Serpensortia Bilingual Triglot Newbie United States Joined 5521 days ago 18 posts - 22 votes Speaks: English*, Russian*, Spanish
| Message 1 of 9 03 December 2009 at 11:34pm | IP Logged |
Human Japanese is an application developed for the iPhone. It gets stellar reviews, and costs only $10; however, I would like to get the opinions of as many people as possible before dishing out my money for it. Is its method helpful?
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Kubelek Tetraglot Senior Member Switzerland chomikuj.pl/Kuba_wal Joined 6851 days ago 415 posts - 528 votes Speaks: Polish*, EnglishC2, French, Spanish Studies: German
| Message 2 of 9 04 December 2009 at 12:01am | IP Logged |
go here and click on "Try out Human Japanese instantly in your web browser." For some reason I can't link to it directly.
Edited by Kubelek on 04 December 2009 at 12:02am
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Serpensortia Bilingual Triglot Newbie United States Joined 5521 days ago 18 posts - 22 votes Speaks: English*, Russian*, Spanish
| Message 3 of 9 04 December 2009 at 12:18am | IP Logged |
Kubelek wrote:
go here and click on "Try out Human Japanese instantly in your web browser." For some reason I can't link to it directly. |
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I have tried the free version; I would like to know how useful it is in the long run.
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Captain Haddock Diglot Senior Member Japan kanjicabinet.tumblr. Joined 6767 days ago 2282 posts - 2814 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, Korean, Ancient Greek
| Message 4 of 9 04 December 2009 at 10:18am | IP Logged |
It seems sort of like an interactive textbook. I don't have it on my iPod, so I can't really review it, but judging from
the website demo, it looks like it has had a lot of thought and care put into it. And I like the bamboo icon.
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Shadow1984 Groupie United States Joined 5488 days ago 53 posts - 57 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German
| Message 5 of 9 04 December 2009 at 11:33am | IP Logged |
It does look like a very interesting tool. I do plan on getting an iphone in the near future so if you get it make sure you write a review about it!
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wildweathel Newbie United States Joined 5562 days ago 32 posts - 71 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Esperanto, Japanese
| Message 6 of 9 07 December 2009 at 7:32pm | IP Logged |
I looked at the title and wondered "'Human Japanese'? As opposed to the Japanese spoken by aliens and giant robots?"
It looks like yet another bilingual textbook to me. Lots of emphasis on cute games and reading things in chatty English. The audio has been recorded by native speaker. Descriptions of the consonants are incorrect: ち is decidedly not pronounced like "chee."
(English CH is pronounced with the tip of the tongue against the upper jaw, Japanese ち with the tip of the tongue tucked behind the lower teeth. Wikipedia has a good picture. That's the shape for し, じ, and ち.)
Overall, I'd say the price is right, but it's probably not something you'll use as a solid reference in the long run. Have fun with it, learn what you can, and when you decide to tackle Japanese seriously, you can switch to better tools.
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Captain Haddock Diglot Senior Member Japan kanjicabinet.tumblr. Joined 6767 days ago 2282 posts - 2814 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, Korean, Ancient Greek
| Message 7 of 9 08 December 2009 at 2:30am | IP Logged |
I don't recall ever seeing a Japanese textbook for English speakers that correctly described those sounds as you just
did, Wildweathel. :) I think it took me 2 years to realize I was pronouncing them wrong.
Edited by Captain Haddock on 08 December 2009 at 2:31am
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Kubelek Tetraglot Senior Member Switzerland chomikuj.pl/Kuba_wal Joined 6851 days ago 415 posts - 528 votes Speaks: Polish*, EnglishC2, French, Spanish Studies: German
| Message 8 of 9 08 December 2009 at 10:30am | IP Logged |
Score! Polish has this sound.
But it took me months in the US to realize that I'm pronouncing it wrong in English.
overall the program contains 40 chapters + several chapters on culture. Sentences and new vocabulary are in kana. Romaji is used while explaining grammar, though.
Looking at a table of contents we have some chapters such as adjectives, adverbs, progressive tenses, verbs, interrogatives, counting objects, optatives and others. The explanations seem pretty easy to me, they use simple language. Grammar lessons are interspersed with vocab oriented lessons such as at school, recreations and leisures, a stroll through town, food.
Let's look at food, lesson 15.
You get a lot of words in kana and English + japanese audio. Around 60 words + 10 verbs or expressions such as 'i like..', 'i dislike' 'my favorite is 'i hate'. Then come sentences using those verbs.
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