The success rate of Japanese learners
Most Westerners, in fact the vast majority, who study Japanese will ultimately fail. I only have a general idea based on personal experience and discussion of the topic, but I know that very few of us actually succeed at internalizing the language.
I was discussing this with one particularly successful Japanese learner (my wife) to hear her take on the state of Japanese learners, and it looks like we’re on the same page about the situation, despite her experience being completely different from mine. While I was a Japanese major at an American university who went to study and live abroad in Japan, she studied Japanese in order to enroll as a full-time student in a Japanese university. While I studied with primarily Westerners (mostly Americans), as a Korean at a language school in Japan she studied with mostly Chinese, Korean, and other Asian students. Yet we still draw the same conclusion: Westerners are more likely to abandon their goal of Japanese mastery than Asian students.
By her own admission, Korean and Chinese learners have it easier. Westerners coming at the language from a completely different linguistic perspective have to put in a lot more effort to learn Japanese. It takes dedication to learn the language, and dedication is an easy thing to abandon. It’s easier to quit than to master, and I reckon that really only about 1% of people who set out to learn Japanese accomplish that goal to a significant degree.
I’m selfish, especially regarding my status
To be honest, I don’t really care if all the people who want to learn Japanese actually do. In fact, I’d rather most people didn’t learn the language. The more foreign Japanese speakers there are, the less special my status becomes. In effect, I become Just Another Japanese Speaker. That’s why I tend to value my Korean studies more than my Japanese studies, because it means more for lack of peers.
But still, although I’m a (self-centered) learner first, I’m a (student-centered) educator as well, and there’s something that drives me to talk about the language learning process with other learners. However, there’s only so much a teacher can do to inspire motivation in students, and considering productive results, it may be better just to focus on learners who are serious about making improvements in their studies, so I guess this blog is actually targeting the top 2% of language learners – The 1% of potential success stories, and the next 1% who are teetering on the edge.
Maintaining this blog is a win-win for me, personally, even if no one comes away with anything from it. At the very least, I’ll be involved in a conversation with other successful learners (which is a plus for me as a learner), and there’s also the possibility that something I write about here inspires intrinsic motivation in other learners (which is a plus for me as an educator). There’s also the bonus that my scribblings here give me ideas for my classroom lectures as well.
So if anyone out there is looking for the secret to learning Japanese (or any other language, for that matter), I can tell you how I think that it is best accomplished: Just keep at it.
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“Westerners coming at the language from a completely different linguistic perspective have to put in a lot more effort to learn Japanese.”
I think that for me it’s that difference that makes it easier to learn Japanese. For me things stand out because they are different, and also I think that without that difference I wouldn’t have the same interest and motivation to learn Japanese that I do. Not that it’s all smooth sailing…
I like to think of it as a really rough ride in the linguistic outback – A hard journey, but one that you certainly won’t forget.
I have to agree with the post on this one. My experience learning Korean was much easier for having known Japanese. Even some of the explanations made much more sense in Japanese than in English such that I was frequently borrowing my Japanese classmates’ grammar books to go over points that I didn’t understand from my English one. I imagine that it would be the same in the other direction.
I truly feel we’re riding the same road, Michael. Japanese was my major, and I’ve since expanded into Chinese (slightly) and Korean (considerably more). Learning Korean after learning Japanese is a smooth ride. Learning German (as I’ve just recently started) is even easier!
Interesting post. I believe that the abysmally low success rate is due to one and one reason only – lack of a clear focus.
You see, most of us language learners (myself included) venture out to conquer the so-called rare, unique and “difficult” languages such as Japanese without realising its full implications.
We want fluency and we want it as soon as possible. And not just fluency – most of us (raised on PD blogs and AJATT) want full-blown native-level fluency without realising what the term actually implies and the associated burdens. After all, the language isn’t just going to maintain itself once you’ve finished “learning” it. You need to constantly be on your guard lest the mites of memory bring down your sturdy linguistic house which you worked so hard to build.
Since Japanese is one of the more difficult languages, people pursuing it as a hobby tend to give up pretty easily. It’s easy to work for hours on end to build up a skill if you know that it will actually come in handy. So the motivation matters more than the actual process.
I guess what I’m trying to say here is “Get your priorities right and goals straight and you can breeze through knowing that all the elbow grease is going to pay off later on”.
Your class makeup is a lot like mine
Your class dress is a lot like mine, as well!
We’ve got a lot in common, Claytonian. 言語景色にも公にも目立つ二人だ。