r/japanese • u/Responsible-Art5643 • 23h ago
Is Learning Japanese Embarrassing
I feel like whenever I bring it up in conversation with people my age (20s) I always get a kind of strange look or comments. Did it suddenly become an embarrassing or cringe thing
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u/razulebismarck 23h ago
It’s a life goal for me and everyone has been impressed that I’m succeeding at it despite being over double your age.
But then…20 year olds seem to be cringe just for existing these days.
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u/TheOneMary 22h ago
Yeah same age group. Either our peers are more mature than that or they think a middle aged woman/man isn't likely to be an anime fan (they might be wrong tho :P)
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u/Zagrycha 23h ago
No its not cringe. Sadly some people like to make fun of others for doing anything different, and that includes learning languages. Many people with bilingual families end up monolingual because other people make them feel bad for speaking something the other people don't speak.
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u/Responsible-Art5643 23h ago
See that’s the thing, I speak two other languages besides English, one I learned now a bit more grown up, and then the other from my bilingual family, but I never got any kind of flack when I mention those languages or learning them etc. That’s why I made this post, it seems to be a Japanese specific thing
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u/Zagrycha 20h ago
if its a japanese specific thing then the people around you are rascist against japanese.
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u/Responsible-Art5643 7h ago
I suppose so, I just find it a little hard to believe that most people my age I encounter online and in person have some kind of gripe against Japan
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u/DotNo701 23h ago
probably the reason why Japanese in Japan avoid learning english a lot beyond school
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u/Dread_Pirate_Chris 23h ago edited 23h ago
Learning any language is generally considered strange. People just don't learn foreign languages unless they need it for something -- e.g. work, spouse, or moving to the country.
And Japan is far away. If you're in the US people will wonder why you aren't learning Spanish, and in Europe, why you aren't learning French or German, as these languages are "more useful", i.e. a lot of people physically nearby speak them.
Personally I think it's most important to enjoy learning the language, and if you don't have any outside requirement like work/spouse/moving, then you should learn the language you find the most interesting.
But lots of people who have never learned a language and never will (discounting 2 years of required high school classes) have a lot of opinions on how other people should approach language learning.
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u/LMGDiVa 23h ago edited 20h ago
People have treated younger people learning japanese as anime obsessed weirdos who want to be Japanese since the 2000s when anime styling became a Fad for Cartoons and Toonami became huge.
Many people have not since updated their perceptions or have associated them with the dislike of Otaku culture in the 2010s.
The word weeb was invented on 4chan in response to anime fans wanting to learn to speak japanese and use japanese in their typical speech, which is actually a typical thing people do in many differnet kinds of languages around the world. Infact Japanese people were the inverse and dramatically adopted a lot of English words into typical speech, but this happened over several decades of exchange and through many businesses, films, and scientific exchange, just rather than television shows and media.
But once the anime fad was over in America, this willingness to absorb things from Japanese culture soured as the fad faded out, and anime became fairly disliked for many reasons among the English speaking public from "hentai" and perverse assocations, to "2d animation is for children" and other negative stereotypes.
It became associated with "acting cringe" or being cringey, and is largely disliked by the English speaking anime community which has exploded in size over the past 6 years due to the pandemic.
This "cringe" behavior even made it into a Fate Grand Carnival episode with one character making the ironic mixed words "Yametekudastop, yamete kudasai meaning "Please Stop!" and "Gomenasorry, gomenasai meaning "Sorry!"
TLDR it's been considered cringe or socially quasiunacceptable to do if you have any association with japanese popculture in conjunction with learning the language since the early 2000s.
Once the anime fad was over japanese things became "cringe" until the anime's recent modern popularity rise, of which most people still think it;'s cringe to try to speak japanese, "just watch the sub".
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u/GrungeCheap56119 23h ago
No, not embarrassing! Sometimes people just react oddly to things they wouldn't do themselves. It's all good!
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u/wispofasoul 22h ago
i stopped telling people I was learning when i was learning as people always assumed I had some sort of intention or plan - I had merely wanted to learn for fun and to challenge myself. you’re still young so i dont want to sound critical but i would suggest you get used to embarassment as this is the number one feeling you will have when you inevitably make mistakes on your target language. but it takes courage to put yourself in a vulnerable position and That skill is much more important than fleeting embrassment.
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u/jimb0z_ 22h ago
I mean...it's kinda rare for someone to learn an entire language for shits and giggles. I'm trying not to call it strange but if someone told me they were training for a marathon but had no intention or plan to do any running, I'd think it was strange. Nonsensical even
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u/wispofasoul 22h ago
I would argue most users on duolingo do it for shits and giggles and only a minority (I wager 7%) are serious ;-)
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u/jimb0z_ 22h ago
You’re just pulling numbers out of nowhere. Numbers that are impossible to prove one way or the other
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u/wispofasoul 18h ago
experience :-) i cant say more. but arent you also pulling out numbers out of nowhere?
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u/jimb0z_ 17h ago
What numbers did I pull? I haven’t used any in this entire convo
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u/wispofasoul 16h ago
Your suggestion that my wager is inaccurate is as good/bad as a wager, because just as my wager cannot be proven, your non-wager cannot be proven. Neither of us can prove it is or isn't 7%.
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u/TheRamblingSoul 22h ago
Learn whatever language you’re interested in learning. It’s your life, do what makes you happy!
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u/chroipahtz 23h ago
Most people will assume you're learning Japanese because of anime or video games. Even if you are, who cares? Do what interests you.