's (which I personally loved). It's still in development but it has grammar points all the way up to N3 currently, or what they consider to be N3. They have some examples of their own and also link to websites/videos like Tae Kim. It's been super helpful for me so far, so I figured I'd share it for anyone who wanted to try it out. [url]https://www.bunpro.jp/[/url][/QUOTE] すごい便利！ ありがとう～

I speak french and moldavian c:

[QUOTE=Empty_Shadow;52787485]すごい便利！ ありがとう～[/QUOTE] いえいえ。ツールは大変良いです！ Has anyone had any positive experiences with Duolingo's Japanese course? I tried it yesterday and it seemed very basic, presented words which I hadn't seen before and expected me to know them, and it lacked pretty much any explanation on what it was presenting. Granted it says it's still in Beta so there's that, but their entire method seems a bit flawed to me. Does it improve later on in the course? [editline]Edited: [/editline] I'd also like to say fuck transitive/intransitive verbs :v: Specifically: 上げる 上がる 下げる 下がる I cannot for the life of me remember the differences and it's killing me on the inside

[QUOTE=Shendow;52793220]Have only been doing vocabulary in the past few months and kind of neglected grammar, so that website's a blessing for me. そのサイトがとても便利！ありがとう。 でも、Androidアプリケーションが欲しい…[/QUOTE] ブンプロの予定、[URL="https://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/comments/762kpu/%E6%96%87%E3%83%97%E3%83%ADbunpro_free_japanese_grammar_srs_study_site_n3/doc9o5y/"]アプリケーション開発が遅らせたですけど[/URL]…

[QUOTE=WitheredGryphon;52792835]いえいえ。ツールは大変良いです！ Has anyone had any positive experiences with Duolingo's Japanese course? I tried it yesterday and it seemed very basic, presented words which I hadn't seen before and expected me to know them, and it lacked pretty much any explanation on what it was presenting. Granted it says it's still in Beta so there's that, but their entire method seems a bit flawed to me. Does it improve later on in the course? [editline]Edited: [/editline] I'd also like to say fuck transitive/intransitive verbs :v: Specifically: 上げる 上がる 下げる 下がる I cannot for the life of me remember the differences and it's killing me on the inside[/QUOTE] That's just how Duolingo is. Good luck trying to remember transitives through translation though, you're gonna need it.

[QUOTE=WitheredGryphon;52792835]いえいえ。ツールは大変良いです！ Has anyone had any positive experiences with Duolingo's Japanese course? I tried it yesterday and it seemed very basic, presented words which I hadn't seen before and expected me to know them, and it lacked pretty much any explanation on what it was presenting. Granted it says it's still in Beta so there's that, but their entire method seems a bit flawed to me. Does it improve later on in the course? [editline]Edited: [/editline] I'd also like to say fuck transitive/intransitive verbs :v: Specifically: 上げる 上がる 下げる 下がる I cannot for the life of me remember the differences and it's killing me on the inside[/QUOTE] So far I've only taken the placement test for it, but usually during lessons you can hover over a word for its meaning, is that not the case with Japanese? Pretty sure they expect you to hover over it to figure it out.

[QUOTE=meek;52795099]So far I've only taken the placement test for it, but usually during lessons you can hover over a word for its meaning, is that not the case with Japanese? Pretty sure they expect you to hover over it to figure it out.[/QUOTE] I think that's just a Duolingo thing (or at least I've never seen it before). Probably explains why I missed it, guess it would be good if you're reviewing vocab and such

Wow, setting my phone, iPad, and Mac to Korean has been extremely helpful in picking up vocab. Seeing those words every day, such as the name of the Photos app (사진), the name of the morning category in my calorie tracker app (아침), and the name of the Phone app (전화) has helped me pick up new words pretty effortlessly. I may not be able to live in Korea, but I still try to find ways to immerse myself in the language every day. I'd give it a try in your target language if you've got an iPhone/Android, iPhone especially, because it seems like iOS has a native localization for a shitload of languages. I'm not sure about Android because I don't have an Android device, but I have to imagine it, too, has good support for many languages. Also, anyone got any tips for listening? As my Korean vocab and grammar skills get better and better, this is the only thing that seems to stay the same. I can formulate sentences at a reasonable speed (provided they aren't too complex), but the moment I have to listen to someone else speak I lose track of everything. I couldn't even blindly transcribe what I hear - all the sounds bleed together, and it doesn't help that spoken Korean is usually "lazy" in that corners are cut and certain sounds bleed together or are dropped entirely for the sake of speaking fast, so I'm never sure if something is supposed to be one thing or another. I know this skill will eventually grow with practice, but I'm wondering if there's anything I can do to speed it up.

Android supports basically every language there is but people in the US are shit out of luck because generally US versions of the phone will have maybe 20 of them compared to the international models with a hundred. My phone comes with all of them and the US version has English, Spanish, German, and maybe Chinese.

Man i wish i could learn languages easily somehow, it's always been extremely difficult for me to remember vocabulary. Still trilingual tho, but if learning language as a requirement from school doesnt count then bilingual.

[QUOTE=Twinflower;52810475]Man i wish i could learn languages easily somehow, it's always been extremely difficult for me to remember vocabulary. Still trilingual tho, but if learning language as a requirement from school doesnt count then bilingual.[/QUOTE] SRS (anki for example) might help. I find vocabulary sticks best when learned in context of a sentence. But vocabulary does bore me faster than I'd like.

[QUOTE=helifreak;52810587]SRS (anki for example) might help. [B]I find vocabulary sticks best when learned in context of a sentence.[/B] But vocabulary does bore me faster than I'd like.[/QUOTE] I think this is the most important thing for me. I find it far easier to recall vocab if I find it in sentences using context (or better yet, write my own sentences using them) than if I just memorize the words themselves.

[QUOTE=WitheredGryphon;52810645]I think this is the most important thing for me. I find it far easier to recall vocab if I find it in sentences using context (or better yet, write my own sentences using them) than if I just memorize the words themselves.[/QUOTE] Thing you have to watch out for if you're making you're own sentences is that if you make a mistake you'll then be reinforcing that mistake when you review.

[QUOTE=WitheredGryphon;52792835]いえいえ。ツールは大変良いです！ Has anyone had any positive experiences with Duolingo's Japanese course? I tried it yesterday and it seemed very basic, presented words which I hadn't seen before and expected me to know them, and it lacked pretty much any explanation on what it was presenting. Granted it says it's still in Beta so there's that, but their entire method seems a bit flawed to me. Does it improve later on in the course? [editline]Edited: [/editline] I'd also like to say fuck transitive/intransitive verbs :v: Specifically: 上げる 上がる 下げる 下がる I cannot for the life of me remember the differences and it's killing me on the inside[/QUOTE] I hammered out the duolingo course and it was decent revision for some vocab and nice relaxing sentence practice, but it's completely useless for actually *learning* grammar because it doesn't explain it, and it never got past basic stuff like 'person', 'train', 'cat', 'cake' Basically it was kinda fun to go through but as a learning resource it was pretty much pointless.

Duolingo generally doesn't go far, even for the big languages it has like German and French, seem to basically stop as soon you've grasped an actual hold of the language.

oh I didn't know this thread was a thing, nice I'm trying to learn japanese, I tried Duolingo's course but well yeah, it doesn't work as a main learning source. I'd try going to classes in my college but it always gets full near instantly by weeb surplus. I know most hiragana characters, but haven't gotten into katakana or kanji and I know like zero grammar. Does anyone know of a good site/channel/guide/whatever that works as a good starting point? could be either in english or spanish since I'm fluent in both and of course if it's free, all the better.

[QUOTE=Ryuken;52816869]oh I didn't know this thread was a thing, nice I'm trying to learn japanese, I tried Duolingo's course but well yeah, it doesn't work as a main learning source. I'd try going to classes in my college but it always gets full near instantly by weeb surplus. I know most hiragana characters, but haven't gotten into katakana or kanji and I know like zero grammar. Does anyone know of a good site/channel/guide/whatever that works as a good starting point? could be either in english or spanish since I'm fluent in both and of course if it's free, all the better.[/QUOTE] [URL="guidetojapanese.org"]Tae Kim's guide[/URL] will cover just about all the grammar you'd ever encounter. I like [URL="http://jalupnext.com/"]Jalup NEXT[/URL] for vocab, does cost but the first 100 cards of each deck are free so you can see if you like it first. The major advantage is that once you hit intermediate definitions stop using English so you get a much better understanding of what the words [I]actually[/I] mean. I did the first 100 kanji and it seemed to be ok but I skipped the kana and beginner so I can't comment there.

[QUOTE=Ryuken;52816869]oh I didn't know this thread was a thing, nice I'm trying to learn japanese, I tried Duolingo's course but well yeah, it doesn't work as a main learning source. I'd try going to classes in my college but it always gets full near instantly by weeb surplus. I know most hiragana characters, but haven't gotten into katakana or kanji and I know like zero grammar. Does anyone know of a good site/channel/guide/whatever that works as a good starting point? could be either in english or spanish since I'm fluent in both and of course if it's free, all the better.[/QUOTE] A crazy idea that might work out is self-teach until you're at an intermediate level, enough to take second-year courses at your college. You should be able to prove your competency and enrol and then get in because a lot of weebs won't continue past the first year.

[QUOTE=Samiam22;52812028]Duolingo generally doesn't go far, even for the big languages it has like German and French, seem to basically stop as soon you've grasped an actual hold of the language.[/QUOTE] I think that's the point though, you have a somewhat usable grasp of the language and can go onto learning it much more directly and organically. [QUOTE=Samiam22;52817373]A crazy idea that might work out is self-teach until you're at an intermediate level, enough to take second-year courses at your college. You should be able to prove your competency and enrol and then get in because a lot of weebs won't continue past the first year.[/QUOTE] Getting through genki 1 & 2 would probably be a good start for this, hell, it's pretty like that they're used for those courses. It'll go a lot faster if you have the independent drive. Some do, some don't.

[QUOTE=Ryuken;52816869]oh I didn't know this thread was a thing, nice I'm trying to learn japanese, I tried Duolingo's course but well yeah, it doesn't work as a main learning source. I'd try going to classes in my college but it always gets full near instantly by weeb surplus. I know most hiragana characters, but haven't gotten into katakana or kanji and I know like zero grammar. Does anyone know of a good site/channel/guide/whatever that works as a good starting point? could be either in english or spanish since I'm fluent in both and of course if it's free, all the better.[/QUOTE] To tack onto what others have already said: WaniKani is very good for getting down vocab and kanji. It will take some time to get started but you will for sure memorize the material if you go through WaniKani's way. Granted, it's Japanese, so by "some time" I mean you've gotta be ready to invest years into studying this stuff. The fastest possible time just to get all of WaniKani's content down is ~54 weeks. Realistically you're looking at 1.5-2 years however. It's a big commitment but a worthwhile one. The first three levels of WaniKani are free so if you don't like them you can take the knowledge with you and move onto a different study method (Anki, etc.) 頑張って！

So i'm thinking about learning a language and i've decided on Dutch. Any apps or books that are good for Dutch?

So Bunpro N2's first lesson was released into Beta. Looks like they've temporarily decided to go with a donation model that gets you access to early content which is really cool of them. They've also announced their full N2 category will consist of ~220 grammar points and because it's so expansive they're going to continue releasing lessons in segments rather than in bulk like they have before. That said I didn't find this out until later but it looks like you can link your WaniKani account with Bunpro. Not exactly sure of what all it does currently besides (I think) the option for hiding Furigana for Kanji you've seen on WaniKani, but it does open some pathways for pretty cool features.

Konichiwa! Boku no namae wa mzathemind... that all i got

[QUOTE=mzathemind;52843190]Konichiwa! Boku no namae wa mzathemind... that all i got[/QUOTE] よろしく！ You should check out learning Hiragana. I found even after I learned it, some Kanji, and basic grammar that it's still confusing to write in Romaji (i.e. konnichiwa as opposed to こんにちは) Tofugu has some great resources to learn [URL="https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/learn-hiragana/"]Hiragana[/URL] and [URL="https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/learn-katakana/"]Katakana[/URL] (both systems together are usually referred to as just Kana). Mastering the kana is a great place to start learning if you're interested

My stepmom is japanese and my stepdad tried to get her to teach me japanese, she did however teach me katanas, terrifyingly.