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[silent-noise]

so i'm currently learning japanese...i got the hirigana and katakana down...but what's the best way of learning the kanji? i'm finding it extremely difficult to remember the characters, adn their meanings...which is kind of ironic given my background...

[PAULH]

[abufletcher]

The only way to learn anything is to make it relevant to you and your own interests. Learning random kanji will waste years of your life -- as it has wasted years of every Japanese person's educational life (and I still have university students who don't know the kanji for many words). I've tried kanji lists and flash cards but always end of giving up once I notice that 90% of the kanjis are completely irrelevant to my life.

I suggest you go to the bookstore and buy a magazine on a topic of interest to you. Find an article in it that you really wish you could read, and start there.

BTW, I find the traditional radical system to be rather bizarre and archane. I'd recommend you start with a dictionary that uses the Halpern system. This is a modern, logically thought out system that groups kanji according to their wholistic dominant visual shapes (much as I suspect normal human vision works). I find it much easier to find an given kanji this way that according to radicals.

[guest of Japan]

The traditional radical system comes in handy when looking them up on your electronic dictionary.

Honestly though, Kanji irk me something aweful. About 6 months ago I had about 400 in my brain, but basic grammar and functional vocabulary were fast escaping my brain. I changed course in my studies. A few hundred of those kanji are no longer in my brain. God, how I miss studying Spanish so long ago. If only my wife weren't Japanese and her family, too.

[shuize]

When I was a foreign exchange student I met another foreign exchange student from Italy who passed along some very wise words about the study of kanji:

Only the first 1,000 are hard. After that it gets easy.

[Brooks]

I like the Kumon series of books.
I learn what elementary school kids learn.
And if you sign up for JLPT next year you will have a good excuse to study more.

For Kanji, you can remember by writing. But you need a lot of reading practice, too.

Frankly, I find Japanese grammar more difficult to understand or remember.

I remember going to Frankfurt a couple of years ago, and I thought it was nice that even though I didn`t know German, at least I could partially understand signs. In Japan, it is a challenge.
I have come to really appreciate alphabets.
Kanji really seems passe.


look at this www.kanjisite.com

[Zzonkmiles]

Ride the train and read maps. That'll help you learn the on-yomi (readings) of a whole ton of characters since these maps and station signs often include romaji.

I agree with the poster who said make your learning relevant by buying a magazine about a topic that interests you. You'll pick up a lot of vocab that way. I personally play Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy games in Japanese and that helps a lot for me.

It's hard now, but it does get easier if you stick with it. You'll be surprised at how many characters you can pick up or even accurately guess what the meaning is just by like at them. There IS a method to the madness (most of the time). For example, if you combine 暗 (the kanji alone means "dark (kurai)" but its on-yomi is "an") and 示 (the kanji alone indicates "show" and is read as "ji"), you get 暗示, read as "anji," which means "hint." When you "show" something in a "dark" or "shrouded" way, you are giving a "hint." Kinda logical, right? There are loads of sensicle kanji compounds out there, but you have to be disciplined enough to stick with it.

[abufletcher]