Comments on: Reasons for Taking Japanese in Section 001

By: Kia

Kia — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 21:47:15 +0000

I kind of fit into two of those catagories. I like anime, but its more of a ‘bored with French’ thing.

By: MomeMordrid

MomeMordrid — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 22:23:53 +0000

… all university students know Taco Bell is *Japanese*, and like or dislike of it the ONLY true deciding factor in whether or not to learn the language.

By: coatie

coatie — Sat, 09 May 2009 00:17:12 +0000

What about “needing to understand the prominent scientific journals necessary for research?”

By: evilthingamajig.

evilthingamajig. — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 17:26:01 +0000

lol *is an anime lover* wanted to study japanese. not anymore because I live where most people speak spanish. I wanna learn spanish. LOL I HAVE to know spanish. xP

By: Cosman246

Cosman246 — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 23:07:41 +0000

Oh, and add to that : People who think Spanish is easy and want to get the ‘Language’ part over with. I’m not taking Spanish, but I know people who do go to Spanish, and most of them do it for the above reason

By: ForceDestroyer

ForceDestroyer — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 12:37:18 +0000

I’m learning Japanese, and guess why…
Anime++;

So what? Better than hollywood and better than watching dubs. Also, I don’t miss out on any other advantages just because Anime was the original reason for being interested in Japan.

BTW WeirdFish: Being a Metalhead is statistically correlated to being intelligent, thus your example is weird.

By: Cosman246

Cosman246 — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 15:37:59 +0000

I agree…..except for the “gotta love the graph” part….

By: Cosman246

Cosman246 — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 05:16:10 +0000

Listen…Some of us know that it isn’t. It’s just that we like it. You guys aren’t the only ones stereotyped, you know. Plus, whether or not it is true, and whether or not you like it it is still a part of culture. We can’t help it if many people like it. And this is missing parts such as “Tourists”, and “People trying to find a job in Japan because they see opportunities there”.

By: Cheeseypink

Cheeseypink — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 00:57:04 +0000

LOL. If I could take Japanese, I would be in the genuine lovers of the language/culture section AND anime… Though I tend to prefer manga. But that’s just coincidence. I happen to love other cultures and. Am a very linguistic person. My love for anime just contributes to that

But even so… Gotta love this graph. Even if it is half directed at me.

By: Cosman246

Cosman246 — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 22:58:09 +0000

Thank you, Zabimaru.

By: Anna

Anna — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 02:50:17 +0000

Hmm…I’m from the 19% (“intrigued by Japanese culture”), but it isn’t because I love anime, but rather that I love manga and Japanese rock music. Now that I have Japanese relatives, I have all the more reason to go there x3

By: zapp

zapp — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 18:52:46 +0000

you people have obviously never taken japanese at any major university.

By: Norwegian Guy

Norwegian Guy — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 22:23:49 +0000

Heh. I’m 1% out of 19%. Makes me feel special.
For me, anime is what you get when you want to make TV, but don’t have the money to do live-action. Also, Russian girls are way hotter than the Japanese ones. I’m still studying Japanese. What do you think most people’s first comment is when they hear that? “Oh – you like anime?”

By: Rinuv

Rinuv — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 05:16:37 +0000

You mean…. *GASP!* Its not?

By: signe

signe — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 15:02:32 +0000

we learn some japanese in my karate class… that’s another reason.

By: T2master

T2master — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 19:46:17 +0000

What, no space for “Love Imported Video Games”?

By: Eeyore

Eeyore — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 19:43:47 +0000

I’m curious as to know where you heard/read that Japanese is a dying language. I think you might be mistaking the business world for the real world, and even then the language still isn’t dying.

By: The Sizzler

The Sizzler — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 19:40:54 +0000

A lot less than there are in China.

And if you look at the interest rates, they can’t even get people to put money in banks there. The economy is dying. China will overrun that country, the same way they’re overrunning others in that area.

(I’m an economist, by the way. Not a xenophobe. I have no problem with Japan, but facts are facts…)

By: Eeyore

Eeyore — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 19:39:46 +0000

I agree with you. The classes are even called “Chinese”, so, it’s a little snobbish to think anything less of people just because they only know the generalizations used daily in media. I wasn’t even aware of the variation in the Japanese language until I started studying a bit in linguistics, learning more about Japan’s diverse cultures, and meeting Japanese people from different parts of Japan.

By: Maderman

Maderman — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 17:25:19 +0000

Good point. Actually makes the case for two stacked 100% bar charts – one showing the % in the intro course, and one showing the % in the 300-level course.

By: WeirdFish

WeirdFish — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 12:37:49 +0000

It’s not a problem to like and enjoy anime. It’s the obsessed people who really put a damper on things, and like most things, the ones who give a bad reputation to the rest.

Like how not all of us metalheads are unemployed Neanderthals who can’t let go of the ’80s.

By: WeirdFish

WeirdFish — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 12:35:04 +0000

Cool. I guess I’ll just go kill myself then. Or resort to OMGLULz!!!

By: WeirdFish

WeirdFish — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 12:33:54 +0000

Chill. They’ll figure that out once they get past “Chinese 1.” As you might have figured out, we’re a stupid breed of people. We need things in broad generalizations before we can get specific. Cutting them off at the knees because they didn’t get the speech of the in-crowd is much more annoying.

When someone says “I wanna learn computers,” you don’t call them a moron for saying the “wrong” thing. You help them get acclimated to the entire field and THEN drill down to the specific. How else is someone going to learn?

By: WeirdFish

WeirdFish — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 12:30:22 +0000

Because the percentage of “loves anime” is true. Der. If you take offense to it and are interested in Japanese for the language and the culture, maybe you’re, oh, I don’t know, part of that 19% in the chart? Novel concept, huh?

It’s why I don’t go to anime conventions or even tell people that I AM Japanese when I meet them because the LAST thing I need is for these jackasses to start gushing about anime as if that’s ALL that encompasses my life, heritage, and culture.

By: Athanar

Athanar — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 08:46:02 +0000

I’m going to start learning Japanese, but not because I love anime. XD (I like the style, but it’s just another style, really… I don’t understand why so many people like it like they do.)

I plan to go into computer programming and a lot of it (especially in video games, where I plan to be) is in Japan, so it’d help. Plus, Japanese seems like it’ll be fun to learn.

By: Asagaya

Asagaya — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 06:37:47 +0000

Luckily, out of those 63% and 99% of 19%, 80% drop out by the second semester. Usually the ones that stay are the relatively calm ones out of the group and are remotely tolerable. Personally, I’m studying Japanese in hopes of becoming a linguist. It is my first studied language, but it is supposed to be one of the hardest for native English speakers to learn (one of the top 3 with Mandarin and Arabic, I believe). I want to get the hardest languages out of the way first, y’know.
Also, learning to even read Mandarin at the same time is difficult, much less learn to speak it at the same time. (I refuse to try to learn to speak it until I get a native speaker to teach me because of those tones). Those people are crazy.
I can also vouch for the fact that 90% of the people that make it to third year in my school are either Chinese, people who learned mostly from immersion in Japan for a year or more, or native speakers learning the kanji all over again.

By: Dave

Dave — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 06:03:59 +0000

That’s because people taking french or spanish don’t do it for those reasons. Wanting to understand anime is the main reason for a lot of people who study japanese. Wanting to screw japanese girls is probably #2, at least from my experience. The other reasons follow after that.

If you aren’t in it for one of those two reasons, the other students in your japanese classes can be potentially annoying.

By: woo

woo — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 04:18:44 +0000

I thought Taco Bell was American.

By: Mallory.

Mallory. — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 03:52:40 +0000

Sadly the truth.

By: Spazzmin

Spazzmin — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 02:59:33 +0000

A dying language?! Yeah, ok then… You do realise how many people there are in Japan…

By: Spazzmin

Spazzmin — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 02:57:38 +0000

there’s no such thing as Chinese – it’s Mandarin, Cantonese, etc.; sorry but I kind of have a pet hate about people saying things like, “I want to learn Chinese”. It’s like saying, “I want to learn African”.

By: austin

austin — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 02:12:34 +0000

DO IT CHINESE IS AMAZING.

(I took Japanese first as well; Chinese is much simpler. Unless you want to be able to write anything. I love them both, but Chinese is more fun.)

By: Lily

Lily — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 02:01:01 +0000

xD Lesbians wanted hentai? -big ole hearty laugh-

By: Lily

Lily — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 02:00:08 +0000

Nope. I hate pretty much everything stereotypically Hispanic except for Taco Bell. Notice the “stereotypically”.

By: Turk

Turk — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 01:35:58 +0000

On the contrary, 63% of people who take Spanish love Chipotle.

By: Stef

Stef — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 00:46:48 +0000

Seconded. I doodle from time to time, and I’ve dabbled in the anime drawings less because it’s ‘omgkawaiidesuyo’ and more cause it’s really damn hard when it’s done right, blargh. I took it because I’m that 1% who likes the culture and language of Japan (it’s also my fifth language, woo!), and it’s a good challenge. I’m gonna try taking Chinese when I get the chance as well.

I got a lot of lesbians in my class asking me to draw hentai with what’s-his-face from Inuyasha for them and when I replied, ‘I’d rather stab myself in the face’ they refused to talk to me for the rest of the class. I’m glad they all stopped after the first year. Although, I can’t find anywhere near me that has anything higher than level 3, so I’m stuck learning it by myself.

By: Yukito

Yukito — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 23:46:22 +0000

Except that Japanese have the highest standard of living on the planet. If you can actually break into the economy… but you have to get through all the foreigners’ red tape first.

By: Yukito

Yukito — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 23:44:11 +0000

What about those in Japanese 300 level and up? ‘Tis a little different:

5 % People learning Mandarin and Japanese simultaneously
20 % Natives who can speak fluently, but don’t know kanj {the characters in written Japanese)
10% Koreans/ Chinese who think Japanese will be easy
15% People who actually studied abroad in Japan to get that good
5% Professional translators
35% Future JET teachers
10% Anime/J-Pop/Culture fans who somehow are actually decent at the language

By: The Sizzler

The Sizzler — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 22:28:00 +0000

Japanese is a dying language anyway. Anyone who is forward-thinking should be learning Mandarin. Languages are for more than reading yaoi.

By: Max

Max — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 21:58:51 +0000

I once took an Intro to Italian class because I wanted to figure out what Solozzo and Michael were talking about in the restaurant before Michael shoots him and McCluskey. So I see nothing wrong with taking Japanese because you like anime.

By: heruyan

heruyan — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 21:56:43 +0000

yay! like me.

By: lady rocketpants

lady rocketpants — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 21:43:07 +0000

although the spanish part is probably true…

By: Cadmus

Cadmus — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 20:47:55 +0000

It’s all true! I did it for 2.5 years at an evening class. I’ve used it a grand total of once and I did only take it as I was a anime fan.

By: Jesse Ruderman

Jesse Ruderman — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 20:35:43 +0000

You forgot “to meet and impress cute Japanese girls”.

By: Lily

Lily — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 19:22:25 +0000

I don’t get it either. A chart about taking French doesn’t say “63% of people learning this love crepes” or, for Spanish, “63% of people learning this love piñatas”. Seriously.

By: ethana2

ethana2 — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 19:03:02 +0000

Hmmm… I don’t quite get where I fit here.. maybe I just don’t count since I dropped it the class. ..eventually I’ll learn lojban.

By: Eeyore

Eeyore — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 17:56:12 +0000

Not completely true. While I did have an interest in anime I continued learning Japanese because of both the traditonal and modern culture. I haven’t even watched anime in years, though dramas might be a bit of a different story…. My interests in Japan now are anthropologically/ethnologically/linguistically influenced. Our percentage may be small, but we do really exist.

You also failed to mention the percentage who are (mostly) guys who have an Asian fetish.

By: Nyaon

Nyaon — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 17:41:52 +0000

rofl, this is true. Not like they don’t cross more than is necessary.

And it’s not like anything doesn’t have its own share of crap. Anime/JPop/JRock is just really outspoken about it.

By: LB

LB — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 17:26:23 +0000

Xenophobia is a bitch

By: whitey138

whitey138 — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 17:09:22 +0000

they sould fit in with the anime people im guessing. it should encompass all that crap.