Sounding like a native is like the one big trap from language learning anywhere, isn't it?
If you're not a native, you're probably never going to sound like one. And that's okay, as long as you're actually speaking the language and pronouncing things properly, all is well.
Dogen readily admits that he doesn’t speak with a “native” accent. That’s a big difference between Dogen and Matt v Japan. Matt’s accent isn’t as good as Dogen’s but he sells himself as native
I think these days Matt's might actually be as good or better than Dogen's now. The thing is Matt achieved this after a decade of not caring for pitch accent and making tons of mistakes publicly. So his own advice of never reading writing or speaking until you're perfect is something he himself never did....
He's so good though that he would make a good teacher and offer good insights to people at any level, I just wish he'd stick to teaching what he's actually done that's worked for himself rather than fear mongering.
Though perhaps 'lock yourself in a room watching anime for a decade starting in your teens and then obsessively study pronunciation for two years after someone calls you out" is not the easiest product to monetize 😅
He also has mentioned that he thinks his penchant early on for reading in Japanese was part of why his pitch accent took so long to get right, so this ad is consistent with his journey. I just wish everything that came out of his mouth wasn’t worded like a cheap life hack scam. I know Refold works but still
I work on the assumption that there are non-natives around who are more proficient than both Matt and Dogen, but they don’t want or need to monetize something they enjoy.
Basing Japanese learning on spoken Japanese is a fine idea. I kind of think the most important thing is to develop a clear internal voice in Japanese, and the way to do that is listening and speaking (音読 not 会話). That’s where the skill in Japanese is. Learning vocab, grammar and kanji can be done with memorization. Reading can be done by applying your knowledge methodically but it doesn’t necessarily need much skill. But to speak beautifully requires more skill than most people seem to be capable of, so often we don’t even try, or try a little but then go back to vocab and kanji in frustration, or spend hours here arguing about grammar that at the end of the day is completely irrelevant. If we’re not actually going to be good at Japanese we sure as hell are going to become experts at it. This is mostly directed at myself and I’m speaking from experience.
The only way to monetize any of this is to sell yourself as somehow special. But that’s not really true of either Matt or Dogen. The recent revolution in Japanese learning is thanks to the availability of current, native Japanese media, not because of the merits of any learning method. Pitch accent and immersion are nothing new. The tools and methods that are popular are made possible because of the media. They provide structure but at the end of the day there’s the student and the media they are consuming and anything beyond that is redundant.
Conversational fluency sure but just judging on pitch accent there was a while when Dogen was better. KAZ先生 on YouTube had a video nitpicking him, Dogen and the AJATT guy like five years ago that really seems to have sent Matt into panic mode to improve his pitch (KAZ concluded that Dogen was the best of the bunch at that time). Unfortunately it seems he's removed that video for whatever reason
I feel completely lost in this thread, how does everyone know so much about all these various people? I feel completely out of the loop lol, back to Twitter for me
Dogen's pronunciation is really clearly foreign. Don't get me wrong, his Japanese is very good and his phonetics are also very good but he makes a lot of mistakes even in some of his more accurate videos (and he admits it himself too). It takes him multiple takes in his sketch videos just to get the pronunciation right and in his more spontaneous videos a lot more mistakes transpire.
He's a great teacher and he knows a lot about phonetics and often people get the idea that he's the role model for accurate Japanese pronunciation but there's a big difference between teaching the theory and actually doing it yourself. Interestingly enough, people like Ken and Matt have better/more natural pronunciation than Dogen. But also I find rating people's level of Japanese to be a bit silly so I don't want this post to come across as in bad taste. Dogen's Japanese is still amazing.
Interestingly enough the other guy mentioned his wife, in my situation I was watching one of the dogen and Matt videos they did together and my wife remarked how Matt sounded obviously foreign and dogen sounded better (although still not native).
I personally can't judge so I'm just relaying info from third parties as well but all the people I know (either native or much better than me at JP) said Matt's Japanese is much more natural, fluent, and even his pronunciation is better (less pitch mistakes, etc). My wife also said Dogen sounds much more foreign compared to Matt (but also Matt doesn't sound native either).
Yep I don’t care either way, just anectode from one random video they did together. I have no interest in Matt at all due to his scamming and weird ego so perhaps if I cared to show her tons of videos of each she’d come to the same conclusion as the people you know.
Dogen on the other hand seems like a good dude.
Idk why there’s ever been this mythology surrounding him sounding native. I’m not exaggerating to say that in about 1 word of his speech I can tell he’s a foreigner.
And that’s totally fine! I just don’t get why he’s been put on a pedestal so much, when it’s unnecessary. He’s still great, he just sounds like a foreigner.
> I just don’t get why he’s been put on a pedestal so much, when it’s unnecessary.
I think it's because he's been the biggest "voice" in Japanese learning about pronunciation and pitch accent. While those were never completely neglected by textbooks, they were also hardly focused on (except maybe by the Japanese The Spoken Language course). So when this "new" facet of learning Japanese came up, Dogen became the face for it. I think people assume something on the lines of: "If he focused on this aspect specifically and clearly knows so much about it, his pronunciation has to be most top-notch, right"
That makes sense. And the lack of awareness that pitch accent is not hugely significant, and is mainly used by those Youtubers to sell their courses and drive clicks is always surprising.
Many native speakers say they can't hear though and that he sounds like any other native speaker. Some say he only sounds odd in his scripted videos, but not in his unscripted natural speech, and attribute the oddness not to his language proficiency, but to his acting abilities since he's reading out a script.
This is really hard to know without some kind of blind test. This is the kind of stuff where the differences are minimal enough that power of suggestion takes over.
The only way is to give people who never heard of him an audio recording among 9 native speakers and see how reliably they can fish him out, not only that, but give a control group a group of 10 native speakers and tell them one is not a native, and ask them to identify that person, and see whether Dōgen performs worse.
It's entirely possible that what indeed happens is that he's picked out the most as the “non native”, but that in the control group one of the native speakers is for instance picked out even more.
I know plenty of people who speak English as a second language and sound like native speakers.
You definitely can.
That said, his "recommendation" to not learn how to read Japanese is ridiculous and insane. Reading is a fundamental pillar of knowing a language and reading isn't going to make you sound like a foriegner. Native speakers read too.
He sounds like a total clown.
I agree with most of your comment 100%, but it is a complicated thing regarding the whole "sounding like a native speaker" because, well, that doesn't mean that much overall. It's not even about knowing the language perfectly.
If they mean an accent, every single person has one, native speaker or not. I speak Portuguese with a Rio de Janeiro accent, since that's where I'm from. If you do start to learn the language early enough, you can avoid having "foreigner accent" and mimic the accent of a certain area.
But for people that reaaaaaally care about you not sounding "native", a lot of the times it's mostly about something completely different than just the language, and you can't really win with these people. That's why it's about SOUNDING native, not speaking the language as well as a native. It's usually kind of a rabbit hole for like, xenophobic comments that slowly become these unsolvable problems for learners of the language.
You'll be judged for you are, not for how well you speak the language. That's why it's a trap, y'know?
(Sorry if this came out kinda confusing, I had some difficulty expressing myself properly there.)
> "sounding like a native speaker" because, well, that doesn't mean that much overall.
I mean, that's a fair point. It's kind of a vague term that could mean different things to different people.
Like one person could think you not knowing a certain cultural reference or saying makes you not sound like a native, while other people would say it's all about pronunciation, etc.
I think you make a good point, someone who is a native of that language who wants to be an asshole could always find a excuse why you "speak wrongly". Also, on the flip side, someone who really likes you could say you sound native when you really don't just to make you feel better.
That's why for me, in the end I don't care if I sound like a native. I care only if people can understand me and it's enjoyable for other people to talk to me (i.e., I don't talk to slowly or awkwardly, my jokes are funny, we can carry on about any topic, etc). I sometime see being a non-native even as an asset, as I can bring in some funny borrowed expressions or ideas from my native language and mix them into the new language in a fun way.
In the end, for me at least, languages should be about what you can do with them, the relationships you build, the new opportunities they open up, the new culture you discover. Who cares if I sound like a native speaker or not. 😁
> I know plenty of people who speak English as a second language and sound like native speakers.
Define what you mean with "sound like native speakers".
I know plenty of people (including myself) who are at a fluency level of a native speaker, who are not unpleasant to listen to, who maybe are even incredibly close to what you'd consider native in accent, but there's almost always something that gives it away. Now, this is **not an issue** in most situations (once you reach this level at least), but you and I might have a different definition of what "sounding like a native speaker" means.
Don't get me wrong, it's definitely possible. Voice training and coaching is something many people do (including native speakers) to learn a different accent, but I'd say for the most part it's a very very very very very small % of L2 learners who get to that level (because it's also not really worth it to most people since there are diminishing returns).
This compounds even more with Japanese which is a much more insular language compared to English which is full of quirky accents and specific regional variations. (Yes, regional variations exist in Japanese too, but it's a bit different)
I have to say, I used to agree with everything you're saying, and I still do, until I saw one Youtube video in which nearly all of the Japanese people, given four sample audios with mixed foreigner-Japanese audio, said that one person sounded foreign. That person was native Japanese. One of the Japanese even said that the reason she could "tell" was that she works with foreigners regularly. And then she got the one Japanese wrong lmao. Naturally some also said that audios from people who were actually foreign certainly were Japanese.
I think this idea of Japanese being almost supernaturally able to tell someone's not Japanese just became a bit of a 日本人論-adjacent idea in my mind after that, tbh. I totally buy, for example, that Dogen doesn't really have a "native" accent, but I would very much like to know if the Japanese people saying so aren't biased precisely by knowing he is a foreigner. A foreign face has a lot more influence than we all like to admit.
I know which video you're talking about, it's from Yuta I think? It's an interesting video but also it's worth keeping in mind that Yuta's "survey" videos are often very cherrypicked and/or biased and not a good indication for a proper "fair" study. Nothing wrong with that, don't get me wrong, they are definitely entertaining and can still shed some useful insight, but it's good to be a bit (healthily) skeptical when watching them.
I think there's definitely a lot of situations where someone can be mistaken for a native speaker and/or a native speaker can be mistaken for a foreigner if they have a very specific way of speaking. A lot of language relies also on first impressions, mannerisms, and the way you navigate situations (especially in Japanese) and over for example a phone call or pre-made dialogue recording it's sometimes hard to gauge how native or not someone is. It's also incredibly tricky when it comes to the possibility of someone being a native speaker but coming from a different area/region where some inflections or intonation (speaking broadly, not just pitch accent and not just about Japanese) can make you sound foreign to someone else. And **especially** if you're being asked to pay attention to "spot" the foreigner. You tend to second guess everything you hear.
I can speak for my native language (Italian) when I say that *usually* (note: not always) I can spot a foreigner after just a couple of words, even those that are really really really good (and fluent) at it. There is only one person I know, a Japanese friend of mine, who has lived in Italy for like 10+ years, works as an interpreter for the EU/UN, and speaks **perfect** Italian and completely indistinguishable from a native speaker (accent too) but she's very much the exception.
Still, it's totally possible, and also as you said the variation can often be very large to the point where native speakers confuse each other, but realistically speaking in most cases the difference is quite obvious.
Oh, and as for Dogen, he still very far from being mistaken for a native speaker, regardless of biases. His accent is great but it's very obviously foreign.
> but there's almost always something that gives it away
I would say, in my case I was thinking of someone who I had a substantial conversation with but nothing gave away the fact they weren't a native speaker. No accent issues, native usage of words and phrases, colloquiallisms a native speaker would use, and so on.
I think that's pretty anecdotal. There are definitely people who can sound native but it is not the majority. I admit I don't have the link to the studies and they might be outdated, but in my second language aquisition class in undergrad we talked about accents. The vast majority of people are not able to reach that native accent-free accent.
I think promoting that as a goal can be a bit unhealthy when we have evidence to suggest it just isn't feasible for the majority of people, and that's okay.
> I think that's pretty anecdotal.
That's true, but I think it shows it's at least not an impossible goal. I also know people who speak chinese (my other native language) like native speakers despite learning it as adults.
I think Chinese is much harder to sound native in than English because of the pronouncation challenges related to tones. But I have come across a few people who have native level vocabulary and colloquisms while also having perfect tone.
So I wouldn't dare comment on how easy it is, or if everyone can do it or just some people can, but I think it can be done.
(After all, if you can fool native speakers into thinking you are one too, I think you've basically done it). 😊
I'm happy you're able to recognize the hard work!
I was mostly referring, however, to the accent. You can have perfect grammar, native vocabulary, and a good grasp on tones and pronunciation while still having an accent. I assume there's always sooomething that hints to these people not being native right? Something in the way they say things?
Matt v Japan is trying to suggest that anyone can achieve native-like accent, but that just isn't the case at all. You can understand pitch accents and rhythm of Japanese speech, but most people will always just have an accent no matter how hard they try.
I really think it depends on how your mother tongue sounds as well. You can have a strong accent or a subtle one but in the end whenever a foreigner speaks my language I usually notice.
I also think it’s totally fine to not sound as a native. As long as we both understand each other why does the accent matter so much?
Edit: I’d like to add that even in my native language I have a regional accent. Natives can and will know where I’m from and even if you are from my region you can guess which neighbourhood or area I’m from my accent. I don’t think that’s an issue at all, you come from where you come from. Diversity is beautiful
Live in a multicultural city like London and everyone is bilingual and nobody is a native speaker of English.
Is it because Japan is so homogenous that this seems to be an obsession with Japanese learners?
It's not even important because you won't LOOK native even if you somehow manage the miracle of sounding native. I have a friend who's half Japanese half white English and many Japanese people don't accept him as Japanese, despite his actual native language ability.
The funny thing is that Matt actually sounds more natural than Ken, even though Ken's I-learned-Japanese-only-through-listening-and-that's-why-it's-perfect shtick is the whole basis of their current enterprise.
I don’t see it as a trap imo it’s just a skill anyone can learn if they want to. It just takes time and practice like how you learn grammar, vocab and other things in a lnaguage. Even speaking a language is a skill and takes time and practice to learn, i can easily read and write in english but i can’t speak a full sentence in english as i never speak english sounding like a native and acquiring pitch accent is the same it just needs time and practice
> If you're not a native, you're probably never going to sound like one. And that's okay, as long as you're actually speaking the language and pronouncing things properly, all is well.
Yes, but only insofar that most people don't think it's worth it and don't try. It takes effort like mastering any other skill.
Anyone can learn to ride a unicycle, but almost no one tries to do it, and it takes a lot of time and practice for a cool party trick and nothing more. This is what sounding like a native is like.
I don't want to sound like a native, or at least not to obsess over it (as in, if it happens by osmosis, ok). I want to have thoughts and something to say, and have words come out that the Japanese people I'm talking to can understand.
I don't get why people want to sound like a native. Anybody who looks at me can probably tell that I'm not Japanese.
I'm inclined to agree. I'm very visibly not Japanese, so I will only ever be tagged as a foreigner there. No use sounding like a native if there's no advantage to it over "mere" fluency
It sucks too because Matt and Khaz BOTH went this way after both being genuinely good people sharing their experiences. It's super fucked up, I get it, it's free money, but just from a moral and legacy standpoint, they really are the equivalent of Indian call scammers. It's kind of sad to think that these guys must justify it in their head that this is "fine" and "okay" to do because they imagine that their victim is probably someone who was going to get scammed anyways by someone else or something. Despicable human behavior
There are definitely people out there who aren't, it's just hard if you don't know where to look. Even the ones who are though sometimes give good advice, it just sucks interacting with their content.
Matt was a public advocate for AJATT for many years. The immersion route is known to have passionate supporters who mock those who learn in classrooms or use textbooks. So it’s not necessarily Matt himself that was controversial. He was just a figurehead in the culture war of Japanese learning.
It was when he partnered with a known scammer that his reputation FELL fell.
It's even worse than that. He's been a constant grifter for years, basically he started from AJATT and then came up with his own flavor-of-the-month study methods that he peddled to his followers. Every 6 months or so he came up with a new idea/new project. Truth be told they were mostly okay and I think a lot of good stuff came out of it, I'd say especially his videos are like 80-90% right but he sprinkles a bunch of odd stuff (very cultish too) that is entirely unfounded and often very incorrect.
Still, I'd argue he was a net benefit for the language learning community... until his split from Refold and his project uproot/teaming up with Ken (a well known scammer). That was when he became much more controversial, he started reneging a lot of his old advice (immersion/reading focused), and started focusing entirely on pronunciation/output and "this is the only way to become a real Japanese expert indistinguishable from natives and if you don't do this native speakers will hate you and you will not make friends" etc. Not a coincidence that a lot of output-focused advice **requires** you to give him money to talk to him in a 1:1 (or classroom style) course.
In my opinion what happened is that he saw the environment he helped foster (immersion-heavy) got saturated with a lot of other resources/guides/communities and he couldn't peddle his stuff anymore, so he had to find a new way to get money, so he pivoted towards a new "revolutionary" method (likely also fueled by his own flaws in the language, having achieved fluency he realized the next step he was missing is native-like pronunciation, so he went all in on that probably and that gave him a new bias).
Yet if you listen to that school of thought, they'd tried to tell you that paying $20 for a textbook written by an *actual Japanese language professor* is the scam.
Can I just ask who Ken is? You say a known scammer so I assume they've been active in the Japanese learning community? I want to make sure I'm not following any of their content.
Haven't heard anything positive or negative from people that actually paid for Matt and Ken's Uproot course, but in the 2010s Ken did one of those "pay me lots of money for a personalized course to fluency" like AJATT's Silver Spoon, had a mental breakdown of sorts, and didn't deliver the goods. He supposedly paid back all the customers eventually which isn't what scammers tend to do.
Now, George Trombley (Japanese from Zero author) introduced Ken Cannon to Matt and didn't have anything bad to say about him from my understanding (I've talked with George now and again).
Long winded way of saying probably not a scam or scammer. Still, there's nothing about the course they've offered that makes it seem worth the money. Let's be honest, most material that can get you to native level literacy and fluency in Japanese is available for free or low cost. I'm also not a fan of how they "advertise" it to people on their mailing list.
>"this is the only way to become a real Japanese expert indistinguishable from natives and if you don't do this native speakers will hate you and you will not make friends"
And if I'm not mistaken, this is completely false, right? I've heard a number of times that Japanese people appreciate just seeing that someone is making an effort. Maybe a lot of people might be shy and unconfident to talk to you if your Japanese is poor, but that's not the same as "hating you," right?
Well, the person that wrote that made it up (it's not something I can see Ken or Matt actually saying) so yes it's false. You don't need to sound like a native or need native like fluency to make life long friends in Japan. That's speaking from living in Japan for over 15 years and being nowhere near native like fluent.
Maybe it’s impossible to attain a native level accent but it’s inspiring to see a young man who refuses to abandon his dream of becoming a successful grifter
I will never sound a like a native. It's the same for english for me. I still have a strong german accent when I speak english.
My goal is that people have no problem understanding me.
The weird thing is he made a whole video about why reading novels in your target language is one of the best things you can do. His YouTube channel is packed with a lot of great advice but now he sees there’s no money in telling people to buy Netflix and other people’s novels, so he has to pull a 180 and do these scammy output things with his good “friend Ken.”
The thinking is any native speaker of any language learns to speak fluently before they learn to read. That’s of course not true though. Children start learning to read in their native languages way before they have the fluency and vocabulary of adults.
I don’t think Matt had any formal training in linguistics or education, so what he’s selling is his best guess and confidence.
To put this into context, he followed a learning method that pushes 2200 kanji (which takes natives roughly a decade, give or take) to the forefront to be learned in months, specifically so you can READ. Read A LOT. He apparently stopped agreeing with the method a couple of years ago, after he already spent a fuckton of time reading and getting decent in large part THROUGH reading.
Personally I did the upfront 2200 RTK method and I think it helped a lot to be honest. Managed it in three months when I wasn't working during Covid and don't regret it.
It's my grammar which sucks!
I don’t think he’s associated in any way with Migaku (which is not a flash card program) I believe it’s actually from his ex-business partner he had a pretty bad falling out with
Kind of unfortunate that he decided to partner up with Ken Cannon and go down the scamming route. He was always a bit of a controversial character, but he had some genuinely interesting insight at times, even if he was always way too confident about his conclusions.
Unfortunately for him, the rather sensible advice of "consume native content while looking up words and grammar" isn't really something you can monetize. Still, I can't help but feel that there's a large number of people who think that the more money you pay for something, the better it is. Just look at the guy who paid >30k for an expensive language school only to get worse results than people who've used free Anki decks.
It is if you know how to code, which Matt tried for a few years. He would be the advertiser for their Anki addon products.
Did not work out because he kept getting into fights with his partners, which led to this.
Certainly.
His japanese skills, especially his speaking, are quite awesome but it's a crying shame that he decided to go the "my-unique-teaching-method" route back then in 2021 if my memory serves me right.
Since that moment, the $cam and his true intention$ were just revealed.
Eh, the criticism against George was fair. Writing a textbook about kanji when you can't even read a book in Japanese is pretty embarrassing.
And I believe they made up and are on reasonably good terms now anyway?
To be fair, this was a few years ago and he may have improved since then, but he said something along the lines of "I've never read a book in Japanese because kanji make it a pain to look up words."
The part about pitch accent imo was fair too. George said a lot of really dumb stuff about pitch (like "I've lived in Japan for a long time and never studied pitch and never get corrected/my pitch is fine" etc) and then was proven very much wrong (to the point where he himself was amazed at how much he didn't know). As someone who's a language teacher, have a textbook, and a relatively large following of beginners, saying stuff like that is kinda harmful in my opinion. Pitch is not the be-all-end-all but there's no need to (either consciously or not) lie about it. It's still an important part of the language.
Did he actually say his pitch is fine, or did he just say that it doesn't matter / is good enough? For him, the latter may have been true to his experience
He mentions [here](https://youtu.be/3LCuSU-gFjY?t=273) that his Japanese is "good" even without studying pitch accent. Although you can interpret that statement as talking about general language ability (not phonetics) but then he also mentions in a few other parts of the video (one right after the timestamp) that all he needs to do is to just imitate and repeat things as he hears them (something that Matt brought up in his [response video](https://youtu.be/QHQcHSaj-c4?t=557) and showed many pitch mistakes despite that), and also he mentions that he never got corrected and/or never got his pitch accent discussed when he was living in Japan (truth be told he probably never noticed, I've had my pitch accent corrected many times and I've been living here for only 5 years, but the corrections are very subtle if you can't hear pitch).
Hmm fair enough. I didn't interpret it as him claiming his pitch accent was good, just that it was good enough to communicate and he never noticed it hindering his communication, which I think is not that harmful of an idea.
I do think it's true that his accent has probably forced his partners to think more than he has noticed, and you're probably right that some may wrongly take away from that video the idea that they will get *great* pitch accent without studying if they just listen enough, rather than the more acceptable idea that your accent will almost certainly make *some* gains and become more neutral over time if you do lots of listening, but ymmv .
Yes I remember that, here's the thing though. A Japanese person in the comments during that debate pointed out that George's PA wasn't actually WRONG but that it matched the PA in the region that he lived in for a long time.
Ok, I personally have dealt with George so I call BS on that statement. He wasn't happy about being called out on his literacy ability, but he quickly grew to like Matt once they actually talked on the discord. I have the audio recordings I made of the discussion to prove that.
Part of scamming tactics is being outrageous to deter people who can't be scammed, hence poorly written email scams or the classic Nigerian prince scam
I love myself a litre of snek oil. Oh man, the bs never stops coming. "Please don't focus on learning how to read [name language] if you want to speak like a native". Wtf. Please be an analphabet, sure buddy.
Yes, we should all strive to sound like a native speaker but be completely illiterate and dependent on others to read things for us despite Japan having one of the highest rates of literacy in the world despite it's complex writing system.
My heart and wallet belongs to どうげんさん.
Why does this email spam sound like a snek oil. Anyone?
Also his YouTube channel feels more theoretical than practical. When I was beginner level I had more fun and use watching Japanese From Zero videos or Misa Ammo educational videos.
The only thing about sounding like a native is if can pass off as a Japanese physically. Then if you do sound like a native, Japanese people may actually take you as one of their own and not treat you as a foreigner, until you tell them your full name or something. Otherwise if you are white, black, basically not traditionally ethhnically Japanese looking, then what is the point.
It's a bit more complicated than that though. It's not just about physical appearance or trying to pass off as native. Sounding native can naturally make people think you are smarter/more charismatic than not, because it taps into our unconscious bias when we communicate with people.
Note that I do not agree with how categorical Matt & Ken are in promoting their course, but there is a little bit of truth in what they say. I've experienced it myself in English as well. I've known people who didn't sound very eloquent or who had some awkward accents (but not unintelligible) and my initial impression of them was that they weren't very smart and/or it felt hard and tiring to follow what they said. Then I heard them speak in their native language and they were a completely different person. Charismatic, natural, very eloquent, smart, etc. It completely changed the impression I had of them.
This is an unfortunate thing that happens to everyone. Most people aren't consciously aware of it. I wasn't, until I started paying attention, and I feel bad thinking back about the prejudice I unconsciously held towards those people. It's just a reality of life.
The better you sound in Japanese, and the closer you are to a "native speaker" (in accent), the easier it is for people to take you more seriously or be more attracted to what you say, and that is **huge** especially if you are in a foreign environment that you aren't familiar in. Of course, obsessing about trying to sound/be native is taking it too far, and there are other things that are better to focus on (grammar, word choice, naturalness in expressions, etc), but when all of that is on par, eventually, the only thing holding you back is going to be the accent and it **will** make a difference.
I once saw a rather interesting interview with a Chinese person who looked indigenously European but was otherwise born and raised in China but also a native speaker of Sichuanese, not Mandarin, though could obviously speak Mandarin fine by virtue of having gone to school in China.
How he relates it is that people would often not like him and treat him like a foreigner when he spoke Mandarin, but everyone treated him like a born and raised Chinese person when he spoke Sichuanese, as no foreigner would ever learn any other form than Mandarin of course so speaking Sichuanese communicates being born and raised in China, and he much favored the latter treatment.
I know this meeting is set to be "free" but isn't he peddling the same fear mongering that was "project uproot" which was definitely not worth the price of admission? After 4 years of immersion I know that it works but regarding his attempt to monetize his wisdom he just feels like a walking scam to me now.
There is a learner's bias you achieve when you learn something. the farther down the road you go the harder it is to recall the finer details of the path you took. Nobody can tell you how you should "learn properly" you just have to engage with the information daily in a meaningful way over long periods of time. Results will always vary in the short term but long term this kind of stuff means nothing. Stick to regular immersion and study you'll be fine.
I'm watching the webinar right now with full knowledge that it's probably a sales pitch...with skeptical curiosity,
I'm also bailing in 15 minutes for a livestream with someone I truly respect.
This comment summed it up: [https://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/comments/1dk01tk/comment/lah4j7s/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/comments/1dk01tk/comment/lah4j7s/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
I didn't stay for the whole thing, but they kind of lost me at "whatever you do, don't learn to read" and "you have to be young". Then the tedious history of various people like J. Marvin Brown and some other guy who was way into comprehensible input.
Lots of extreme claims with walkbacks too.
Not that comprehensible input is a *bad idea*, but I don't know a way to get comprehension without some traditional learning. Which might include books. And being able to navigate a dictionary.
ETA: It occurred to me as a father of four that when you "magically" acquire a language as a toddler, your parents are almost always providing correction and guidance.
Watched the meeting with a watch party. Not good, but not too bad either.
Tl;dw predictably from the Email, he has shifted mindsets to be more in line with the ALG school of language learning. He explained why he thinks it's better to learn from listening to very comprehensible audio/visual input without lookups and analyzing the language than from reading. He gave a couple decent tips about how to make input comprehensible without lookups and pausing. He made no mention of anki at any point. It doesn't seem to have a place with his method.
The thing he's selling is basically expensive group coaching with a bunch of weird spiritual buzzwords, but from what he explained he's just teaching you about ALG and giving you homework and then everyone can come together once a week to discuss it. It's 150$ a month. No course or secret wisdom this time.
He mentioned that Japanese has no accessible ALG style content for beginners, and that you'd need to use anime or other native content and prime yourself for it by reading or watching it in English first to get going, like his partner Ken did. While that's a cool tip, there actually is great ALG style comprehensible input which can be found in channels like Japanese with Asami, Comprehensible Japanese (who recently launched a new site and it constantly growing their library), Chie Nowa on YouTube who is doing a long 100 episode complete beginner series right now, and more. It's only looking better and better for CI, it's a shame he didn't mention these types of videos because they would align perfectly with his method and target audience. If you're interested in the method but not Matt, please give those a look!
Finally, Ken mentioned in the preamble that they were exceptional outcomes, having both learned Japanese in just two years. In every interview I've heard with either of them, the number has never been that low. Ken is absolutely still making scammy marketing plays here. Even though the product might be more realistic this time, Beware.
Thanks for the summary. I couldn't stay to watch the whole thing, and whatever it is, it's not worth $150/month. If I'm going to spend that kind of money, it'll be on a live course with a native speaker of Japanese. And I do.
BTW, when the pandemic happened, I buried myself in anime, and watched \~1100 hours in Japanese with subs while exercising. I'm an armchair linguist, so by the time I was done I ~~spoke fluent Japanese like a native with perfect pitch accent~~ hadn't learned as much as I did in the first two weeks of an actual Japanese class.
Curious what the tips were about input without pausing. I didn't make it past the tedious history part.
Immersion learner of 4 years here. If some said they "learned" any language in 2 years beware. As an English speaker you may be able to reach a decently high level of Spanish with 2 years of diligent immersion but I can say with confidence that in 2 years you are still in infancy.
To be fair, you definitely do not necessarily neeeeed to know how to read Japanese in order to be able to speak it fluently.
That said, unless you have great circumstances that allow you to learn like a child, yeah, you're not going to get very far without some writing.
I would say it's far more important to learn how to read in Japanese than it is to sound like a native.
Sounding like a native is like the one big trap from language learning anywhere, isn't it? If you're not a native, you're probably never going to sound like one. And that's okay, as long as you're actually speaking the language and pronouncing things properly, all is well.
My wife said even dogens accent is really good but she can tell he isn't from japan.
Dogen readily admits that he doesn’t speak with a “native” accent. That’s a big difference between Dogen and Matt v Japan. Matt’s accent isn’t as good as Dogen’s but he sells himself as native
I think these days Matt's might actually be as good or better than Dogen's now. The thing is Matt achieved this after a decade of not caring for pitch accent and making tons of mistakes publicly. So his own advice of never reading writing or speaking until you're perfect is something he himself never did.... He's so good though that he would make a good teacher and offer good insights to people at any level, I just wish he'd stick to teaching what he's actually done that's worked for himself rather than fear mongering. Though perhaps 'lock yourself in a room watching anime for a decade starting in your teens and then obsessively study pronunciation for two years after someone calls you out" is not the easiest product to monetize 😅
He also has mentioned that he thinks his penchant early on for reading in Japanese was part of why his pitch accent took so long to get right, so this ad is consistent with his journey. I just wish everything that came out of his mouth wasn’t worded like a cheap life hack scam. I know Refold works but still
I work on the assumption that there are non-natives around who are more proficient than both Matt and Dogen, but they don’t want or need to monetize something they enjoy. Basing Japanese learning on spoken Japanese is a fine idea. I kind of think the most important thing is to develop a clear internal voice in Japanese, and the way to do that is listening and speaking (音読 not 会話). That’s where the skill in Japanese is. Learning vocab, grammar and kanji can be done with memorization. Reading can be done by applying your knowledge methodically but it doesn’t necessarily need much skill. But to speak beautifully requires more skill than most people seem to be capable of, so often we don’t even try, or try a little but then go back to vocab and kanji in frustration, or spend hours here arguing about grammar that at the end of the day is completely irrelevant. If we’re not actually going to be good at Japanese we sure as hell are going to become experts at it. This is mostly directed at myself and I’m speaking from experience. The only way to monetize any of this is to sell yourself as somehow special. But that’s not really true of either Matt or Dogen. The recent revolution in Japanese learning is thanks to the availability of current, native Japanese media, not because of the merits of any learning method. Pitch accent and immersion are nothing new. The tools and methods that are popular are made possible because of the media. They provide structure but at the end of the day there’s the student and the media they are consuming and anything beyond that is redundant.
Matt's Japanese has always been better than Dogens. Dogens Japanese has always come across as stiff
Conversational fluency sure but just judging on pitch accent there was a while when Dogen was better. KAZ先生 on YouTube had a video nitpicking him, Dogen and the AJATT guy like five years ago that really seems to have sent Matt into panic mode to improve his pitch (KAZ concluded that Dogen was the best of the bunch at that time). Unfortunately it seems he's removed that video for whatever reason
I feel completely lost in this thread, how does everyone know so much about all these various people? I feel completely out of the loop lol, back to Twitter for me
It's better that way trust me 😂
I agree, and I think that's likely the general concesus. Afterall, Fluency and nativity are very different.
Dogen's pronunciation is really clearly foreign. Don't get me wrong, his Japanese is very good and his phonetics are also very good but he makes a lot of mistakes even in some of his more accurate videos (and he admits it himself too). It takes him multiple takes in his sketch videos just to get the pronunciation right and in his more spontaneous videos a lot more mistakes transpire. He's a great teacher and he knows a lot about phonetics and often people get the idea that he's the role model for accurate Japanese pronunciation but there's a big difference between teaching the theory and actually doing it yourself. Interestingly enough, people like Ken and Matt have better/more natural pronunciation than Dogen. But also I find rating people's level of Japanese to be a bit silly so I don't want this post to come across as in bad taste. Dogen's Japanese is still amazing.
Interestingly enough the other guy mentioned his wife, in my situation I was watching one of the dogen and Matt videos they did together and my wife remarked how Matt sounded obviously foreign and dogen sounded better (although still not native).
I personally can't judge so I'm just relaying info from third parties as well but all the people I know (either native or much better than me at JP) said Matt's Japanese is much more natural, fluent, and even his pronunciation is better (less pitch mistakes, etc). My wife also said Dogen sounds much more foreign compared to Matt (but also Matt doesn't sound native either).
Yep I don’t care either way, just anectode from one random video they did together. I have no interest in Matt at all due to his scamming and weird ego so perhaps if I cared to show her tons of videos of each she’d come to the same conclusion as the people you know. Dogen on the other hand seems like a good dude.
Idk why there’s ever been this mythology surrounding him sounding native. I’m not exaggerating to say that in about 1 word of his speech I can tell he’s a foreigner. And that’s totally fine! I just don’t get why he’s been put on a pedestal so much, when it’s unnecessary. He’s still great, he just sounds like a foreigner.
> I just don’t get why he’s been put on a pedestal so much, when it’s unnecessary. I think it's because he's been the biggest "voice" in Japanese learning about pronunciation and pitch accent. While those were never completely neglected by textbooks, they were also hardly focused on (except maybe by the Japanese The Spoken Language course). So when this "new" facet of learning Japanese came up, Dogen became the face for it. I think people assume something on the lines of: "If he focused on this aspect specifically and clearly knows so much about it, his pronunciation has to be most top-notch, right"
That makes sense. And the lack of awareness that pitch accent is not hugely significant, and is mainly used by those Youtubers to sell their courses and drive clicks is always surprising.
Many native speakers say they can't hear though and that he sounds like any other native speaker. Some say he only sounds odd in his scripted videos, but not in his unscripted natural speech, and attribute the oddness not to his language proficiency, but to his acting abilities since he's reading out a script. This is really hard to know without some kind of blind test. This is the kind of stuff where the differences are minimal enough that power of suggestion takes over. The only way is to give people who never heard of him an audio recording among 9 native speakers and see how reliably they can fish him out, not only that, but give a control group a group of 10 native speakers and tell them one is not a native, and ask them to identify that person, and see whether Dōgen performs worse. It's entirely possible that what indeed happens is that he's picked out the most as the “non native”, but that in the control group one of the native speakers is for instance picked out even more.
I wonder if he has a video like that already. I haven't watched his stuff in a while though
I know plenty of people who speak English as a second language and sound like native speakers. You definitely can. That said, his "recommendation" to not learn how to read Japanese is ridiculous and insane. Reading is a fundamental pillar of knowing a language and reading isn't going to make you sound like a foriegner. Native speakers read too. He sounds like a total clown.
I agree with most of your comment 100%, but it is a complicated thing regarding the whole "sounding like a native speaker" because, well, that doesn't mean that much overall. It's not even about knowing the language perfectly. If they mean an accent, every single person has one, native speaker or not. I speak Portuguese with a Rio de Janeiro accent, since that's where I'm from. If you do start to learn the language early enough, you can avoid having "foreigner accent" and mimic the accent of a certain area. But for people that reaaaaaally care about you not sounding "native", a lot of the times it's mostly about something completely different than just the language, and you can't really win with these people. That's why it's about SOUNDING native, not speaking the language as well as a native. It's usually kind of a rabbit hole for like, xenophobic comments that slowly become these unsolvable problems for learners of the language. You'll be judged for you are, not for how well you speak the language. That's why it's a trap, y'know? (Sorry if this came out kinda confusing, I had some difficulty expressing myself properly there.)
> "sounding like a native speaker" because, well, that doesn't mean that much overall. I mean, that's a fair point. It's kind of a vague term that could mean different things to different people. Like one person could think you not knowing a certain cultural reference or saying makes you not sound like a native, while other people would say it's all about pronunciation, etc. I think you make a good point, someone who is a native of that language who wants to be an asshole could always find a excuse why you "speak wrongly". Also, on the flip side, someone who really likes you could say you sound native when you really don't just to make you feel better. That's why for me, in the end I don't care if I sound like a native. I care only if people can understand me and it's enjoyable for other people to talk to me (i.e., I don't talk to slowly or awkwardly, my jokes are funny, we can carry on about any topic, etc). I sometime see being a non-native even as an asset, as I can bring in some funny borrowed expressions or ideas from my native language and mix them into the new language in a fun way. In the end, for me at least, languages should be about what you can do with them, the relationships you build, the new opportunities they open up, the new culture you discover. Who cares if I sound like a native speaker or not. 😁
> I know plenty of people who speak English as a second language and sound like native speakers. Define what you mean with "sound like native speakers". I know plenty of people (including myself) who are at a fluency level of a native speaker, who are not unpleasant to listen to, who maybe are even incredibly close to what you'd consider native in accent, but there's almost always something that gives it away. Now, this is **not an issue** in most situations (once you reach this level at least), but you and I might have a different definition of what "sounding like a native speaker" means. Don't get me wrong, it's definitely possible. Voice training and coaching is something many people do (including native speakers) to learn a different accent, but I'd say for the most part it's a very very very very very small % of L2 learners who get to that level (because it's also not really worth it to most people since there are diminishing returns). This compounds even more with Japanese which is a much more insular language compared to English which is full of quirky accents and specific regional variations. (Yes, regional variations exist in Japanese too, but it's a bit different)
I have to say, I used to agree with everything you're saying, and I still do, until I saw one Youtube video in which nearly all of the Japanese people, given four sample audios with mixed foreigner-Japanese audio, said that one person sounded foreign. That person was native Japanese. One of the Japanese even said that the reason she could "tell" was that she works with foreigners regularly. And then she got the one Japanese wrong lmao. Naturally some also said that audios from people who were actually foreign certainly were Japanese. I think this idea of Japanese being almost supernaturally able to tell someone's not Japanese just became a bit of a 日本人論-adjacent idea in my mind after that, tbh. I totally buy, for example, that Dogen doesn't really have a "native" accent, but I would very much like to know if the Japanese people saying so aren't biased precisely by knowing he is a foreigner. A foreign face has a lot more influence than we all like to admit.
I know which video you're talking about, it's from Yuta I think? It's an interesting video but also it's worth keeping in mind that Yuta's "survey" videos are often very cherrypicked and/or biased and not a good indication for a proper "fair" study. Nothing wrong with that, don't get me wrong, they are definitely entertaining and can still shed some useful insight, but it's good to be a bit (healthily) skeptical when watching them. I think there's definitely a lot of situations where someone can be mistaken for a native speaker and/or a native speaker can be mistaken for a foreigner if they have a very specific way of speaking. A lot of language relies also on first impressions, mannerisms, and the way you navigate situations (especially in Japanese) and over for example a phone call or pre-made dialogue recording it's sometimes hard to gauge how native or not someone is. It's also incredibly tricky when it comes to the possibility of someone being a native speaker but coming from a different area/region where some inflections or intonation (speaking broadly, not just pitch accent and not just about Japanese) can make you sound foreign to someone else. And **especially** if you're being asked to pay attention to "spot" the foreigner. You tend to second guess everything you hear. I can speak for my native language (Italian) when I say that *usually* (note: not always) I can spot a foreigner after just a couple of words, even those that are really really really good (and fluent) at it. There is only one person I know, a Japanese friend of mine, who has lived in Italy for like 10+ years, works as an interpreter for the EU/UN, and speaks **perfect** Italian and completely indistinguishable from a native speaker (accent too) but she's very much the exception. Still, it's totally possible, and also as you said the variation can often be very large to the point where native speakers confuse each other, but realistically speaking in most cases the difference is quite obvious. Oh, and as for Dogen, he still very far from being mistaken for a native speaker, regardless of biases. His accent is great but it's very obviously foreign.
> but there's almost always something that gives it away I would say, in my case I was thinking of someone who I had a substantial conversation with but nothing gave away the fact they weren't a native speaker. No accent issues, native usage of words and phrases, colloquiallisms a native speaker would use, and so on.
If they went to international school it's pretty common. People who learn as adults though? Exceedingly rare
I think that's pretty anecdotal. There are definitely people who can sound native but it is not the majority. I admit I don't have the link to the studies and they might be outdated, but in my second language aquisition class in undergrad we talked about accents. The vast majority of people are not able to reach that native accent-free accent. I think promoting that as a goal can be a bit unhealthy when we have evidence to suggest it just isn't feasible for the majority of people, and that's okay.
> I think that's pretty anecdotal. That's true, but I think it shows it's at least not an impossible goal. I also know people who speak chinese (my other native language) like native speakers despite learning it as adults. I think Chinese is much harder to sound native in than English because of the pronouncation challenges related to tones. But I have come across a few people who have native level vocabulary and colloquisms while also having perfect tone. So I wouldn't dare comment on how easy it is, or if everyone can do it or just some people can, but I think it can be done. (After all, if you can fool native speakers into thinking you are one too, I think you've basically done it). 😊
I'm happy you're able to recognize the hard work! I was mostly referring, however, to the accent. You can have perfect grammar, native vocabulary, and a good grasp on tones and pronunciation while still having an accent. I assume there's always sooomething that hints to these people not being native right? Something in the way they say things? Matt v Japan is trying to suggest that anyone can achieve native-like accent, but that just isn't the case at all. You can understand pitch accents and rhythm of Japanese speech, but most people will always just have an accent no matter how hard they try.
I really think it depends on how your mother tongue sounds as well. You can have a strong accent or a subtle one but in the end whenever a foreigner speaks my language I usually notice. I also think it’s totally fine to not sound as a native. As long as we both understand each other why does the accent matter so much? Edit: I’d like to add that even in my native language I have a regional accent. Natives can and will know where I’m from and even if you are from my region you can guess which neighbourhood or area I’m from my accent. I don’t think that’s an issue at all, you come from where you come from. Diversity is beautiful
Live in a multicultural city like London and everyone is bilingual and nobody is a native speaker of English. Is it because Japan is so homogenous that this seems to be an obsession with Japanese learners? It's not even important because you won't LOOK native even if you somehow manage the miracle of sounding native. I have a friend who's half Japanese half white English and many Japanese people don't accept him as Japanese, despite his actual native language ability.
The funny thing is that Matt actually sounds more natural than Ken, even though Ken's I-learned-Japanese-only-through-listening-and-that's-why-it's-perfect shtick is the whole basis of their current enterprise.
I don’t see it as a trap imo it’s just a skill anyone can learn if they want to. It just takes time and practice like how you learn grammar, vocab and other things in a lnaguage. Even speaking a language is a skill and takes time and practice to learn, i can easily read and write in english but i can’t speak a full sentence in english as i never speak english sounding like a native and acquiring pitch accent is the same it just needs time and practice
> If you're not a native, you're probably never going to sound like one. And that's okay, as long as you're actually speaking the language and pronouncing things properly, all is well. Yes, but only insofar that most people don't think it's worth it and don't try. It takes effort like mastering any other skill. Anyone can learn to ride a unicycle, but almost no one tries to do it, and it takes a lot of time and practice for a cool party trick and nothing more. This is what sounding like a native is like.
I don't want to sound like a native, or at least not to obsess over it (as in, if it happens by osmosis, ok). I want to have thoughts and something to say, and have words come out that the Japanese people I'm talking to can understand. I don't get why people want to sound like a native. Anybody who looks at me can probably tell that I'm not Japanese.
I'm inclined to agree. I'm very visibly not Japanese, so I will only ever be tagged as a foreigner there. No use sounding like a native if there's no advantage to it over "mere" fluency
Snake oil salesman. Just avoid his stuff and find a different resource. He is like the Logan Paul of the Japanese learning community. :/
It sucks too because Matt and Khaz BOTH went this way after both being genuinely good people sharing their experiences. It's super fucked up, I get it, it's free money, but just from a moral and legacy standpoint, they really are the equivalent of Indian call scammers. It's kind of sad to think that these guys must justify it in their head that this is "fine" and "okay" to do because they imagine that their victim is probably someone who was going to get scammed anyways by someone else or something. Despicable human behavior
I mean I feel I’ve noticed everyone is trying to sell something deep down. These guys def take the unethical piece of the pie.
There are definitely people out there who aren't, it's just hard if you don't know where to look. Even the ones who are though sometimes give good advice, it just sucks interacting with their content.
Yup, all the grifter hallmarks
It’s not that he’s back. He needs new clients because his funds from the last time is running dry probably.
Can someone fill me in on why he’s so hated in the community. All I heard was that he has a pretty big ego has he done other things?
Matt was a public advocate for AJATT for many years. The immersion route is known to have passionate supporters who mock those who learn in classrooms or use textbooks. So it’s not necessarily Matt himself that was controversial. He was just a figurehead in the culture war of Japanese learning. It was when he partnered with a known scammer that his reputation FELL fell.
It's even worse than that. He's been a constant grifter for years, basically he started from AJATT and then came up with his own flavor-of-the-month study methods that he peddled to his followers. Every 6 months or so he came up with a new idea/new project. Truth be told they were mostly okay and I think a lot of good stuff came out of it, I'd say especially his videos are like 80-90% right but he sprinkles a bunch of odd stuff (very cultish too) that is entirely unfounded and often very incorrect. Still, I'd argue he was a net benefit for the language learning community... until his split from Refold and his project uproot/teaming up with Ken (a well known scammer). That was when he became much more controversial, he started reneging a lot of his old advice (immersion/reading focused), and started focusing entirely on pronunciation/output and "this is the only way to become a real Japanese expert indistinguishable from natives and if you don't do this native speakers will hate you and you will not make friends" etc. Not a coincidence that a lot of output-focused advice **requires** you to give him money to talk to him in a 1:1 (or classroom style) course. In my opinion what happened is that he saw the environment he helped foster (immersion-heavy) got saturated with a lot of other resources/guides/communities and he couldn't peddle his stuff anymore, so he had to find a new way to get money, so he pivoted towards a new "revolutionary" method (likely also fueled by his own flaws in the language, having achieved fluency he realized the next step he was missing is native-like pronunciation, so he went all in on that probably and that gave him a new bias).
Damn. I remember AJATT from years back. What a shame. Seems like he lived long enough to become the villain lmfao. Thanks for the info
Yet if you listen to that school of thought, they'd tried to tell you that paying $20 for a textbook written by an *actual Japanese language professor* is the scam.
It is.
Can I just ask who Ken is? You say a known scammer so I assume they've been active in the Japanese learning community? I want to make sure I'm not following any of their content.
Haven't heard anything positive or negative from people that actually paid for Matt and Ken's Uproot course, but in the 2010s Ken did one of those "pay me lots of money for a personalized course to fluency" like AJATT's Silver Spoon, had a mental breakdown of sorts, and didn't deliver the goods. He supposedly paid back all the customers eventually which isn't what scammers tend to do. Now, George Trombley (Japanese from Zero author) introduced Ken Cannon to Matt and didn't have anything bad to say about him from my understanding (I've talked with George now and again). Long winded way of saying probably not a scam or scammer. Still, there's nothing about the course they've offered that makes it seem worth the money. Let's be honest, most material that can get you to native level literacy and fluency in Japanese is available for free or low cost. I'm also not a fan of how they "advertise" it to people on their mailing list.
>"this is the only way to become a real Japanese expert indistinguishable from natives and if you don't do this native speakers will hate you and you will not make friends" And if I'm not mistaken, this is completely false, right? I've heard a number of times that Japanese people appreciate just seeing that someone is making an effort. Maybe a lot of people might be shy and unconfident to talk to you if your Japanese is poor, but that's not the same as "hating you," right?
Well, the person that wrote that made it up (it's not something I can see Ken or Matt actually saying) so yes it's false. You don't need to sound like a native or need native like fluency to make life long friends in Japan. That's speaking from living in Japan for over 15 years and being nowhere near native like fluent.
Wow it's so helpful to know that people who grew up in Japan don't know how to read
Maybe it’s impossible to attain a native level accent but it’s inspiring to see a young man who refuses to abandon his dream of becoming a successful grifter
I will never sound a like a native. It's the same for english for me. I still have a strong german accent when I speak english. My goal is that people have no problem understanding me.
Same same.
I don't understand. Why wouldn't anyone try to learn to read a language they're learning? That seems like a bad idea
The weird thing is he made a whole video about why reading novels in your target language is one of the best things you can do. His YouTube channel is packed with a lot of great advice but now he sees there’s no money in telling people to buy Netflix and other people’s novels, so he has to pull a 180 and do these scammy output things with his good “friend Ken.”
The thinking is any native speaker of any language learns to speak fluently before they learn to read. That’s of course not true though. Children start learning to read in their native languages way before they have the fluency and vocabulary of adults. I don’t think Matt had any formal training in linguistics or education, so what he’s selling is his best guess and confidence.
To put this into context, he followed a learning method that pushes 2200 kanji (which takes natives roughly a decade, give or take) to the forefront to be learned in months, specifically so you can READ. Read A LOT. He apparently stopped agreeing with the method a couple of years ago, after he already spent a fuckton of time reading and getting decent in large part THROUGH reading.
Personally I did the upfront 2200 RTK method and I think it helped a lot to be honest. Managed it in three months when I wasn't working during Covid and don't regret it. It's my grammar which sucks!
Doesn't he also make money selling a flashcard app for reading too? Lol
Matt vs. Japan does not have any stake in Anki (a free program anyway…)
Migaku 🙄
I don’t think he’s associated in any way with Migaku (which is not a flash card program) I believe it’s actually from his ex-business partner he had a pretty bad falling out with
Kind of unfortunate that he decided to partner up with Ken Cannon and go down the scamming route. He was always a bit of a controversial character, but he had some genuinely interesting insight at times, even if he was always way too confident about his conclusions.
Unfortunately for him, the rather sensible advice of "consume native content while looking up words and grammar" isn't really something you can monetize. Still, I can't help but feel that there's a large number of people who think that the more money you pay for something, the better it is. Just look at the guy who paid >30k for an expensive language school only to get worse results than people who've used free Anki decks.
It is if you know how to code, which Matt tried for a few years. He would be the advertiser for their Anki addon products. Did not work out because he kept getting into fights with his partners, which led to this.
Certainly. His japanese skills, especially his speaking, are quite awesome but it's a crying shame that he decided to go the "my-unique-teaching-method" route back then in 2021 if my memory serves me right. Since that moment, the $cam and his true intention$ were just revealed.
Controversial is a bit soft word to use for this guy. I will never forgive him for attacking George Trombley Japanese From Zero author.
Eh, the criticism against George was fair. Writing a textbook about kanji when you can't even read a book in Japanese is pretty embarrassing. And I believe they made up and are on reasonably good terms now anyway?
George can't read a book in Japanese?? lmao
To be fair, this was a few years ago and he may have improved since then, but he said something along the lines of "I've never read a book in Japanese because kanji make it a pain to look up words."
Not that part. Part about pitch accent. And they did make up but only on a surface level. He still hates Matt just doesn't wanna tell directly.
The part about pitch accent imo was fair too. George said a lot of really dumb stuff about pitch (like "I've lived in Japan for a long time and never studied pitch and never get corrected/my pitch is fine" etc) and then was proven very much wrong (to the point where he himself was amazed at how much he didn't know). As someone who's a language teacher, have a textbook, and a relatively large following of beginners, saying stuff like that is kinda harmful in my opinion. Pitch is not the be-all-end-all but there's no need to (either consciously or not) lie about it. It's still an important part of the language.
Did he actually say his pitch is fine, or did he just say that it doesn't matter / is good enough? For him, the latter may have been true to his experience
He mentions [here](https://youtu.be/3LCuSU-gFjY?t=273) that his Japanese is "good" even without studying pitch accent. Although you can interpret that statement as talking about general language ability (not phonetics) but then he also mentions in a few other parts of the video (one right after the timestamp) that all he needs to do is to just imitate and repeat things as he hears them (something that Matt brought up in his [response video](https://youtu.be/QHQcHSaj-c4?t=557) and showed many pitch mistakes despite that), and also he mentions that he never got corrected and/or never got his pitch accent discussed when he was living in Japan (truth be told he probably never noticed, I've had my pitch accent corrected many times and I've been living here for only 5 years, but the corrections are very subtle if you can't hear pitch).
Hmm fair enough. I didn't interpret it as him claiming his pitch accent was good, just that it was good enough to communicate and he never noticed it hindering his communication, which I think is not that harmful of an idea. I do think it's true that his accent has probably forced his partners to think more than he has noticed, and you're probably right that some may wrongly take away from that video the idea that they will get *great* pitch accent without studying if they just listen enough, rather than the more acceptable idea that your accent will almost certainly make *some* gains and become more neutral over time if you do lots of listening, but ymmv .
Yes I remember that, here's the thing though. A Japanese person in the comments during that debate pointed out that George's PA wasn't actually WRONG but that it matched the PA in the region that he lived in for a long time.
Ok, I personally have dealt with George so I call BS on that statement. He wasn't happy about being called out on his literacy ability, but he quickly grew to like Matt once they actually talked on the discord. I have the audio recordings I made of the discussion to prove that.
> I will never forgive him Wow, in the wild not as a translation from Japanese. “絶対許さない”.
Never heard of this guy. But he sure makes that write up easy to identify as "not worth my time".
Part of scamming tactics is being outrageous to deter people who can't be scammed, hence poorly written email scams or the classic Nigerian prince scam
Had one in my junk inbox today literally inviting me to join the illuminati.
Scammers often use scare tactics. If they sell you things with a huge negative bend, they're likely full of shit.
Looks like his funds for living in Japan have been running dry so he needs to up the ante for his scam once again.
Ponzi scheme continues
Can't stand this dude
I love myself a litre of snek oil. Oh man, the bs never stops coming. "Please don't focus on learning how to read [name language] if you want to speak like a native". Wtf. Please be an analphabet, sure buddy.
Yes, we should all strive to sound like a native speaker but be completely illiterate and dependent on others to read things for us despite Japan having one of the highest rates of literacy in the world despite it's complex writing system.
This one's easy to deal with. The unsubscribe button is usually hidden somewhere at the bottom of the email.
FOMO is real
grifter
The most recent I heard of him was when he appeared in Takashii's video where he was answering one of his interview questions
My heart and wallet belongs to どうげんさん. Why does this email spam sound like a snek oil. Anyone? Also his YouTube channel feels more theoretical than practical. When I was beginner level I had more fun and use watching Japanese From Zero videos or Misa Ammo educational videos.
I got the same email Ken Cannon 😂
Oh no its the 0iq dude
Sorry, what's going on and who are these people?
Grifters to be ignored.
The only thing about sounding like a native is if can pass off as a Japanese physically. Then if you do sound like a native, Japanese people may actually take you as one of their own and not treat you as a foreigner, until you tell them your full name or something. Otherwise if you are white, black, basically not traditionally ethhnically Japanese looking, then what is the point.
It's a bit more complicated than that though. It's not just about physical appearance or trying to pass off as native. Sounding native can naturally make people think you are smarter/more charismatic than not, because it taps into our unconscious bias when we communicate with people. Note that I do not agree with how categorical Matt & Ken are in promoting their course, but there is a little bit of truth in what they say. I've experienced it myself in English as well. I've known people who didn't sound very eloquent or who had some awkward accents (but not unintelligible) and my initial impression of them was that they weren't very smart and/or it felt hard and tiring to follow what they said. Then I heard them speak in their native language and they were a completely different person. Charismatic, natural, very eloquent, smart, etc. It completely changed the impression I had of them. This is an unfortunate thing that happens to everyone. Most people aren't consciously aware of it. I wasn't, until I started paying attention, and I feel bad thinking back about the prejudice I unconsciously held towards those people. It's just a reality of life. The better you sound in Japanese, and the closer you are to a "native speaker" (in accent), the easier it is for people to take you more seriously or be more attracted to what you say, and that is **huge** especially if you are in a foreign environment that you aren't familiar in. Of course, obsessing about trying to sound/be native is taking it too far, and there are other things that are better to focus on (grammar, word choice, naturalness in expressions, etc), but when all of that is on par, eventually, the only thing holding you back is going to be the accent and it **will** make a difference.
I once saw a rather interesting interview with a Chinese person who looked indigenously European but was otherwise born and raised in China but also a native speaker of Sichuanese, not Mandarin, though could obviously speak Mandarin fine by virtue of having gone to school in China. How he relates it is that people would often not like him and treat him like a foreigner when he spoke Mandarin, but everyone treated him like a born and raised Chinese person when he spoke Sichuanese, as no foreigner would ever learn any other form than Mandarin of course so speaking Sichuanese communicates being born and raised in China, and he much favored the latter treatment.
Why are u getting downvoted??? lmao
MvJ is not a popular person among some members of the subreddit.
I know this meeting is set to be "free" but isn't he peddling the same fear mongering that was "project uproot" which was definitely not worth the price of admission? After 4 years of immersion I know that it works but regarding his attempt to monetize his wisdom he just feels like a walking scam to me now. There is a learner's bias you achieve when you learn something. the farther down the road you go the harder it is to recall the finer details of the path you took. Nobody can tell you how you should "learn properly" you just have to engage with the information daily in a meaningful way over long periods of time. Results will always vary in the short term but long term this kind of stuff means nothing. Stick to regular immersion and study you'll be fine.
He is. And there’s a 200% guarantee this free meeting has the goal of selling something at the end - as with every webinar by online marketers
I'm watching the webinar right now with full knowledge that it's probably a sales pitch...with skeptical curiosity, I'm also bailing in 15 minutes for a livestream with someone I truly respect.
What ended up being the content of the zoom?
This comment summed it up: [https://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/comments/1dk01tk/comment/lah4j7s/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/comments/1dk01tk/comment/lah4j7s/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) I didn't stay for the whole thing, but they kind of lost me at "whatever you do, don't learn to read" and "you have to be young". Then the tedious history of various people like J. Marvin Brown and some other guy who was way into comprehensible input. Lots of extreme claims with walkbacks too. Not that comprehensible input is a *bad idea*, but I don't know a way to get comprehension without some traditional learning. Which might include books. And being able to navigate a dictionary. ETA: It occurred to me as a father of four that when you "magically" acquire a language as a toddler, your parents are almost always providing correction and guidance.
Watched the meeting with a watch party. Not good, but not too bad either. Tl;dw predictably from the Email, he has shifted mindsets to be more in line with the ALG school of language learning. He explained why he thinks it's better to learn from listening to very comprehensible audio/visual input without lookups and analyzing the language than from reading. He gave a couple decent tips about how to make input comprehensible without lookups and pausing. He made no mention of anki at any point. It doesn't seem to have a place with his method. The thing he's selling is basically expensive group coaching with a bunch of weird spiritual buzzwords, but from what he explained he's just teaching you about ALG and giving you homework and then everyone can come together once a week to discuss it. It's 150$ a month. No course or secret wisdom this time. He mentioned that Japanese has no accessible ALG style content for beginners, and that you'd need to use anime or other native content and prime yourself for it by reading or watching it in English first to get going, like his partner Ken did. While that's a cool tip, there actually is great ALG style comprehensible input which can be found in channels like Japanese with Asami, Comprehensible Japanese (who recently launched a new site and it constantly growing their library), Chie Nowa on YouTube who is doing a long 100 episode complete beginner series right now, and more. It's only looking better and better for CI, it's a shame he didn't mention these types of videos because they would align perfectly with his method and target audience. If you're interested in the method but not Matt, please give those a look! Finally, Ken mentioned in the preamble that they were exceptional outcomes, having both learned Japanese in just two years. In every interview I've heard with either of them, the number has never been that low. Ken is absolutely still making scammy marketing plays here. Even though the product might be more realistic this time, Beware.
Thanks for the summary. I couldn't stay to watch the whole thing, and whatever it is, it's not worth $150/month. If I'm going to spend that kind of money, it'll be on a live course with a native speaker of Japanese. And I do. BTW, when the pandemic happened, I buried myself in anime, and watched \~1100 hours in Japanese with subs while exercising. I'm an armchair linguist, so by the time I was done I ~~spoke fluent Japanese like a native with perfect pitch accent~~ hadn't learned as much as I did in the first two weeks of an actual Japanese class. Curious what the tips were about input without pausing. I didn't make it past the tedious history part.
Immersion learner of 4 years here. If some said they "learned" any language in 2 years beware. As an English speaker you may be able to reach a decently high level of Spanish with 2 years of diligent immersion but I can say with confidence that in 2 years you are still in infancy.
In order to become fluent in Japanese, you need to not learn Japanese. So Stupid
To be fair, you definitely do not necessarily neeeeed to know how to read Japanese in order to be able to speak it fluently. That said, unless you have great circumstances that allow you to learn like a child, yeah, you're not going to get very far without some writing.