Two levels? If only Japanese were that simple. 
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Mhh, that does make sense 
Might have been a bit too much subtext/background for me to understand it somewhat out of context.
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I donât think Iâve seen any prevailing social attitude towards Asian languages.
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Agreed. I like to add that I know quite a few Japanese learners, from online interactions (not here) who are obsessive, or compulsive, perfectionists and they nitpick on everybody whose progress is too slow, who mispronounces something, misunderstands a grammar point, or who wants to approach Japanese language learning differently than them⊠You just have to avoid such people if their criticism comes from a wrong place and itâs not constructive.
Plus, there are plenty of people who also want to dump their own problems, and failings, on others to justify their inability to overcome hurdles. You really just have to ignore/avoid them, otherwise they drag you down until you conform with their views.
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I guess if thinking that japan is weird is racist, that makes me a big fat racist, although that is a part of the reason Iâm learning japanese to begin with.
I think calling swaths of people who have no real reason to care about the japanese language racist is a bit inflammatory. Of course it doesnât make sense to people that donât know it.
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You not an inferior speaker, you just have an accent, if I understand you correctly;) As you say, the message is a lot more important that native-like perfection in pronunciation. The language is about connecting and communicating with people.
Sometimes, learners of different language see it as an end in itself, almost like an intellectual badge of honor where if you donât speak and sound like a native speaker you are a âfailureâ⊠I think thatâs just too âconstrictingâ and prone-to-fail approach to learn a language.
Iâm is the same boat, English is my fourth language I learned, by far the most fluent, even though I started learning it at 21. I put my ability to express myself in English even above my native language. Living and working 20+ years in the U.S. surely has something to do with it;)
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I think misrepresenting what people actually said, deliberately trying to misunderstand them and twisting words is a bit inflammatory. I have repeatedly stated that there is a difference between subjective statements like âthis doesnât make sense to meâ and seemingly objective attitudes like âthis does not make senseâ. This is like the fourth time I am trying to convey that point. I do not think it is particularly hard to understand.
And yes, the attitude that âJapan is weirdâ as contrasted to our perfectly sensible Western culture is inherently racist. I am sorry if saying that out loud offends you.
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Yeah lmao. It was a video I saw awhile ago but I can probably try to dig it up later. Dude claimed to be fluent and I think he was at some store talking to people in their native language and filming it.
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Did anyone else read that in a William Shatner/Captain Kirk voice in their head?
Who said western culture is sensible? I sure didnât.
Also Iâve never seen an objective societal attitude that âthis doesnât make sense and will never because itâs japanese.â Could you point out some examples of that.
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The power of positive, but realistic, thinking;) Iâm the same. I revel in differences, they are interesting to me. Iâm curious why it is structured and said in such a way⊠Oh, the beauty of Japanese⊠Itâs still a big unknown for me but thatâs what makes it exciting. There is nothing that curious mind cannot solve.
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They study of the origin and evolution of languages is an interesting topic. I read quite a bit of old stuff and it is interesting to see how the English language has changed. Sometimes when I start reading something old after having been reading recent stuff it can take me a chapter or two to shift to a state where I can read it without stumbling all the time. My wife assures me that reading old Japanese is the same for her.
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always disappointing when I think I have the right word in time for the right occasion and the listener is like âăă?â because Iâve either mispronounced it slightly or they are just not sure which of the many words I might be sayingâŠ
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No, I canât, because that is not what I have said.
What I have said is that
there is a difference between subjective statements like âthis doesnât make sense to meâ and seemingly objective attitudes like âthis does not make senseâ.
âObjectiveâ and âseemingly objectiveâ are not the same thing.
I have no idea what an âobjective societal attitudeâ even is.
I have also never suggested that people hold an attitude of âX doesnât make sense because it is Japaneseâ. Not once. What I have suggested is a contrast between people unassumingly treating their own culture as perfectly normal while treating things from other cultures as âweirdâ without a) making an effort to understand and contextualize them or b) even considering that maybe our normative assumptions of what is ânormalâ might not be objective.
And that can begin with such harmless attitudes as âitâs so weird how the Japanese eat raw fishâ - which, given Sushiâs popularity in the West seems to be in decline but itâs still something my grandma says. (She also says that onions are food for Jews so personally I am inclined to distrust her culinary advice.) Itâs in the whole âanime is so weirdâ thing, where many people still believe that Japanese culture consists entirely of tentacle porn. And, as I have asserted before, it is part of the attitude that the Japanese language âdoes not make senseâ.
None of these attitudes would be in any way problematic if people were equally willing to denounce their own culture as weird in the same way, but many people absolutely LOSE THEIR SHIT when you call the Christian tradition of consuming the corpse of Jesus Christ a bit weird. Or, just the other day, someone on this forum commented how nonsensical the Japanese obsession with blood types is (and, well, that is basically scientifically proven to be complete bullshit so I donât disagree in the slightest), but how often do we stop and think âhow weird is it that every major newspaper has a horoscopeâ (which is equally scientifically proven to be complete bullshit)?
Again: the issue is not that people are critical of other cultures. The issue is in being overly nitpicky, dismissive or smug towards other cultures while treating ours as ânormalâ, without ever acknowledging that normalcy is socially constructed, it is not god-given or objective. It is a comparison.
Now you can keep going âiâve never seen any of that happen so it canât possibly existâ and immediately write another comment that blatantly ignores what I have said in favor of some strawman version of what you think Iâve said, or you could take a bit of time to honestly consider what I have said, and see if maybe you notice things in the future that you have not previously noticed. Itâs your choice.
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I remember the first time I went to Japan, in college, after 2ish years of Japanese study. I could get around with my broken Japanese, but there was a guy I worked with who seemed to be able to say or understand anything. He said he had been studying Japanese for a year and a half. He was a Mormon missionary. Whatever language training program the Mormons (I mean, the Church of Latter Day Saints) use, it must be good.
Anyway-- proof that it is possible.
Also, I donât know why people complain about Japanese grammar. Yes, Itâs really different from English, but I actually think itâs more sensible than English grammar. Although, so far, it does seem like Japanese authors favor super long sentences, which are hard to parse in any language.
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funny, a couple of days ago there was the opposite thread about âToxic kanji learnersâ who âclaim learning kanji as in all the joyo kanji and passing the JLPT N2 to be an absolute cake walkâ 
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Iâm gonna jump into this discussion, even though the better part of my brain is telling me not toâŠ
The way I see, and define, racism is that it needs not only a statement but you need to act on that statement, or figure the intent behind that statement and thatâs somehow lost nowadays when people throw the word racism around on the Internet. Even worse, they seem to assume for everyone what their true intent was, and thatâs a bit patronizing⊠But I guess thatâs the Internet for you where lot of times we speed up our conversations, jump to assumptions, and go from zero to ballistic in seconds.
I cannot know just from a sentence âJapanese is weirdâ if the person saying it meant it in a racist way. Sure, it might be insensitive and idiotic to phrase it in such a way but unless I know for sure that they intended it to hurt, or demean, someone, I should not jump to such conclusion right away. The in-between step of finding out the âintentâ should not be eliminated, otherwise it just leads to misunderstanding, at best, and antagonizing, vilifying, at worst. If I interact with someone who says something like that a bit longer, speak with them, listen to them, I can definitely find it out very quickly if they are racist and have no problem to call them out, or be call out myself for saying such stupid things.
Overall, I agree with what you are saying, I just read too much Chomsky to care about semantics:) Peace.
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I personally dont think japanese is difficult, just time consuming. Iâve seen too many dumb rules and specific spellings and incomprehensible grammar in both portuguese and english to care.
In fact, japanese is way easier in some areas than english, especially phonetics. Almost the sounds of the language are easy to make and easy to distinguish, and I already knew how to do them anyways. I had to spend 4 days learning some of the english phonetics, and my accent is still thick.
Its just a game of learning rules and slowly adapting them onto your brain, if it makes sense
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Making a statement is an action in itself; and as I have outlined before, racist action is usually rooted in racist speech and in racist thought. There is, obviously, a difference between having thoughts with racist connotations and building a concentration camps. I have also said that before. I have also stated that I do not intend to attack anybodyâs personal opinions, I just want to suggest people examine a specific societal attitude through a critical lens. But this is the internet and people jump to assumptions and go ballistic in seconds so that nuance seems to be lost on some people.
I cannot know just from a sentence âJapanese is weirdâ if the person saying it meant it in a racist way. Sure, it might be insensitive and idiotic to phrase it in such a way but unless I know for sure that they intended it to hurt, or demean, someone, I should not jump to such conclusion right away.
You are right! And I am not jumping to that conclusion! I am merely stating that this attitude is rooted in widely-held racist beliefs, not that the person making this statement is personally, actively, consciously engaging in acts of racism.
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I donât know why youâre giving âweirdâ such a negative connotation. When people say that something is weird, it doesnât not mean that itâs therefore bad. If other cultures werenât weird to people, they wouldnât be other cultures anymore. Of course foreign cultures are not normal to people, because itâs not what theyâve known for their entire lives. Of course what people think is normal isnât objective, itâs relative to how theyâre raised. If thatâs being racist, youâre on the fast track to convincing me that racism isnât inherently bad.
Iâm not deliberately trying to misrepresent what youâre saying, what youâre saying actually doesnât make any sense to me. Youâll have to better describe what you mean by âseemingly objectiveâ. If youâre using it in a way of âthis person believes their culture is the true way to liveâ kind of way, then yeah, those guys are stupid. However, that doesnât mean that you should assume that when someone says âx is weirdâ that they mean that their way of life is the only right way. If this is some strawman, feel free to better explain what you mean.
Also me saying that I havenât seen something happen doesnât mean that I donât think it exists. Youâre putting words in my mouth again.
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