The method I spoke of is the one invented by Joseph Jacotot, which I learned about from the writings of French magus Joséphin Péladan. Basically what you do is find a text in both languages. It can be anything at all. You memorize it in both languages, a sentence at a time. This literally restructures your brain so you pick up the inner structure of the language, and makes learning it much, much faster.
I don't know Japanese, so I'll use Latin as an example. Let's say you choose The Hobbit. In English, the first sentence is "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit." In Latin -- I'm using Mark Walker's fine Latin translation here -- that's "In foramine terrae habitabat hobbitus." Memorize them both so you can repeat them out loud. Don't try to analyze -- just know that one means the other. Go on to the next sentence, or (since it's long) the next phrase: "Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell" in English; "Nec foedum, sordidum madidumque foramen, nec extremis lumbricorum atque odore caenoso impletum" in Latin. Learn one pair of sentences a day. Review the previous day's sentences every day. Do whatever other language exercise you like, but keep at the memorization. In a matter of weeks you'll have picked up much more vocabulary than you expect, and will also have absorbed a lot of grammar and structure. That's the method.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
branchandroot
Re: Learning a new language
Date: 2024-06-10 09:16 pm (UTC)I don't know Japanese, so I'll use Latin as an example. Let's say you choose The Hobbit. In English, the first sentence is "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit." In Latin -- I'm using Mark Walker's fine Latin translation here -- that's "In foramine terrae habitabat hobbitus." Memorize them both so you can repeat them out loud. Don't try to analyze -- just know that one means the other. Go on to the next sentence, or (since it's long) the next phrase: "Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell" in English; "Nec foedum, sordidum madidumque foramen, nec extremis lumbricorum atque odore caenoso impletum" in Latin. Learn one pair of sentences a day. Review the previous day's sentences every day. Do whatever other language exercise you like, but keep at the memorization. In a matter of weeks you'll have picked up much more vocabulary than you expect, and will also have absorbed a lot of grammar and structure. That's the method.