hey guys so today i want to talk about
why reading novels is i think one of the
best ways to really take your japanese
abilities to the next level just to use
an example to kind of explain right like
when i say the best i'm comparing it
against
mostly visual mediums like anime
and manga
but really even non-fiction as well
because just to take as an example if we
say we have a scene in an anime where
someone walks into the room in the
morning and they sit down and they start
eating breakfast and then they're
their mom says to them like wow you're
uh you're up earlier than usual today
just some cliche see you might see in an
anime if this was an anime or manga the
only japanese you'd get during this
whole scene is well you're up earlier
than usual today and maybe a few sound
effects here and there if it's a manga
if it's anime sound effects won't be
written in japanese
but if this was a novel
they'd have to describe
not only the physical scenery of this
entire situation but also
every single little movement that he's
going to make maybe as i opened his door
to the
living room and walked in where his mom
wearing blah blah blah blah was sitting
with her face facing the kitchen blah
blah blah and then they're going to
describe what the whole room looks like
though the way he walks over maybe
they'll say he like sulked over maybe
he'll say he was like looking really
ganky i don't know and then they're
going to describe his breakfast and and
all these little things and so you get
way more it's kind of common sense when
you think about it actually it's totally
common sense since it's not a visual
medium it has to describe everything
with japanese whereas if it's a visual
medium there's so much it doesn't you
can just see so it doesn't have to
specifically tell you in fact there's
like a saying you know in film show
don't tell so actually the more well
done piece of fiction that's a visual
medium is the less language it's
actually going to be involved which
means from a language learner's point of
view the
less helpful it's going to be whereas in
a novel it literally describes
everything and also it describes things
that normally you don't get to hear
right because like i said in real life
real life is is visual as well so
we don't normally describe all these
little things we show a lot as well and
also things are just self-evident but
every once in a while you know some
little description will come up will
come up like maybe say when you have to
explain how your your friend like did
this really cool play in some game or
like how someone slipped and fell and
you're describing that to your friend
it's really important to know how to
describe physical scenery and physical
movements in the language and be able to
understand them of course
but it's hard to practice this when
you're only engaging with visual mediums
because it just doesn't come up that
much and so that's one of the reasons
why novel is really powerful the other
thing is you still get all the visual
stuff in that example i brought up
you're still gonna hear the oh hey
you're up later earlier than usual today
so you get all of what you would have in
the anime
plus more you're not missing out on
anything there's an expression in
japanese
which basically means bigger stuff
contain the smaller things within them
and that's what's going on here
when i say novel i mean audiobook as
well
i used to think that
basically audiobooks were the most pure
form of japanese possible
because they're like raw distilled
japanese it's like you're consuming a
story based on nothing but spoken
japanese right there's no pictures
there's no sound effects or anything and
you could say the same about the written
form but since languages are written or
originally a spoken thing for some
reason audiobooks still seem a little
more pure to me you know it like it
contains all of the information you need
and so
they're definitely really difficult
compared to almost every other medium
right like even compared to non-fiction
books you realize that novels are way
harder because a novel part of the art
is in
how you're describing things right it's
not just a matter of the content of what
you're describing the language you're
using to describe it is pretty much just
as important right that's why it's
considered an art and so
people don't say things in cliche ways
authors are always trying to think of
how can i say something in a new fresh
way how can i create a really vivid
image for the reader and this is what
makes it so challenging it's almost like
meant to be challenging because if it
wasn't challenging that would mean it
would be boring so it's like when you
can really get used to reading novels
everything else starts to feel really
easy and this is why even non-fiction
books still are really easy compared to
novels because they're not trying to be
creative in a non-fiction book a
nonfiction book the content's really all
that matters the form doesn't really
matter that much in fact if you get too
fancy with the form it just gets in the
way so that's why i think novels are
really the pinnacle of getting your
japanese to a really high level like
truly breaking out of the gaijin ghetto
and getting to a place where you can
handle whatever is thrown at you and
that's what i think really got me to
that next level and most all my
vocabulary came from books like that's
what i didn't really i never watched the
news i never really uh engaged with too
many different forms of japanese but
because i read novels so much it kind of
like encompassed all of that right like
a lot of things have their own set of
vocabulary right it's like the news has
news vocabulary and anime has anime-like
vocabulary and a teacher has teacher
vocabulary in real life and it's like
every domain of language has their own
kind of set of way of speaking and
vocabulary specific to that domain but
novels since they're always trying to be
creative they take from every domain
that's one of the main ways that authors
are creative is they use a word that
the meaning is clear like meaning wise
they're not saying anything out of the
ordinary but they're using a word that
would normally be used for like
something completely different like if
they want to make a metaphor maybe
they'll use a word that would normally
be used for for like something very
physical and normally is never used
metaphorically in a metaphorical way
and so because this is one of the common
techniques they use they grab from
everywhere and everything
and if you can learn to understand all
that
it will just like exponentially grow
your ability plus not to mention the
fact that when you're learning from
context the context itself is more
language it's like it's pure language
when you're reading it's like the
highest density of japanese input
because if you're watching a movie
there's scenes where there's no speaking
you're reading a manga you're looking at
the picture some of the time and the
other thing is like even if you're
watching a movie right even if it's a
scene with a lot of conversation part of
your brain is watching
the visuals and it's not being used to
only listen to the audio but if it's an
audio book or you're reading a book
you're using 100 of your brain power to
just deal with the raw japanese i mean
you still are building mental imagery
but that's actually part of the process
of engaging in japanese because you're
converting raw japanese into meaning in
your head like visual imagery is one of
the ways you understand meaning so you
get the best bang for your buck time
wise too it's like pretty much the best
way you can use your time if you want to
really get better at japanese and i
would put a lot of emphasis on
audiobooks as well because if you get
you're reading it too far ahead of your
listening ability that's going to
you up in the long run it's going to be
if the gap gets too big it's hard to
catch it up and then your accent is
going to take a big hit because if
you're learning your words just from the
written medium and you aren't learning
how to how they actually sound
it's gonna you up
but yeah i actually just uh was watching
this anime on netflix called a devilman
crybaby that just came out and i won't
comment on
on the content of the anime because
that's not my job but
they had this bonus audio track that i
i'm guessing it's for blind people it's
like it narrates what's physically
happening in the show uh alongside the
normal like dialogues and stuff and so
every like the character will be having
a conversation and then as soon as they
start doing stuff this voice will come
on it's like deep narration voice and
explain exactly what's happening
physically when you turn that on it
shows you the difference between visual
mediums versus novels
because you realize wow this is so much
richer like my japanese ability would be
challenged so much more by the second
one and so i'm gonna show you a couple
of that now so you can see the stark
difference that i'm talking about
first let's watch 30 seconds of the
normal audio track
okay now let's view the same
30 seconds but this time with the
narration track one
be
[Music]
so as you can see there was not only way
more japanese with that narration track
on but also the japanese that was used
was a lot more difficult and expressive
than the actual lines of the show so
hopefully this was a useful metaphor for
why
novels give you so much bang for your
buck japanese-wise and also
i think that this show right here is
actually a super cool resource because
since this narration track
was i assume created for blind people
it's giving you information that
normally you would already have if you
can see
and so
basically it's going to make things
super comprehensible because you're
getting the same information twice and
you can use the visual information to
fill in the japanese information so uh
if netflix has other shows that also
have this kind of second narration track
we should look into that because this is
a super awesome resource okay that's all
from me if you found this video
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