Japanese and Navi

sefuheron · February 20, 2010, 05:27:55 AM

I have a question. I am currently trying to learn Japanese, just after I started on Navi... I cant help but notice how similar these two languages are. I am beginning to believe that it will be almost impossible to learn both, as one will probably overwrite the other.

Any opinions on this?

Fnua Atxkxe · February 20, 2010, 05:31:40 AM

What similarities do you see? Just out of interest, I was thinking of learning Japanese at some point. Don't they have like, three alphabets? Sorry can't answer your question

jparachoniak · February 20, 2010, 12:02:40 PM

I tried learning Japanese a while ago (lost interest/didn't know how)

The similarities have to do with word order freedom and the concept of Noun cases. Something really new to us English speakers.

Those are the similarities I've noticed.

wm.annis · February 20, 2010, 01:24:14 PM

Quote from: sefuheron on February 20, 2010, 05:27:55 AMI have a question. I am currently trying to learn Japanese, just after I started on Navi... I cant help but notice how similar these two languages are. I am beginning to believe that it will be almost impossible to learn both, as one will probably overwrite the other.

For two glorious semesters in college (lo, those many years ago), I had classes in Chinese (Mandarin), Japanese and Sanskrit. While it's true I wasn't expected to produce spoken Sanskrit on the spot, nonetheless there was never really any confusion. The languages are all different enough.

While there may be some superficial similarities between Na'vi and Japanese, they aren't deep similarities. Frommer doesn't know Japanese. I can't imagine them interfering with each other while you're studying both.

Nyx · February 20, 2010, 01:56:08 PM

I know some people who studied Spanish for 3 years, and when they tried Italian they couldn't tell the difference any more. And a similar thing happened to me with German and Dutch. It takes quite a bit of work to get out of that gulf. But those languages are so similar that they sometimes sound like they're only accents. I think you're safe with Na'vi and Japanese, they sound very different from each other, and the similarities in grammar might be a huge help as you could use patterns from one for the other. Don't quote me on the last part though, I haven't studied any Japanese

Tsu'roen · February 21, 2010, 07:28:02 AM

Now I'm German and grew up close to the Dutch border. I don't know how to confuse those two languages as they sound quiet different and are also quiet a bit different in grammar.

Nyx · February 21, 2010, 08:08:42 AM

Quote from: Tsu'roen on February 21, 2010, 07:28:02 AM
Now I'm German and grew up close to the Dutch border. I don't know how to confuse those two languages as they sound quiet different and are also quiet a bit different in grammar.

There are quite a few words that are really similar, i think that's why it's easy for an outsider to confuse them. I mean, I could actually understand Dutch before I started studying it, because I spoke German (and maybe Swedish helped too, hehe). I think that since you grew up with it, it's easier for you to keep them apart. However, nowadays I have no trouble at all ^^

My point was anyway that similarities can be an advantage when you're studying languages that aren't really related (like Japanese and Na'vi).

sefuheron · February 23, 2010, 03:27:13 AM

Yeah, i guess it will get better as I go. Some consonants are the same, like the r. And vowels all get spoken.

I admit I do like subject particles in both. And japanese doesnt worry about changing nouns baswd upon plurality. Guess on the surface they seem more similar.

Arigato and irayo my friends.