optimistic-gold•6mo ago
Is watching netflix without subtitles in 3 months really possible?
I was looking to buy the lifetime sub potentially. I currently use Language Reactor but a one time price is very convincing.
Do you have any information about what percentage of english speakers manage to watch netflix in Japanese without subtitles within 3 months of starting to learn with Migaku?
146 Replies
fair-rose•6mo ago
@jake Don't think we have such concrete numbers, but to start doing so effectively, all you really need to do is go through the Japanese Fundamentals course and then a little bit of the Japanese Academy course (which you can do in around 3 months).
Maybe other users can chime in as to their personal experiences from when they started consuming Netflix.
optimistic-goldOP•6mo ago
I also noticed it’s a similar number of months to some other languages that are traditionally considered much easier for english speakers to learn (eg like 1/3rd of the time to reach the same level)
😆 I guess watching netflix isn’t necessarily the same as understanding netflix, fair enough.
fair-rose•6mo ago
Actually even more. You could start right away.
You need to understand what watching netflix in a foreign language means. It's about learning. Not sitting back and enjoying it like it's your mother tongue.
And this way of learning is backed by actual language acquisition theory: You learn by understanding messages. You understand messages by watching netflix with Migaku and making use of that very convenient popup dictionary.
The introductionary course of Migaku simply helps you with acquiring some vocab beforehand with the most efficient Method, which aims at giving you sentences where you only have 1 unknown entity, which in most cases will be one unknown word.
If you jump directly into shows to learn vocab it might be a bit overwhelming at the beginning, as - depending on the show - you would often have two unknowns or more. Not impossible ... but harder.
optimistic-goldOP•6mo ago
So long as you understand enough to start picking up words.
This is more feedback. Everything on the marketing pages looks really solid, the reasoning, the features / etc. That one claim on the home page just… idk made me suspicious 😆
Anyway, that does clarify, thanks!
xenial-black•6mo ago
My understanding is if you do the course (or your own frequency deck if they do not have a course yet) consistently for 90 days you should be able to immerse by those 90 days. Personally for me in French which I started recently. I could immerse on Netflix and YT from day 1 and it was comfortably after a couple of weeks. I think 3 months in a just a conservative estimate just to be safe.
fair-rose•6mo ago
To be clear, it does say "start watching Netflix" not "effortlessly consume shows on Netflix." I definitely understand where you're coming from. We try to be really careful to walk the fine line between misleading claims and marketing what we see as an incredibly powerful and useful product faithfully.
So much out there is quick to say you will get fluent, etc. after X or Y short period of time. That is definitely not us or what we claim
optimistic-goldOP•6mo ago
Right, I think my issue is that it doesn’t have enough substance to it to really be meaningful.
To be clear it’s very possible you’ve A/B tested it, and it does cause more conversions, and people that otherwise wouldn’t have started learning started learning, and accomplished more than they would have otherwise.
So it’s very likely a net positive.
I’m probably not reading it the same way as the average user. But to me it’s at best not specific enough to mean anything, or at worst misleading.
Also using the same 3 months makes it seem like it’s just made up, intuitively.
fair-rose•6mo ago
I'll defer to @lima_murat (UTC +5) @suikacider on whether they want to make changes to that language
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
3 months is conservative for e.g. french, and optimistic for japanese. So you won’t have to try hard to get there for french, but you’ll have to try harder in the case of japanese.
rival-black•6mo ago
3 months for japanese is pure nonsense.
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
Academy course plus fundamental is around 2300 cards. Study 25 cards per day (which is a lot but doable) and you’re done within that time.
xenial-black•6mo ago
"Start watching" is the term used and it isn't exactly a scientific term. I've heard people talk about starting to watch slice of life anime after a little while of doing the course consistently.
rival-black•6mo ago
Even if you could pull that off (lol) you still won't understand anything.
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
This is such grounded marketing that Im kind of scratching my head at the discourse surrounding it lol.
Do you have any idea how many notifications Ive gotten from hello chinese saying "Get FLUENT in 3 months!"??
xenial-black•6mo ago
I have seen YT videos in my recommended about learning a language in a week.
fair-rose•6mo ago
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
Why are you so confident about that?
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
According to my calculations, you'd be able to understand precisely 2300 words :KEKW:
relaxed-coral•6mo ago
I remember that when I watched The Bad Kids I only had about 800 words registered as known and in some episodes I had up to 80% comprehension. 2400 seems little but as a start it's not so bad, you just have to find the right shows
rival-black•6mo ago
Because I am several years in and still can't understand much. Also because of the way the brain processes information. Japanese people can read and write English decently, but they can't speak or understand anything they hear as a general rule. Its like saying "I've watched all these swimming videos about how to swim, I'll be fine jumping off the boat in the ocean."
No, you would theoretically be able to recognize 2300 words on paper (the classic "I passed N1 but can't watch anything without subtitles or have an actual conversation with anyone"), which means very little when it comes to actually hearing and understanding those words on the fly in a real conversation. Everybody has had the experience of hearing a sentence and not recognizing one or more words that they definitely knew, or hearing a sentence where they knew every word, but didn't under the meaning of the sentence as a whole.
You definitely did not have 80% comprehension with 800 words and that low level of grammar.
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
Someone who knows 2300 words needs to start consuming loads of input in order to improve comprehension.
One might even say it’s time for them to “start watching Netflix”
fair-rose•6mo ago
Am I correct in the assumption that you didn't try to consume media in your target language a lot so far? That's kinda the whole point.
If you start doing that after 3 months (or even earlier) instead of classic vocabulary lists and so on, you will be able to understand a lot of stuff quicker due to how language acquisition works.
I know people who started roughly 9 months ago and are watching anime and playing games in Japanese now. They are well on their way to N2.
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
That's correct. The only way to start understanding is a lot of input. If you want to go hard, several hours per day.
I myself often only get 1 hour per day, so even though I live in Japan, there's still a lot of fast speech I don't understand. But I understand enough. It's not black and white.
rival-black•6mo ago
No. The majority of my study has been listening. 2-6 hours a day for 3 years. I still can't hardly understand anything. Most everything is too fast, slurred, doesn't register as language.
I don't believe anyone who claims they can watch anime AND understand it (much less read it well) in 9 months. That's just absurd lying. No idea why you would believe that.
fair-rose•6mo ago
Passive listening? Or actual comprehensible listening? Because you need the latter to acquire language. Just sitting around and getting bombarded with words one doesn't know, doesn't help a lot.
I can guarantee you that it's not lying. It's just that people who struggle with language often learn in a bad way (passive listening only, grammar exercises, trying to learn grammar by heart and so on). I myself had that problem for years because barely anybody tells you how you actually acquire language.
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
You can watch with subtitles
You can repeat lines
rival-black•6mo ago
About 50% is passive. You can't go somewhere to find something comprehensible to your level. Everyone knows different things. Once you get past baby talk its a free for all.
Your claim is basically miraculous and if it were true people would be writing papers on it and getting prizes. The brain cannot process new information that quickly.
I might be worse than many at languages (even stuff I know often doesn't register as language when I hear it), but what you are claiming is absurd. Even stevie, the miracle man, said after his 1.5 years to N1 he could still only understand like 70% of what he heard. I don't believe for a second that anyone did that in 9 months.
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
You can watch this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-umeYLvhtU&list=PLmhqv13HLg3eyeZrtO-f6yUns9Esnu_dj
Comprehensible Japanese
YouTube
Actions with a smartphone (Japanese TPR Lesson) スマホを使っていろんな動作をしよう！(...
I’m Yuki Kimura, a native Japanese speaker living in Fukuoka, Japan. I make Japanese lesson videos to help learners to acquire Japanese in the most natural and fun way.
Let me give you a quick introduction to my teaching method and how it’s effective.
My teaching method is based on Dr. Krashen’s Input hypothesis. Dr. Stephen Krashen, a famous ...
rival-black•6mo ago
That would require being able to read kanji at a native speed. I can hardly read at all.
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
I think your view of what "watch something in 3 months" is, is too narrow. Of course you won't be able to do it comfortably in most cases
You can repeat lines and train yourself in this way. Often, reading Kanji together with hearing the words maximizes comprehension
fair-rose•6mo ago
It's not miraculous. If you want papers ... people do write papers about it. Have been for years. The most popular is this guy:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiTsduRreug
There's more like this study from the Cambridge University:
https://www.cambridge.org/elt/blog/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Extensive-Reading-whitepaper_72dpi.pdf
And also this guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yW8M4Js4UBA
Mark Rounds
YouTube
Stephen Krashen on Language Acquisition
Stephen Krashen on Language Acquisition from the 80s.
Beyond Language Learning
YouTube
ALG: The Most Unique Language Learning Method
Automatic Language Growth is an effortless, comprehensible input-based approach to second language acquisition. Its goal is for adults to speak new languages as fluently and as accurately as native speakers. ALG is based in part on Krashen's Natural Approach and ideas about comprehensible input. Two main things that make ALG different from other...
rival-black•6mo ago
I think when most people hear that, they aren't thinking, "Oh, I can begin to try to listen". They are likely to think they will be able to understand shows as if they are watching English.
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
That wouldn't be a very motivating headline
rival-black•6mo ago
I am aware of krashen. I found migaku via Matt. Nobody is getting fluent in 9 months in those studies.
Well, now you ae arguing marketing vs reality.
fair-rose•6mo ago
We are talking watching Netflix. Not being fluent. Former is input, latter is more about output. But input is the base for output.
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
You don't have to aim for this goal if you don't believe it's possible. Somebody else might, and work it out too. It depends on your goals and willingness to do what it takes to get there
rival-black•6mo ago
Do you honestly think that when someone hears "watch netflix" they believe that means "struggle to understand a few words here and there"? Or do you think they believe they will be able to follow what is going on?
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
Most people will not reach their goals. It's the nature of the game. Not everybody who signs up for a gym membership in January will still be going by March
But they might be going again in April, or next year, or a year later
It's not always linear
There's only way to find out if it works or not
fair-rose•6mo ago
I believe as a language learner one should see it as "Use it to learn" instead of "watching fluently" to begin with. Furthermore Migakus claim is "start watching" and, as i understand it, aims more at the point of "Learn some basics and then throw yourself in to continue the journey"
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
The goal post youve created is fluent now? Sheesh, next youre gonna start talking about how no one gets their PhD in East Asian studies in 2 hours
watching anime and playing video games in japanese within 9 months really isnt crazy at all. The Defense Language Institutes Japanese course is 14 and a half months with a curriculum full of inefficient classroom time
rival-black•6mo ago
he claimed people who started 9 months ago are watching and reading , which is basically fluent.
not "watching and read so badly they spend 20 minutes on a single page" or pausing every line of dialog
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
Did he say they read or watch fluently? One has to read and watch to progress from bad to good
rival-black•6mo ago
if he meant the later, then thats being very misleading
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
That's just semantics
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
we have extremely different ideas of what fluent is
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
You have to start like this. It's the definition of the path
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
bro is gonna have a stroke when he sees what middlebury does in 8 weeks
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
Middlebury Language Schools
YouTube
Middlebury Language Schools: Before and After
Beginning Chinese student (Level 1), Jason Steyn, is interviewed on the first day of Middlebury Language Schools and the final day just after exams.
Middlebury College has been delivering life-changing summer immersion language programs from beginner to graduate level for over 100 years. Middlebury offers 11 languages (Arabic, Chinese, French, ...
rival-black•6mo ago
fluent means yu can interact in the language at full speed and there are no comprehension or understanding issues on either side when speaking about general topics.
fair-rose•6mo ago
Becasue they don't spend 20 minutes of a page as they use tools like migaku for lookups of words they don't understand.
The main feature of Migaku is a popup dictionary to be used with subtitles. Consuming content and looking stuff up is the learning.
rival-black•6mo ago
ok, well if they are looking up 50 words a page thats something else entirely. someone can do that from day one, but that's not what people think is happening when you say they are watching and playing games
fair-rose•6mo ago
You are the only one using the "fluent" claim.
rival-black•6mo ago
because words have implications
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
Yeah fluent does somewhat imply "fluent" comprehension. I wouldn't say fluency in 9 months is realistic, but if you grind from morning to evening, it's likely not impossible either. But we don't promise this part, do we
rival-black•6mo ago
again, nobody who hears "they play games and watch netflix" is going to imagine someone clicking on 500 unknown words in an anime episode or 15 minute segment of game dialog
fluent in 9 months is absolutely impossible
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
It's because they don't know the process. Once they do, they'll understand
Simply a skill issue, limit of understanding
Lack of knowledge
For almost all people, yes
fair-rose•6mo ago
It's not like they lookup so much either.
I also don't know what your point here is. That you don't want to try consuming media because you learned without it so far and can't understand it fluently? In that case you will have some troubles ever reaching fluency.
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
Watch that middlebury video. Youre telling me you honestly dont think he would be able to watch donghua with over 4x times as much time in that method?
multiple-amethyst•6mo ago
So you're telling me, you chuck someone into a random town in Japan with a Japanese family, their one goal in life for the following 9 months is to learn Japanese to fluency and they can spend every waking hour learning and immersing, you don't believe they will be fluent by the end of that?
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
Btw kaufman became fluent in chinese in approximately a year
rival-black•6mo ago
no, for all people.
lol, no he didn't
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
It's fine if you choose to believe that. Maybe you're right
rival-black•6mo ago
correct, not even close.
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
I don't have prove that it's possible or impossible. Maybe the proof is out there somewhere. Somebody who tried
rival-black•6mo ago
and maybe elves made of cotton candy are sustaining our dimension
multiple-amethyst•6mo ago
Fair enough then, agree to disagree I guess
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
I know some people who believe something close to that xD
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
rival-black•6mo ago
sure, people believe all sorts of nonsense.
he did not learn 25k words and grammar and become so comfortable using them he could speak freely without issue and understand without issue in a year.
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
That's a fun conversation though! Thank you. I have to go back to building a brick wall now though before the concrete cures
continuing-cyan•6mo ago
I think an inherent keystone/bias of input-based learning approaches is that you achieve fluency by reading and watching things; not that you wait to become fluent to do these things
I'm reading Solo Leveling in Korean despite knowing only 660 words
It is relatively slow going; I can read an episode in Mandarin in ~5 minutes, but it takes me ~25 minutes in Korean. All the same, it doesn't take a ton of effort, and it's a lot more fun to learn Korean this way than with a textbook
Even as a beginner, it's not really that troublesome:
1. Keyboard command to OCR a bubble
2. Migaku detects that my clipboard has content and adds it to the top-right panel
3. I click on new words; if I still don't understand, I copy the dialogue line to Papago
4. If the sentence has only one unknown word, the word seems useful, and the sentence is OK, I make a flashcard out of it
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
in my experience rawdogging anki quite intensly for 1 month after 1 month of slow paced learning was enough to start watching simple content
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
mind you this is in 2021 and we're heading towards 2025 and i still wouldnt be able to 100% grasp a netflix show
japanese btw
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
Lol this is insane. But if it works, it helps to prove our point lol
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
yeah it does. looking back, the only prerequisite that helped me was just listening to tons lots of japanese content without understanding anything before this
because it seems like people that skip this end up always struggling with being able to hear the actual sounds of language
i'm in jp right now and i'd still give credit to that month as being the basis of my language ability tbh
relaxed-coral•6mo ago
I'm not the best example because I didn't start from scratch and I had more or less 800 words at that time because I was manually adding the known words while I was finding the words in the subtitles. I can't speak about the grammar because I didn't use the Migaku fundamentals course either. I guess this gives you a base, enough to start watching content. Anyway, I still think that even a little vocabulary can give you a high comprehension if you look for content that is not too complex, in this case it is a series in which the protagonists are children so it is not strange that in some episodes you have a decent comprehension with little.
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
If it’s so easy to understand children then why can’t I understand a word this little shit says? HUH SMART GUY?
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
relaxed-coral•6mo ago
I'm a woman, and I think it's because those children speak anime language, you have to do certain rituals and human sacrifices before you understand how they speak
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
*HUH SMART GAL
Kaufman was a delegate to China when canada formally recognized the PRC and learned mandarin in a year of intense study.
World record holder Munkhshur Narmandakh memorized the exact order of 1,092 playing cards in 30 minutes.
Just because you might not have personally accomplished something does not make it impossible.
I'm roughly 2.5 years in, I've been going at a really slow pace (averaging probably less than 1 hour of immersion a day) and I can watch slice of life anime without issue (90%+ word comprehension). If I did it in 2.5 years with minimal effort, there definitely are people who can achieve that much quicker.
rival-black•6mo ago
Doing a memorization trick is not learning and being functional in a language.
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
"memorization trick"
rival-black•6mo ago
By pushing these silly stories you're basically saying that anyone who can't replicate this is retarded
memorizing cards is a trick, yes
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
It is the standardized way to test memory palace competency....
Do you think that it only works with cards?
rival-black•6mo ago
it's a gimmick. Nobody is walking around in their "memory palace" when talking to someone in a second language.
exotic-emerald•6mo ago
many thousands of people have used memory palaces to learn a second language. You keep inventing ridiculous scenarios and making that the goalpost
extremely telling about the projection that is occuring here
rival-black•6mo ago
No projection. The only reason to bring of claims of these extreme outliers is to make normal people look bad and incompetent.
xenial-black•6mo ago
Some people are probably better at languages than other but I think these stories are inspiring. I do not think people hear about stories of how profession athletes got good at their craft and find it discouraging. I do not really seen why learning a second language would be that different. The process of learning a language is fundamentally the same even if some may have advantages of some sort.
fair-rose•6mo ago
You know ... you wanted papers about how to quickly learn a language. Which I provided. Where are the papers confirming your position?
At the moment all I am seeing you doing is trying to deny the achievements of people and wanting them to agree that your method is the only way and anybody saying they achieved goals faster is just lying. Basically trying to pull down others to your level so you don't have to change.
You learned a lot with not much visible progress. It sucks. I know that feeling. I was in that spiral for a good decade.
But why not try yourself what people who made faster progress are telling you to try out?
rival-black•6mo ago
I didn't suggest any method, nor did I suggest consuming content was wrong. I simply said people on the internet lie about their accomplishments. Krashen's input hypothesis is not universally accepted and has been heavily critiqued as inadequate. Nobody is saying input is a bad idea.
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
fair-rose•6mo ago
So you just want to criticise without any goal or proposition what would be better whatsoever? Not sure there is much room for discussion then.
And Krashens theory is the generally accepted theory regarding language acquisition. He didn't even invent it. It's been around for at least a hundred years. You can find all sorts of linguists talking about it. From all kinds of reputable sources. Not only Universities but also the UN for example. https://unric.org/en/why-do-children-learn-languages-more-effortlessly-than-adults/
United Nations Western Europe
Why do children learn languages more effortlessly than adults?
UNRIC spoke to Dr. Eleonore Smalle (Ghent University, Belgium) about the recent findings in the field of language learning.
rival-black•6mo ago
I don't know the answer as to what would be better. Many suggest output is needed, which seems to be the true in my case. Since I have started, it has made a difference. But I wouldn't say that is THE answer.
I've seen many linguistics talking about how different people need different approaches.
Input has certainly been overlooked by most language learners and traditonal teachers.
No disputing that.
fair-rose•6mo ago
When you talk you get better at talking. But hard to talk if you never heard how to talk. Which brings us back to input.
It's not like anybody said "Just listen all the time and suddenly you are perfect at speaking!"
rival-black•6mo ago
That's literally What Matt was selling for years.
And his new scammer partner is also saying that, "just watch anime bro"
fair-rose•6mo ago
I am not aware of Matt or what he said. I can tell you though that Krashens theory does not say this.
rival-black•6mo ago
Ken's whole scam was "just listen all day"
xenial-black•6mo ago
I think some studies show grammar is acquired quicker through output.
rival-black•6mo ago
And another guy just cropped up on youtube selling this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fvCb5_Nzq4
Trenton《トレントン》
YouTube
Learning Japanese Isn't Actually That Hard
immersion is kinda cool ngl
➣ Resources
-Stephen Krashen on Comprehensible Input: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnUc_W3xE1w
➣ Anki
- Immersion Kit: https://www.immersionkit.com/dictionary
- Jpdb: https://jpdb.io/
- Pre-Made Decks: https://ankiweb.net/shared/decks
- Anki Connect Addon: https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/2055492159
➣ Pitch Acce...
rival-black•6mo ago
It is definitely true in my case.
xenial-black•6mo ago
Subjectively when I output I notice my mistakes when I read or listen again.
fair-rose•6mo ago
I mean ... you are arguing besides the point now. "Some guy on.youtube said something wrong!" is not a good argument against the benefits of input and theory of language acquisition.
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
Same here. But there might be this nuance to it: It’s psychologically easier to imitate people close to me who i speak with, than some anime character lol
fair-rose•6mo ago
That goes in line with Krashens monitoring hypothesis. Even though how useful grammar actually is, is heavily debated. At some point it all comes down to word meaning anyways.
rival-black•6mo ago
rival-black•6mo ago
Seems to be related to some level of unconscious level of understanding and getting it to stick and be recognizable.
fair-rose•6mo ago
With "anybody" I mean reputable sources. Not "random guy I found somewhere"
rival-black•6mo ago
What % of language learners are reading research papers as opposed to going to youtube do you think?
fair-rose•6mo ago
That's completely besides the point we are arguing.
rival-black•6mo ago
"At some point it all comes down to word meaning anyways."
Not really when it comes to set phrases. You have to add another layer of abstract meaning onto what the words atcually mean that you have to process on top of the other meanings.
if nobody is doing it, it is relevant.
fair-rose•6mo ago
I am not even sure what you want to argue anymore. It started solely about being able to comprehend sentences. Then you turned it into a fluency and output discussion.
rival-black•6mo ago
Comprehending sentences is a part of fluency. So is output.
fair-rose•6mo ago
But that was not the original topic. It was merely about: Understanding netflix shows.
rival-black•6mo ago
I think youd' be hard pressed to find someone who can understand everything they hear but can't produce it at all.
fair-rose•6mo ago
Sure. But now what? It just feels like this discussion is going in circles and all points have basically been made. With lots of people saying that they learned by watching and can understand shows well enough to follow them.
genetic-orange•6mo ago
I dont think anyone can learn enough of a language to reach comprehension level in 3 months lol
Unless youre a genius or extremeley dedicated
xenial-black•6mo ago
The claim is "start watching", so I would think it is in the realm of possibility based on the claims I have heard from friends who I know who are learning Japanese. I do not know how accurate these claims are. They seemed rather dedicated. Obviously I do not any of the particulars of learning Japanese, but I could read books after a few months of immersing in German. It really depends what you mean by comprehension level. I am almost 40 days in French and am watching and enjoying a series in French. I am probably missing plenty of details and I look up words, but I can watch it, follow the plot, and enjoy it without much difficulty. I was doing around 30-80 new cards a day. Could the same be the case in other languages more divergent from the languages I know? Perhaps but I would not have personal experience myself.
rival-black•6mo ago
lol
genetic-orange•6mo ago
I didn't read the whole argument about what's going on, but from what you said I'm going to assume you guys are arguing about the integrity of their statement being "start watching Netflix in 3 months"
My opinion on it would be that sure you can pick apart the sentence and say that "start watching" doesn't imply you are fluent/can comprehend Japanese
But I think the majority of people at first glance would get the impression that they are subtly implying that you can reach fluency within 3 months to be able to watch Netflix
Because I mean, technically you are right in that they say "start watching" doesn't directly imply fluency, but I mean its a marketing tactic lol
Marketing is just basically getting away with saying as much as you can without lying
Saying "Start watching netflix in 3 months" gives the impression that you will be conversationally fluent enough to understand Japanese in 3 months
If you pick it apart though then you can say that technically it said "start watching" which means a lot of things
So its just a marketing tactic
Its akin to me saying something like "Read this book and you'll be playing like a chess master"
xenial-black•6mo ago
Honestly it is a meaningless statement in my opinion. You could watch from day 1 and start sentence mining if you really wanted to. A lot of people here do not even speak so I am not really sure that many people are conversationally fluent.
genetic-orange•6mo ago
When you say "statement" are you talking about the whole "start watching in 3 months" thing
What statement are you referring to
xenial-black•6mo ago
Yes that is what I mean.
genetic-orange•6mo ago
Oh yeah
Then I would agree with you
It holds no meaning lol
It's just there to entice people as a marketing tactic
xenial-black•6mo ago
My understanding of the origin of the statement is that they have a course after 90 days of doing it consistently you should able to get into easier animes in theory. Is that true? People who have done it can be the judge.
genetic-orange•6mo ago
Wait, what is everyone arguing about then
I don't want to go back and read the 150 messages lol
rival-black•6mo ago
partially what you said, and partially the bogus claim that people are becoming fluent in another language in a year
genetic-orange•6mo ago
Oh
I see
Mmmmmm
I think for the average joe becoming fluent in a year for a language would only be possible for an easier language that is close to your native tongue
rival-black•6mo ago
not even then is it possible.
genetic-orange•6mo ago
When I say close I mean close
Like someone who speaks Cantonese learning Mandarin
Something like that with enough dedication and time would be within realm of possibility
Since the words have a lot of overlap and there are a few tonal changes / additions
rival-black•6mo ago
No amount of dedication can rewire your brain beyond a certain point.
There are physical processes in the brain that need to occur.
genetic-orange•6mo ago
I mean how are you defining fluency
rival-black•6mo ago
both people can speak and understand each other easily and spontaneously when not speaking about specialized subjects. no frequent pauses to remember words or grammar, no frequent misunderstandings. imagine having a converstion with a 12 year old.
you can say what you want to say without having to think about how to do so
you can speak and understand as easily as your native language
genetic-orange•6mo ago
I think this is achievable
This not so much
rival-black•6mo ago
in a year? no
most people NEVER get to this level
genetic-orange•6mo ago
Yes thats why I say this one not so much
But for this I believe it is possible depending on the target language and your native language
rival-black•6mo ago
why?
genetic-orange•6mo ago
For reference the CIA trained their spies foreign language fluency and recorded data on how long it took to reach conversational level for different languages
Let me pull up one of the released studies
rival-black•6mo ago
And why would you think that wasnt propaganda aimed at the enemy? "we can learn your language and infiltrate super quickly"
genetic-orange•6mo ago
It wasn't just for the CIA
It was also for diplomatic relations
I can't find the one by the CIA but I found one by the foreign serviec institute
https://www.state.gov/foreign-language-training/
This one is for teaching language to US diplomats
"The following language learning timelines reflect 76 years of experience in teaching languages to U.S. diplomats, and illustrate the time usually required for a student to reach “General Professional Proficiency” in the language, or a score of “Speaking-3/Reading-3” on the Interagency Language Roundtable (ILR) scale."
I think around Speaking-3 is enough to speak with a 12 year old
They don't have data on anything reaching beyond Speaking-3 though
Where speaking 3 is "what is usually used to measure how many people in the world know a given language. A person at this level is described as follows: • able to speak the language with sufficient structural accuracy and vocabulary to participate. effectively in most conversations on practical, social, and professional topics."
As I was saying I think depending on the language and its similarity to your own native language, learning within a year could be possible
I know it's not another language but what I'm saying is like, say English and Irish (Hiberno-English) english where two different languages.
I could probably learn and become fluent in "Hiberno-English" within a year
Because most of the words overlap and there are a few tonal/pronunciation changes between that and regular English
Kind of how like Portguese speakers can understand most of what a Spanish speaker is saying despite it technically being two different languages
But for something like learning Chinese or Japanese as an english speaker, it probably wouldn't be possible
adverse-sapphire•6mo ago
Brackets just cleaned up this chat
Nice
Japanese is classified as super hard lol. True that. 88 weeks at 2200 hours of structured learning
genetic-orange•6mo ago
lol yeah
For an English speaker its a whole new way of communicating
fair-rose•6mo ago
Funnily enough: If you treat language learning as your dayjob with 8 hours a day then this is doable in a year.
vicious-gold•6mo ago
I kind of agree with the original post that „start watching Netflix in Japanese after 3 months“ is a bit misleading as a claim. We all know it means something along the lines of „start learning Japanese with Netflix after 3 months“ in reality. That is absolutely doable. The claim implies something else, though (casually watching). And I don’t believe that’s realistic for most people after 3 months. I was surprised when I saw it too.
Can it be done? Yes, I think so. Is it realistic for people who aren’t studying full-time? I don’t think so. In that way I agree that that particular claim is misleading. I don’t think it’s good marketing tbh
sensitive-blue•6mo ago
I feel y'all are drowning in a glass of water with this :neet:
fair-rose•6mo ago
Always remember: When the optimist says the glass is half full and the pessimist says the glass is half empty, the physicist ducks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EytSWiKrFg
xkcd's What If?
YouTube
What if a glass of water were LITERALLY half empty?
Get a copy of What If? 2 and Randall’s other books at: https://xkcd.com/books
More serious answers to absurd questions at: https://what-if.xkcd.com/
What if a glass of water was, all of a sudden, literally half empty? The pessimist is probably more right about how it would turn out than the optimist.
Credits
***
Randall Munroe | Narrator
H...