みなさんへのコメントのコメント

Dear learners,

Thanks for the sharing your story behind learning Japanese in the comment section in the previous entry.

I have to say I really enjoyed reading them. Yes, you had to fill student information sheet on the first day of class and I read those, too but what you wrote on the last blog entry was far more revealing. It's like there was your voice, more or less, and I could hear you, well almost.

If you haven't read what others wrote, please read them through.
My hope is that learning more about each other will contribute to form positive / supportive learning environment for all of you.

I thought I should comment back to your comments but if I did it in the previous entry it will be really long so I think I'll do it here in a new entry.

By the way, it's cool some of you can type in Japanese already. We can try that later, if you are interested.

>Gregさん

Maybe you know it already but there is a course focused on reading taught by Sato sensei.

It is a course for those who have finished 3rd Year Japanese. One way to take it as soon as possible is to do study in a summer program for the 2nd Year then next year, in 2007-2008, take the 3rd Year Japanese. But obviously your background in Chinese should help tremendously along the way.

>Tonkatsu さん,

When I started learning English I wished I could watch movies withour the subtitles. I didn't happen overnight but gradually I began to be able to pick up a word, phrases, sentences. I think it is both motivating and effective way to learn a language.

About the heritage that you have, it just makes me think about the consequences of the actions taken by our former government and how I relate to that.

>koさん
It's interesting to hear you say that Japanese is cooler sounding language. I, as a native speaker of the language, can't ever objectively hear Japanese as a foreign language. So I think it's just interesting to imagine how it might sound to speakers of other languages....

One of your favorite movies is in Japanese? Which one is it? Maybe someone else in the class has seen it, too.

>Liz さん

Wow, so Japanese is really a part of your career plans. That is great!
Environmental issues are definitely global issues and something Japan has had for long time since the 1970's. And, yes the connection with that generation.

>Pedro さん

I

Yes, if you know the language, you would be able to interact with/participate in the culture. You mentioned in class that you were interested in going to Kyoto with KCJS program. There are other programs listed here. I think we will have another information session on study abroad program on 11/10(F). (By the way, there will be one for not Study abroad but Japanese government-sponsored English teacher program (JET program) on 10/20 (F).)

> Jazz/ヤスミナ さん
You have multiple interests in Japan. Appearance in Japanese fashion magazine sure told me you were interested in modern pop culture, or one element of it but you have more. Lucky you to be here and able to take courses in history. I would be interested in taking them except I'm a bit scared to do that on top of the coursework I'm doing in TC....

And what a linguist you are to be interested in learning 20 languages. I think you can say that learning Kanji in Japanese will help you learn Chinese better because believe or not more than half of Japanese vocabulary is Chinese origin. Well, I should say words (compound words, to be more precise) made of words written by kanji. They sound very different because they were taken from different dialects and at different era but there is some systematic correspondence, so it should help you a bit.

>kaoru さんのコメント...

Ten years ahead of you? In terms of what? Declining birth rate? Hmmmm. But I can imagine you will be going to Japan to study for sure. There is KCJS and summer programs as I mentioned above in my comment to Pedro san.

Speaking of doctor, one of my students was interested in why so many female doctors who must have worked so hard to be a doctor quit after certain years of practice. She said she would be going to Japan this summer to do some research on that. I wonder how she is doing....She also has Japanese family members.

> Nathalie ： ナタリ さん

Korean and Japanese share so much similarities, indeed. Grammar (word order, use of particles, counters, politeness language) influence of Chinese, vocabulary. Actually there has been a boom in Japan for Korean culture (music, TV drama) and more and more people are learning Korean in Japan, too.

> Shimokita さんのコメント...

I think it could be exciting to see how your own resources from exposure and casual learning to Japanese would be reconstructed through learning it formally. I'm sorry it's my interest in second language acquisition babling...

You know, come to think of it I have a friend, well he was a undergraduate student here but lived there for a couple of years and came back and almost finishing law school in Toronto. And I think he said he already has a position or position waiting for him to practice in Japan....He said he would be coming to the Chat Club on 10/6. So maybe you could talk to him then.


Well, this is taking me longer than I thought...
Sumimasen ga, I think I'll write another entry to finish what I started.