Japanese Study Resources: Audio

I haven’t posted in a long time about my study regime or what resources I have been using lately.  This post is going to focus on the audio  resources I use, which are mostly podcasts (I’ll post about video resources later).

I spend about 30 minutes to 1.5 hours listening to Japanese.  Usually I listen when I am getting ready for work in the morning, driving to the Metro and sometimes on the Metro.

Japanese Pod 101 Dot Com:

http://www.japanesepod101.com/

For a long time I have used the free audio from Japanesepod101.com.  This is a great resource to supplement other listening because they explain the grammar and new vocabulary and the conversations are realistic.  The audio blogs are an especially good resource because there is no English but the level is not extremely advanced.

I subscribe to the premium level service because I wanted to try it out for a year, but honestly if you want to subscribe I recommend subscribing to the Basic subscription.  I don’t use most of the extra resources you get with Premium, but the PDFs you get with both Basic and Premium are very useful.  I will renew my subscription for Basic when my current subscription expires.

Japanese LingQ:

http://www.japaneselingq.com/

This free podcast and blog/learning center has listening for beginner and more advanced learners.  Be careful, some of the audio has non-Japanese people speaking Japanese, which is not great for learning correct pronunciation.

S-J-P Study Japanese Podcast:

http://sjp.cocolog-nifty.com/blog/

I really like this podcast, but they haven’t put up new lessons in a long time.  It is two guys who present dialogues and then discuss them and define the new vocab in Japanese.  This podcast is almost entirely in Japanese.

Fashion Snap Dot Com:

http://www.fashionsnap.com/podcast/

This is an all Japanese podcast which has 2 guys and a girl discussing current fashion trends.  This is natural Japanese, but uses Japanese which is a little more formal than some podcasts you find.

Zima Presents Verbal Eyez Podcast:

http://www.zima.jp/

This is a music podcast sponsored by Zima and it features the musician M-flo (check out his music here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99YQqebbLYU)

Tokyo Local:

http://www.tokyolocal.jp/blog/

I think you can guess what this one is about.  It’s sponsored by Proactiv so there is some talk of beauty and a little advertising, but it’s enjoyable listening.

Yomiuri News Podcast:

http://podcast.yomiuri.co.jp/

This is the Yomiuri News Podcast.  It is a daily podcast feature daily news.  You can also find video and good reading materials at the Yomiuri website.

Coffee and Milk (コーヒーと牛乳) Radio Blog:

http://coffee-and-milk.radilog.net/

I just started listening to this one.  It’s an all in Japanese radiolog.

Junk Podcast:

http://www.tbs.co.jp/radio/junk/

This podcast is a Japanese comedy/talk show podcast.  It’s very casual and lots of joking so I find it a bit difficult to understand.

Almost all of these podcasts can be found on the USA iTunes store.

Jouyou Kanji (常用漢字)

The Jouyou Kanji is the government issued list of kanji that everyone should know. However, the kanji placed on the list are not the most commonly used kanji encountered in everyday life, making the list not as useful as it could be.

I recently read Tae Kim’s post about the proposed revisions to the list and the “usefulness” of the list in the first place. Check it out for a great look at the Jouyou Kanji and how studying from the list might not be the most effective way to learn Japanese.

Useful links:
常用漢字 (Jouyou Kanji 日本語)

All 1945 Jouyou Kanji in 10 Minutes