It's hard to consider oneself a card-carrying member of the geek community these days without showing at least a passing interest in Japanese culture. Fact is, to most westerners Japan represents about as foreign a culture as can be imagined, with a language and alphabet that, while often admired from a stylistic standpoint, often seems beyond the grasp of the average mortal.
It's no surprise that the über-geek Internet underground often refers to Japanese as "Moonspeak." While Japanese design, media and movies have made steady inroads into Western culture over the last two decades, a grasp of the language is still relatively rare even amongst those who like to consider themselves Otaku.
The problem is simple: while we'd all like to be able to watch Kōkaku Kidōtai without subtitles, few of us have the time, commitment or dedication to listen to endless hours of language lessons. Life has a certain way of, well, getting in the way.
What if you could learn a language the same way you check your Twitter feed? What if you could apply the concepts of information-snacking and ubiquitous access that form the basis for most good mobile applications to learning a (very) foreign language?
Think about it for just a second. Your iPhone is always with you. During your average day you have a multitude of one-, three- and five-minute intervals of boredom. Those small time-bites, currently used to tweet, play Rolando, or catch up on this blog's RSS feed (hint!), are just the perfect amount of time to learn a new bit of information about a new language.
As luck would have it, there is a wide choice of Japanese learning apps for the iPhone, ranging from flash cards to full-fledged study books. I am currently experimenting with Human Japanese 2.0, a very well written, approachable book-style application which aims to teach the actual inner workings of the language rather than just a number of useful phrases.
Article comments
1 - Catalin Nichita
The Japanese culture is impressive. I've just read Shogun by James Clavell. It's amazing!