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The English Paradox: Four decades of life and language in Japan

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Re: The English Paradox: Four decades of life and language in Japan

#101

Post by svilen_dobrev »

bitwize wrote: post #49
tkgally wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Partly it was the location: An upper floor of a building in a neighborhood full of bars and pachinko parlors, which seemed much sleazier to me then than it would now. But more it was, I think, that I didn’t understand yet why Japanese college students and office workers would pay money to practice English with me and a few other recent foreign arrivals. The fact that much of the conversation consisted of the customer…

Spend enough time in Japan, and you realize that young to middle-aged Japanese people really do understand that competence in English will give them an edge -- but they don't know where or how to go about learning so they will try damn near anything, especially if they think it's easy or a "shortcut". There's potentially a big market for apps like Rosetta Stone or Duolingo over there, I don't know how things like tha…

> so they will try damn near anything

2012.. i am not a native english-speaker but white, in Tokyo for 2 weeks, staying in friend's apartment, not knowing a word except "Arigato". One day, In some very big shop, i was looking for some locally made hand cream, and after walking the shelves with hundreds of things only labelled in japanese hieroglyphs, i asked the lady on the cash-desk "Where are hand-creams?" and she showed me to one shelf full of Avon stuff (which i saw but avoided), and eventually at its end there were some others japanese. So i looked at there and picked one or two, choosing by colorfulness of the bottle :) All that time, a student-age-girl was staying at next row, keeping and looking at some pocket device in her hands, and when i finally picked something, she approached me and asked, in not-that-bad-english : "Excuse me, did you ask for a "hand cream"?

You know, this picking of any opportunity to train your hearing/speaking is.. amazingly diligent. And their curiosity also amazed me.

Ever since i'd like to try move and live there, but.. too bad it's very difficult to go to work or live there. Expensiveness is only one little part of it..

Re: The English Paradox: Four decades of life and language in Japan

#102

Post by svilen_dobrev »

minebreaker wrote: post #96
card_zero wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heh, Slavoj Zizek. Why should the Japanese learn English? To understand a Slovenian, naturally!

I'm not sure you are being sarcastic or not, but it is absolutely the best aspect of having the lingua franca. In an ideal world where I had an infinite time, I'd love to learn Slovenian, but obviously I don't, and my life is too short to learn so many languages. Some blame English for globalism and Americanization, and sure they deserve the blame, but I don't want to live in the world where the people stuck in their…

as someone from a very minor east-euro country (~7m people overall) - but having its own language AND alphabet) - one has to invest in some lingua-franca languages in order to be world-compatible :) and to have access to (quality) translations of whatever-other-language-media. For me those have been English and Russian, covering maybe 30-50% of world, as culture (or at least the accessible world). i'd love to have one more covering the east-asia.. but it's a somewhat too late, and nowhere to do it..

i mean, for me, translations of Tao-Te-Ching in english are different from those in russian.. general idea is same but kind-of emphasizing different aspects/interpretations/connotations of the original. IMO English is much more perpendicular to east-asian thinking than russian.. which has its pros and cons.

Re: The English Paradox: Four decades of life and language in Japan

#103

Post by Aeolun »

expatjapan121 wrote: post #97
germandiago wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have been a couple of times in Japan, have some Japanese friends here in Vietnam, where I live. I am spanish. In my humble opinion, japanese society is very kind and well-behaved, but, if you cannot speak japanese and you live in one more-or-less big city, according to all the feedback I got, then, you are basically out. And anyway, you will never be a japanese. I mean, there is much less difference between foreign…

> if you cannot speak japanese and you live in one more-or-less big city, according to all the feedback I got, then, you are basically out. > And anyway, you will never be a japanese. I think you answered yourself that if you _can_ speak Japanese, things are different. The reality is that if you can speak Japanese, it's quite easy to be well integrated with the people. In your example, I don't know if the Romanian le…

I think the OP is correct, though probably not in the way they mean.

I love living in Japan, but I’ll never be able to adopt that mindset, or be able to eat all those disgusting fishes they love.

That’s fine. A lot of Japanese people think it’s valuable to have different perspectives too, even if they could never convince themselves that it’s ok to just walk up to someone and ask them what their problem is.

Re: The English Paradox: Four decades of life and language in Japan

#104

Post by Aeolun »

tomcam wrote: post #87
ekusiadadus wrote: post #86

I'm Japanese. Speaking English in Japan is very challenging. All my friends and family speak Japanese, and everything from social media to news is completely accessible in Japanese. I'm an entrepreneur, and I use English when talking with international clients and overseas VCs. However, I lack confidence, and the communication tends to remain superficial, making it difficult to effectively do business internationally…

Your written English is excellent. You are underestimating your skills, I think. Is there a world in which you could simply pause and plan out your words before speaking? Westerners won’t mind. Elon Musk often pauses noticeably in interviews when he’s discussing something controversial or novel, for example. I retrained myself how to speak in my 20s and went through a similar process.

In general just pausing without saying eeuuh will make you smarter.

Re: The English Paradox: Four decades of life and language in Japan

#105

Post by SiVal »

tkgally wrote: post #60
SiVal wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, I thought your name sounded familiar! In 2008, I bought "Reading Japanese with a Smile" on a trip to Japan and loved it. It was very well done and perfect for me. I ended up buying two copies and for years I kept checking on Kinokuniya visits hoping it would become a series. No such luck, but my guess is it was just too much work for too little reward. But you should know that a HN reader still remembers your wor…

Thank you for the kind words! I am glad to hear that you found that book useful. The editor and I did discuss a sequel and I started collecting material for it, but I had changed careers by that point and no longer had the time or motivation to see it through to completion. And now I’m not sure if there’s a market for such books anymore. At least, if I were learning to read Japanese myself now, rather than buying a b…

It's a little sad, but you're right of course that many books no longer make business sense now that everything they offer is online and free. Well, when the AIs put us all out of business and we're home all day in our rabbit hutches, we'll have plenty of time and free content to read.

Re: The English Paradox: Four decades of life and language in Japan

#106

Post by expatjapan121 »

Aeolun wrote: post #103
expatjapan121 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if you cannot speak japanese and you live in one more-or-less big city, according to all the feedback I got, then, you are basically out. > And anyway, you will never be a japanese. I think you answered yourself that if you _can_ speak Japanese, things are different. The reality is that if you can speak Japanese, it's quite easy to be well integrated with the people. In your example, I don't know if the Romanian le…

I think the OP is correct, though probably not in the way they mean. I love living in Japan, but I’ll never be able to adopt that mindset, or be able to eat all those disgusting fishes they love. That’s fine. A lot of Japanese people think it’s valuable to have different perspectives too, even if they could never convince themselves that it’s ok to just walk up to someone and ask them what their problem is.

IIUC you are saying OP is correct in that culture exists in the world. And you are affirming that Japanese people believe this too and are fine with people that don't eat "disgusting fishes", like me (cooked I can't do, sashimi I'm fine).

So the sentiment that somehow Japanese are incompatible for culture reasons, which is the message I got from the thread I replied to, is not correct in your opinion too, right?

Re: The English Paradox: Four decades of life and language in Japan

#107

Post by germandiago »

expatjapan121 wrote: post #97
germandiago wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have been a couple of times in Japan, have some Japanese friends here in Vietnam, where I live. I am spanish. In my humble opinion, japanese society is very kind and well-behaved, but, if you cannot speak japanese and you live in one more-or-less big city, according to all the feedback I got, then, you are basically out. And anyway, you will never be a japanese. I mean, there is much less difference between foreign…

> if you cannot speak japanese and you live in one more-or-less big city, according to all the feedback I got, then, you are basically out. > And anyway, you will never be a japanese. I think you answered yourself that if you _can_ speak Japanese, things are different. The reality is that if you can speak Japanese, it's quite easy to be well integrated with the people. In your example, I don't know if the Romanian le…

I am not saying your experience must be the same.

According to the three japanese people in my group here and some other feedback from people living there before, same as you I guess, and they speak japanese quite ok, our conclusion is that being one more is not as easy as in other countries.

I say this from the strictest respect to japanese. I like them, I like their culture.

If you live there you must know perfectly that just bc they act politely does not mean they are thinking you do not bother them. A japanese would rarely tell you that. And if someone did, it is likely to do it in an indirect way, as most asians do. Japanese are in the extreme of that polite behavior.

Re: The English Paradox: Four decades of life and language in Japan

#108

Post by germandiago »

expatjapan121 wrote: post #106
Aeolun wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the OP is correct, though probably not in the way they mean. I love living in Japan, but I’ll never be able to adopt that mindset, or be able to eat all those disgusting fishes they love. That’s fine. A lot of Japanese people think it’s valuable to have different perspectives too, even if they could never convince themselves that it’s ok to just walk up to someone and ask them what their problem is.

IIUC you are saying OP is correct in that culture exists in the world. And you are affirming that Japanese people believe this too and are fine with people that don't eat "disgusting fishes", like me (cooked I can't do, sashimi I'm fine). So the sentiment that somehow Japanese are incompatible for culture reasons, which is the message I got from the thread I replied to, is not correct in your opinion too, right?

I think you got wrong what I said. I said that becoming part of a group of japanese people where japanese people accept you is more difficult than in other countries.

That is different from going around and just interacting with them, which I found smooth and polite.

If you think that interacting eith japanese at work or shops or restaurants is the same as becoming part of them, well, that is ok, you seem to live there. I think it is more difficult than in other countrues and by this I am not meaning they are bad.

For example, far fewer japanese speak english than other developed countries, which is a trait of ehat they care about.

Also, when working or interacting with japanese myself, I found they follow rules really strictly compared to the "flexibility mindset" that westerners tend to have when solving problems.

They will not go and correct their bosses if they see mistakes because "they will notice themselves". So there is a lot of room to make innocent mistakes when interacting with them and many, face it, are not even that interested beyond a trivial and polite conversation and I am not meaning bad. Every culture has their priorities and taste.

Re: The English Paradox: Four decades of life and language in Japan

#109

Post by eszed »

anal_reactor wrote: post #71
laurieg wrote: post #64

I've lived in Japan for over a decade and I think this article summarizes some aspects of English education well. I'd like to share a few of my thoughts and experiences too. English is often put on a very high pedestal. Speaking fluent English is associated with being "elite". A tech company in my city is slowly moving to doing all development work in English. I went to a casual tech talk event they held. Every talk…

> It makes sense to give all the talks in Japanese to a Japanese speaking audience, but the whole vibe was that English was so impossible that the idea of giving a talk in English was absurd. When I was a student I took some classes in English, and some in my native language. Having someone speak your native language makes things infinitely easier to understand and more engaging. Even if you're a fluent speaker it's…

> Having someone speak your native language makes things infinitely easier to understand and more engaging.

I don't really disagree with this. However, it's only axiomatically true if you hold teaching skill constant. I once learned far more on Tuesdays and Thursdays from a brilliant teacher who spoke no English than I did on Mondays and Wednesdays from a perfectly bi-lingual instructor who was only meh.

When I taught ESL I held onto English-only except in extremis. Knowing (though only a bit of, in my case) the other language, could otherwise become unproductive. As the teacher, it was on me to find the four or five (or however many were necessary!) ways to get to the concept in English. Hearing all of them may have only been necessary for a few of the students, but hearing them was re-inforcing for the students who had 'got it' first time.

Re: The English Paradox: Four decades of life and language in Japan

#110

Post by jhanschoo »

bondarchuk wrote: post #89
laurieg wrote: post #64

I've lived in Japan for over a decade and I think this article summarizes some aspects of English education well. I'd like to share a few of my thoughts and experiences too. English is often put on a very high pedestal. Speaking fluent English is associated with being "elite". A tech company in my city is slowly moving to doing all development work in English. I went to a casual tech talk event they held. Every talk…

At least having English as an elite-signalling language is still quasi useful. Over here kids slave over ancient Latin or Greek to prove that their parents are elite.

As someone who enjoys languages, I observe with irony that in terms of proficiency per unit of effort spent, at least formal ancient language education isn't a such a waste of effort that formal language education is, in the sense that immersion will teach you language more painlessly, and with more velocity and distance than formal modern language education will; but immersion is quite inaccessible for ancient languages.
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