illiterate boy speaks perfect Japanese

[@mattvsjapan]

Here's the link to get Ken's interview with me where I reveal details about my past that I've never discussed publicly before: www.japanesethroughanimeclass.com/matt

[@trevorguy63]

Surprised how no one is talking about how Ken braved all his personal struggles like a champ. Really inspiring.

[@japanjapan7574]

Matt is getting very good at interviewing always asking interesting questions

[@nigelcarruthers335]

"It takes a long time to learn Japanese. At least a year..." 🤣

[@kn.y9108]

If you guys feel like you can’t do anything or something is impossible, just remember this guy learned Japanese just by watching tv

[@Powerphail]

Wow, dude's a fuckin trailblazer. Ken's a cool guy and his story is super interesting. Can't wait to see what you guys are working on together.

[@kl9043]

i really like this guy, hope you keep working with him in the future. the going around in public video you two did was the best one yet, cause you guys just seem to work nicely together. actually got me to sign up for the outtakes and those were great XD

[@Ian24089]

This guy inspired the hell out of me. I've been doing pretty much exactly what he did these past few days and I am already feeling like this is gonna work really well. I'm watching each episode of Naruto, one time subbed, one time raw. I only have two hours a day to dedicate, not eight, but I still expect I will start to see my myself getting a lot better after a few months. This type of natural way of learning languages needs to gain more widespread attention. The traditional studying methods have never worked well for me because it is so boring and hard to commit to. I like this so much more. I learned English (my native language) through immersion, so why not Japanese?

[@thatswhatshesaid9908]

I guess a lot of people here are learning Japanese, so I'll write in Japanese. 英語と日本語はあまりにもかけ離れた言語で、習得するのにはとてつもない時間がかかるのにも関わらず挑戦しようと思ったそのマインドセットを尊敬する。そもそも言語の種類が違うし、ピッチアクセントとか漢字とか学ぶことが大変だと思うけど、頑張ってほしい。そしていつか日本にきてください。待ってます。 guys, I respect every single person on this planet who is learning Japanese cuz it's freaking hard. I know. but immerse yourself in Japanese 24/7 and improve your skills little by little. You can do it !

[@toolworks]

You have the talent to become the first popular podcast on language learning, Matt. I'm imagining case studies like Ken, but also interviews with people only tangentially related to language learning like neuroscientists, NLP computer scientists, speech therapists, voice actors and beat boxers. There are a wide array of conversations which would be interesting to people who study languages, and you are clearly capable as an interviewer.

[@tardysauce7330]

This actually sounds amazing

[@Sonic-jx2dw]

Seems quite busy with other stuff before that though...

[@Yotanido]

This subtitle tutor technique is actually kinda similar to what I do. I can't watch unknown anime raw - for the exact reasons mentioned. If you only understand maybe half of what is said, you miss out on so much and you just want to know what's going on. So... I watch series that I have already seen. I don't watch episodes back-to-back, but I just watch a series I watched two or three months ago without subs. This still gives me enough context to feel like I understand most of what's happening, but it's not so fresh in my mind as to be boring. That said, I might try the back-to-back method. I've never actually done that. This might help with some scenes that are particularly hard to understand for me. (One that comes to mind: In Hunter x Hunter when they arrive at the exam in the elevator. I know roughly what they are talking about, but I understand basically none of it when watching without subs.)

[@jateearhart1262]

I've watched over 10,000 hours of subbed anime, and it never helped me because I didn't have a base (and it's "fake immersion"). I definitely want to try adding in what Ken did into my learning. Rather than watch 2 episodes before bed, I'll try watching it once in English, and again in Japanese. I'll keep doing my other studies on top of that for now as well I suppose.

[@icantskate1614]

I’d look through tae Kim grammar guide and some of genki, if you really want to supplement your immersion. Also learn a few hundred words at least. But that is a good idea it sounds like

[@decisive5760]

His "subtitle tutor" method is what started off my journey years ago. It worked incredibly well.

[@dLzzzgaming]

You'd be better off rewaching shows you've already seen with subs, if you're into that

[@aang272]

I had to pause the video to write this comment. I love the interview so far! I really like that he said the first time he tried to watch something in Japanese after studying hard he couldn’t understand a word. I had the same experience and now I can understand about 50% don’t give up!

[@daiyan5688]

so I'm actually one of the few people who watches all of matts videos until the very end 👀 Ken is awesome, his whole journey inspires me and I realize once again how bad I am or rather, how good I could already be if I would but in more hours... And definitely gonna focus more on listing during this year, I definitely wanna sound good in the end..

[@SayHelloToOblivion]

Ken is one of those fellas I will always love. I was a supporter of JTA but unfortunately never kept studying. I am my own worse enemy and need to battle with consistency. I was happy when he offered later to let us download all the videos. We all go through crap in life (Ken included) and I’m happy to see him pull himself up and show us his strength through a smiling face. Wish nothing but good things for him.

[@shimewaza]

The most surprising thing to me is that he was able to find Japanese girlfriends that were willing to correct and fine-tune his Japanese for hours every day. I've dated several Japanese girls and most were happy to help me to an extent but they would have run for the hills if I'd pushed them to do that level of assistance.

[@mambadotes]

where do you get them, do you live in Japan

[@suzubee9602]

@@mambadotes maybe worry about learning Japanese before a japanese gf

[@drauc]

I've wanted to ask Ken these questions for over 10 years. Thanks Matt and Ken!

[@Post-ModernCzechoslovakianWar]

"He didn't use any anki." I hate anki, but I love watching anime, listening to stuff, and reading manga! Wow! That's encouraging to here, cause I feel like I've gotten nowhere in 3 or 4 years.

[@jame254]

i honestly ditched anki after the 3rd year of learning was getting nowhere with it. Immerse how Ken does it. though caveat is i have to make sure i am using i have seen or heard or you do forget it.

[@muttlanguages3912]

He says he was watching anime like 8 hours a day, so that's ridiculous for most people

[@justalameusername1736]

Just do less anki, less the easiest words you find, make anki reps almost affortless and it won't be hell Make sure you're dealing with leeches and keep your retention high.

[@_console]

@@muttlanguages3912 well he said he was immersing for 8 hours, but that doesn't mean it's active immersion, he might have done 3 hours active and the rest passive.

[@TheNasem007]

just about to start my 2nd year of learning primarily through immersion. feels so weird to look back, not having spent a lot of time 'studying' at all, but still being able to sit through podcast episodes with practically no issues understanding it.

[@rhetrix6450]

Are there any Japanese podcasts you can recommend?

[@mannyw_]

What exactly did you do to get to that point if you didn't do much studying?

[@benw-l7k]

@@mannyw_ Watch the video you've commented under, do that

[@TheNasem007]

@@rhetrix6450 "japanese with noriko" and "Nihongo con teppei" are both pretty good, though the latter is my favorite.

[@TheNasem007]

@@mannyw_ lots of listening/comprehensible input. A beginner podcast might use simple words to explain new words, thus you learn the word and its meaning exclusively through Japanese. Example: if you know the words for body, water and exercise. If someone explains to you that X is the water that comes out of your body when you exercise, you've learned what the word for sweat is.

[@paulwalther5237]

I did speed up the video but I was hooked until the end. Ken’s life story around Japanese is fascinating. He should write an autobiographical book or something and sell it. I’m a little disappointed that uproot isn’t going to apply to me but I hope it works out really well.

[@bobfranklin2572]

What is it 😮

[@misterguyman9669]

2x speed club

[@Retog]

@@bobfranklin2572 Did you find out?

[@masjos7103]

A lot of people speed up the video these days. Why not use your native language to your advantage and save time?

[@humanbean3]

this man was fueled by his love for anime and japanese girlfriends

[@DavidBonelo]

bruh, that girlfriend that helped him to correct his pitch accent I would build her a shrine 🙏🤣🤣

[@humanbean3]

@@DavidBonelo we found the real KEY to fluency... japanese girlfriends.... with a little anki on the side

[@Sygnit]

This is amazing and makes me feel so much better about mainly just watching and not stopping to look up words I do use Anki to supplement but I find it so tedious to stop every single line and look up words

[@LeonSKennedy7777]

This new set which has been appearing in recent videos is beautiful! Is this your living room? We’re so used to the classic bedroom backdrop, lol.

[@ariaingraham2721]

Proud to be in that 10% who watched this whole video. This was amazing and insightful. Thank you!

[@hopperhelp1]

Wait! Ken Cannon! I was using his book for learning Japanese before I was doing Refold. That’s so cool.

[@sleepyfeelings6285]

MAN, that guy must write a book about his life.

[@thecasual1482]

"The earlier you start reading the better." "Reading too early on can have negative effects." Idk what is what anymore honestly.

[@furretar6484]

Depends on your goals, if you want speed then read and if you want a good accent then don't read

[@Matheus_Braz]

@@furretar6484 whats up with reading and accent??

[@_console]

@@Matheus_Braz it's what they said in the video, if you read a lot you will vocalize the words internally which will result in a bad accent.

[@brendon2462]

@@furretar6484 who wants a bad accent though?

[@RayZin]

Matt can you make your videos shorter, it’s ruining my immersion

[@nfrankiksa4596]

glad english is my target language lol

[@ポップパンク和訳]

It's not like your knowledge will be sucked through a black hole for watching one English video

[@Gadottinho]

@@ポップパンク和訳 it's 1 and a half hour that could be spent in immersion...

[@ffnovice7]

Y'all need to watch the video fully to understand the allusion joke

[@ardavan8313]

@@nfrankiksa4596 omg same😂

[@Maldito011316]

I'm living vicariously through Ken

[@TonySelam]

I wouldn’t say he learned entirely through input immersion. Seems like he was actively studying. Frequency list and rewatching shows, once in English and then once in Japanese. Still very impressive though.

[@brendon2462]

Isn't a frequency list still a type of input/studying you're reading Japanese words. Learning what they mean. Then listening for them in the content you consume.

[@DDranks]

I fail to see how "rewatching shows, once in English and then once in Japanese" isn't immersion. Maybe you have a different definition, but to me me, immersion means learning through consuming/interacting with large amounts of comprehensible input without paying attention to the grammatical form; so that should fit the bill.

[@hiananyaa]

I would scour vivinavi all the time in college😂 One specific winter break I found a post where a Japanese and American couple needed a babysitter for their kid. Long story short he got natto in his hair and I taught him incorrect Japanese-but what an experience.

[@misterguyman9669]

31:41 "I made her like it" - Gigachad Ken

[@hijay8501]

Just finished the video! I've recently decided to learn Japanese and this video was so helpful! Kens story was very fascinating! 💥❤

[@thedmitryguy]

Are ya’ll watching his channel to learn Japanese? I personally watch it to improve my English, as the advice he gives is universal to whatever language you’re learning.

[@mattbattaglia4694]

By far the most fascinating language learning interview I’ve ever seen

[@エンゾ]

thanks to your videos about immersion and listening i was able to drastically improve my listening skills and reading speed (about reading oh god it improved very well) by watching videos with subtitles (by natives ofc), at the first moment i didn't thought that it would be effective but bro, it's really amazing how the brain works without you notice.

[@datonekidvids1432]

Is Ken the friend you have spoken about on patreon who "learned japanese entirely through listening"?

[@mattvsjapan]

Yes, this is him!

[@ramil9678]

You seem like a nice guy, like you really have grown by taking the challenges you had in your life. And that is extremely inspiring about your story Kenn! Also thank you so much for hosting this great interview Matt!

[@Learninglotsoflanguages]

I first wanted to learn Japanese when I was in elementary school. Digimon was my gateway show 😂 Found a notebook from when I was like 12 and I tried writing all the Japanese characters and random words. Next month I am going to finally go full force into learning it for real this time 😃

[@KevCo95]

Missed your videos!!! So happy to see this upload.

[@cpfc4life1505]

What I think most people forget is that if you have the enthusiasm you will learn the language no matter what. This guy was “home schooled” he just had a bunch of time with the willingness to match. He could of read his way to fluency instead because of his attitude.

[@darkmattergamesofficial]

Wow, I intuitively did the same method of watching first with subs, then without. First time I have heard about someone else doing that. I think it helped ease me into understanding the bare basics, so after a few months when I took the training wheels off it wasn't too grueling.

[@hecate6834]

This video reminds me how much I enjoy your interviews, always so many interesting tidbits. Cough cough I want to see more interviews :).

[@trollingisasport]

If you're trying to learn Japanese or any language really, I recommend looking into audiation and look to build that in your target language. The more you can naturally here things in your head the easier you can produce it and notice your mistakes. Also, if you can manage to find a good tutor, I recommend going through kids stories or easy short stories first to get the basic sentence structure, having your teacher guide you through questions and answers and also ask you about how characters feel,etc. as this reflects the way that Japanese children are introduced to the language.

7:05 My Japanese was "raised" on Yan-san as well. His real name is Nick Muhrin, and he's not Mexican. He's from the USA. I think his character's nationality was never talked about in the series. He supposedly said that his face was covered in makeup to make his character look darker and more "foreign". Last I heard he is still living in Japan and was active in the local jazz music scene as a guitar player.

[@nh8444]

Good on you for being so open, man.

[@orderByScore]

Ken's timeline is like one in an anime. At the end of the video, I wasn't sure when what happened. But yeah, his whole journey was certainly interesting.

[@paulwalther5237]

Just like what ken’s saying my ability to read Japanese followed after my speaking ability. I will never forgive Japanese for making me learn to speak before learning to read.

[@mannyw_]

According to Ken your accent/pronunciation should be much better, though, right?

[@paulwalther5237]

@@mannyw_ Not so much in my case. I brute forced my ability to speak through flash cards.

[@dylan9350]

Bro had girlfriends on girlfriend and girlfriends for his girlfriends

[@baltimorewhisperer]

and girlfriends for his girlfriend's girlfriends

[@Geerzy]

This is crazy valuable.

[@Quantum_Cowboy]

I was (and still am) very bad about doing my listening input because I have always been more of a reader. Up until maybe about month 6 I wasn’t really doing a lot of listening comprehension but I remember the turning point of when I really started to understand Japanese. I like doing this exercise where I’ll read and study lyrics in Japanese songs and then make translations of them and I remember the first time I ever did it for one of my favorite songs it felt so rewarding to understand something completely. A couple days later I was listening to a different song and just completely understood it and it felt amazing. The next thing that really sky rocketed my learning was during month 7 when I finally decided to seriously dedicate some time to listening comprehension and in about one week I improved vastly. Im still really bad about slacking off in both listening comprehension and doing anki just because I’d rather play video games or read manga in Japanese but I seriously need to start watching more shows in Japanese haha

[@maxxrenn]

I had no idea he was completely illiterate. Amazing to overcome that.

[@RafaelColladoLemon]

Amazing interview. Many gems on multiple fronts!

[@mellow2979]

Stopping immersion for this (just this once ;).....

[@jamba_d2225]

Matt, you really have a knack for interviewing....perfect balance of reaction, engagement, good questions, and allowing the flow. Best wishes for continued success!

[@m0ppu]

really dope stuff, excited for the vid where ken interviews you too. ken's story is actually super inspirational and his improvement trajectory/methods are a lot closer to mine than i was expecting, though i'm not nearly as far along lol. also glad to see you're finally going the silverspoon route, though by the sounds of it what you're going for is a lot more reasonable; hope it works out for the folks that pay for it. will these ideas ever be made public?

[@thedmitryguy]

Your interviews are really good.

[@satellite964]

I wonder if we could train a neural network machine learning model to detect wrong pitch accent and act as a digital assistant.

[@user-gj6jq5dk4z]

Great interview! Loved every second of it! Uproot sounds exciting, I'm very curious now!

[@matsu9253]

What is this project you guys are talking about? Can't wait to know...

[@ffnovice7]

Near end of video

[@kevinpaskevicius1643]

great video. brings me some inspiration as i continue my journey, but i have to say, the video with Steven krashen has been the most valuable :)

[@shotakonkin2047]

Ken's life story shares many similar to mine; I was homeschooled, had a dysfunctional home life, parents had separated (unofficial divorce) and been through homelessness. 日本語だと第二言語習得やってる、とても下手していたんだけどもう学習って少し長いんですよ

[@angcientrock]

Pretty incredible and inspiring story. Such a determined guy. Thanks Matt and Ken

[@lprof8139]

i admire u so much matt

[@wonderwhatsnext5408]

I appreciate all of the effort you put into creating quality content for the channel! Thank you for all of your hard work!

[@erikuslatinevivit348]

Matt, something I noticed in this video and the other is that your personality types seem quite different, you seem to be slightly more introverted and seem to process your thoughts more while Ken seems to be more extroverted, intuitive and slithtly more fluent in whatever language he speaks. I think this could be an interesting topic for a video, i.e the differences in personality type and introversion vs extroversion on language learning. Looking forward to seeing it!

[@KanjiEater]

The Tales of games are why I started learning Japanese - nice shout out to them :)

[@munzutai]

I don't think his exact method will work for a lot of people but I think everybody should consider his philosophy of just learning by having fun more. He definitely inspired me to have more fun with Japanese rather than just sitting down and studying it.

[@TruthWould]

なるほどですね マットさんさすがですね 日本語上手いですね　定期的に動画見てますよ　応援してます

[@valentinwodolashski8046]

getting a girlfriend - best way of learning anything

[@stewfire4916]

His way of analysing word in a series before watching it might be a next step for immersion learning. I would say it's genius, but at the same time it's so basic that the only thing missing is just a software to do it. It's always a problem for immersion learning to select media that is just right for one's level. Mostly, the workaround right now is to first learn a base vocab from premade cards as a beginner, then make sentence cards from the media at highesr levels. But what if people could computer analyise videos first, automatically generate sentence cards (with pictures and voice saved), learn the expressions needed for the show, and then immerse in it? There could even be a way to exclude cards that are too basic based on previous completed cards from other decks. Then, the time one would normally spend on making cards would be 0, the anxiety of not knowing words during immersion would also be reduced. A drawback would be that learning times might increase. On the other hand, it's not like one has to perfectly learn words before watching a show. Learning the most frequent 10 and some exotic expressions should be enough to start and pay attention to during immersion. Then afterwards, one might even select from the sentence cards generated which ones to save. There might even be a way to estimate language difficulty of the show compared to the learner's level based on card complition. The software could quickly inform the learner of relative difficulty, and could assist with the generated cards if the learner still decides to pursue a show because it seems interesting.

[@purple_sky]

Question: does this assumption that will be uprooted only apply to Japanese, or language learning in General?

[@easyduster]

This guy is a god. Learning by watching one piece and playing Tales.

[@LukeParham]

Killing my immersion efforts…

[@Aristotle000001]

Ken Cannon - The art of learning Japanese only from -women- anime.

[@sesudesu]

My dream is to be interviewed by Matt once I become proficient enough

[@jonh1995]

I’ll race ya :)

[@camoraz]

Same here hahaha, how long have you guys been studying for?

[@watLegends]

Ken is such a weeb and I love it hahaha, he's such a good storyteller I was actually laughing throughout this interview.

[@mohammadaminkhaje8224]

that's actually how i started learned(or better say acquired) english when i was 14~15(im 17 btw), i never really looked anything up and just continued watching youtube and other content that appealed to me, i never even noticed my own improvements but before i knew it i was fluent, btw english is not widely spoken where i live so everyone thinks im some sort of genius lol, i also learned arabic this way when i was 5, and now im trying to learn japanese, though for japanese i use anki heavily, like i wouldn't have been able to make kanji a part of photographic memory without RTK and anki.

[@futurez12]

That's a cool story, but I don't think it's possible to do that when you're a mature adult as there's no basic, dumbed down content to hold your interest for long enough to do it. When you're a kid you'll happily watch Logan Paul all day and be entertained by it, but if you're happy to do that as an adult then you probably have more important things to address than learning a new language.

[@Gadottinho]

@KinoI learnt a lot of English by "playing" euphoria hahaha

[@RedFenceAnime]

​@@futurez12 Never watched logan paul but I'm pretty sure a 10y/o non-english speaking kid has no clue what he's saying. You just need to find something you enjoy watching even without understanding. Like Takashi's Castle or Batsu Game or Teasing master Takagi-san. Or watch something you already watched. Learn Hiragana & Katakana and you can read Yotuba, even if you don't know the words you can read the sounds. And the pictures and good enough to basically get what's going on and enjoy. (also bilingual manga) I switched my phone and computer to Japanese. When I didn't know English the games I played were in English and I figured it out then too. You can use your mouse to write kanji in google translate, or finger Gboard handwritten mode.

[@ffnovice7]

I learned fluent to advanced English primarily through reading EGM articles over and over. Immersion and interest are key. It's not just how many hours or words do you rote memorize (or attempt to), but both of those *times willing repetition to solidify what you've learned and also to induce a state of play, so you can be confident in experimenting and extrapolating associated concepts. tl;dr do what you enjoy, a lot

[@MCA0090]

Same for me... I watched so many things with English subs and KZbin with or without captions that I learned English along the years, I was very lazy to look up every new word on Google/dictionaries, so most of the things I learned was by the context and repetition (I had a basic knowledge of English grammar when I started doing it), too bad I didn't focused on phonetics from the beginning, my listening was very bad until the point I was decided to focus on it... Now I'm learning Japanese with immersion and interacting with natives, I'm too lazy to study kanji so I'm basically learning by listening and studying a bit of grammar to understand how sentences work in Japanese... My listening is so good now and I'm kinda surprised on how easier it is to memorize words by the sound rather than focusing only on reading/writing and how fast I can understand spoken Japanese naturally without all that thinking and mental translation process.

[@MakotoOPT]

Oh I am early!!? Matt I just wanted to say I love your videos and although I am learning Spanish and not Japanese your tips and theory on language acquisition helped a ton!

[@bangkokadventures298]

This one is really interesting... I totally get what he was saying early in the vid. You study with these well known apps, then find out that almost none of it is useful for conversational Japanese

[@soidogcowboy3282]

Using this method for Spanish

[@CJ_Walks]

I still have questions about that initial phase before he spoke to anyone and then he claims to be speaking with natives enough to impress. I bet there's more output before that whether it's conscious or not and I would love love love to dive into it more, but otherwise this was a nice video to watch and seeing this new perspective from another legend is great to supplement what I'm learning on my own. I'm not even learning Japanese but I've been following your videos for over a year.

[@바보Queen]

what i dont understand is how do u understand complex grammar points just from immersion.. you had to have looked it up just to understand it.. plus translation subs aren't always correct .. or just an equivelant translation sometimes.. making it even harder to grasp.. he must be a genius or something

[@nums9408]

So should I avoid reading as a beginner learner? I'm worried that a focus on reading now will lead to bad pronunciation down the line like he said.

[@jvlog5349]

Thank you so much for sharing good contents.

[@sacrinarose]

Great interview!

[@loogloogloogr]

44:00 damn man you had it far worse than me thank you for giving me something to be grateful for.

[@tanoshiifun9321]

Sorry some people hated you, Ken, when you were really trying to do something new. I hate you too, but in my case it’s only because you’ve really lived my dreams, dude. (I’m talking about the good times, not your difficulties.) Diving into Japan with such commitment at such a young age! The beautiful country itself, the izakaya, the anime, and… yes… the girls (oh, come on, let’s just admit it for once, shall we?)

[@chadbailey7038]

Amazing interview guys! Really really valuable information. I haven’t watched ALL ur videos Matt. But the ones I do watch, I always watch til the end bc it’s really valuable info. Best of luck with ur new course 🙌🏾 ⚡️

[@kr_japan3143]

Would anyone be able to offer any advice about how to make a deck for all 尾高 words? Or perhaps someone has made one already?Just like Ken, I tend to mix up 平板 and 尾高 too, and this would be really useful! :)

[@danielhaag7875]

"It smelled like my anime" - this guy is great :-D

[@humanbean3]

I think i still have that "free trial" of rosetta stone on a disc somewhere lol ;) i was stoked about it because i had the "free trial" of a ridiculously expensive program. I learned a bit of spanish and carried on with my life tho... unfortunately... if only I'd of discovered japanese back then...

[@richardhartung1576]

high end interview with the title "illiterate boy speaks perfect Japanese" lol

[@lastninjaitachi]

Top words in naruto. 1. Dattebayo!!! 2. Nani!!! 3.sasukee!! 4.Kakashi sensei 5. Hokage. Good now go learn Jpanese.

[@antonbabych3622]

Super insightful!

[@Playreadygamers]

matt.......you didnt need practice?? didnt you study/practice for hours straight? didnt you spend "every waking moment" studying Japanese as a teenager?

[@Crazyeg123]

What a great interview. I'm going to do what he did with the subs then no subs, because right now i've been doing no subs only and it can get very boring. This plus Twitch.

[@honoda5176]

Hey Matt! Would you consider putting timestamps for this interview?

[@なにいってんの-s5e]

This channel I swear, this is a storage of motivatian

[@k.5425]

His girlfriends were really dedicated...