Eh JordenJapanese, The Spoken Language – Part 3 (Yale Language Series)

This textbook series shows its age. Made in the 1980s, most situations presented focus around business situations, which was a major reason for deciding to learn Japanese at that time. Vocabulary lists are similarly a little dated (e.g. the word for typewriter is presented, but not the word for cell phone), but that can be remedied with supplemental vocab lists from a teacher or tutor.What makes this textbook truly outstanding is the vast amount of audio material available, either from the Cornell University website or from the OSU website, and the meticulous presentation of accent. Practice audio files are available for hundreds of conversations and drills, and practice with these is critical to good pronunciation and fluent use of grammar. Also, every word and every sentence has marks for pitch accent, and nearly every grammatical explanation includes a note about how pitch accent behaves in the grammatical pattern at hand.The JSL textbook series provides the tools you need to get a solid foundation in spoken Japanese, except for the teacher. Heavy practice with the audio, and application with a teacher using this textbook series will give a great start for advanced fluency.

This textbook has the most comprehensive and logical system of Japanese grammar, admired by the native Japanese linguists. People who complain the textbook is in romaji probably didn't read the introductory chapter of the first volume. Pitch variation does matter in correct Japanese pronunciation to the level you can sound offensive instead of trying to be polite. The textbook uses a written language representation that takes care of correct phonology and pitch variations. This was the main goal: teach you the correct pronunciation of the spoken language, not teach you the written language.

I had to use this for school, and the only thing, and seriously the ONLY thing I don't like about it is that the series is written out all in romanization. There are no Japanese characters in this book. Drove me insane. Also, the romanization is weird.For example, the "shi" sound is written as "si"The "chi" sound is written as "ti" and so on.Other than that, though, I liked it a lot.

Japanese Language book that is in Romaji. Terrible way to learn the language. Explanations are either long, unclear, and difficult to understand or non-existent. Go with any other Japanese book series that written in the language like Japanese for Busy People or the Genki series.

Arrived in condition described. Very helpful book that is quite frankly the quickest way to gaining confidence in fluency in very common phrases heard and spoken every day (certainly none of "the book is under the table" stuff that is not only boring but a phrase that never gets used in real life). This book focuses on extremely high yield phrases and scenarios.