Improve your Japanese Intonation with YouTube
Intonation is an aspect of Japanese that is often ignored. It is very important though and essential to having smooth, understandable conversations with people. You can get away without perfect intonation and people will understand you ok most of the time. However, if you are unfamiliar with how it works in Japanese then transitions from word to word and sentences will sound unnatural. That will make it harder for Japanese people to listen to what you are saying. The best way to improve your intonation is to listen a lot and listen closely to Japanese speakers. If you don’t live in Japan it may be hard to do that, but YouTube makes it easier.
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How to Improve your Japanese Intonation with YouTube
YouTube has all sorts of channels and videos in Japanese. If you find the right one for you, then you have 90% of the work already done. In order to improve your Japanese intonation with YouTube there are a few steps you will need to take.
https://japaneseuniverse.com/2024/02/18/pac-man-in-japaneseconcepts-behind-development-to-global-icon/Find a Channel you Like
First, you will need to find some channel that clicks with you. I have found that YouTube often likes to hide videos in the search results that I may want to watch and instead shows me more popular channels. This drives me crazy but I have found that if I search for a specific topic and then filter by date, playlist, live and so on I can sometimes get YouTube to suggest other videos that I can’t find just with normal search.
https://japaneseuniverse.com/2020/08/29/how-to-improve-your-intonation-in-japanese/
Anyway, it may take some time depending on what you like. But, just play around with it until you find a channel that you like. Finding a channel you like is the most important part since you need to be motivated to watch it. However, if you can find one with the following criteria it is even better.
- A Channel with a single person that does a lot of talking
- That person does not try to overact, and speaks more like a normal person
- The channel has lots of videos or content
One Person Speaks
It is good if you have a channel with a single YouTube speaking. That is because it will be easier to try to copy that person instead of listening to several different people. That is why a normal YouTuber would be a better choice than say, a news channel.
No Overacting
This may just be my preference but I prefer less edited more straightforward content. It is more natural and especially when you are trying to learn intonation if you have someone acting too much then they are probably trying to sound good when they speak instead of natural. This is again why listening to normal YouTubers over news channels is better. Most of the time. If you get a really big channel then most likely the YouTuber will be overacting and exaggerating. That is not all bad, but it is better to learn to sound normal if you want to speak normally.
Lots of Content
This is self-explanatory but a channel with more videos means more listening time.
Watch Every Video of the Channel
Ok, depending on how much content there is, maybe not everything. It is a good goal though to aim for. If you watch hours and hours of a single person speaking then you will unknowingly start to mimic them and maybe sound more like them.
Pay Close Attention What is being said
While you watch your YouTuber make sure that you are focused on what they say. In order to do this, you will want to do a few things.
- Turn off subtitles
- Don’t take notes
- Don’t do anything else
These three things are essential. If you turn on subtitles you will end up wanting to read instead of listening. That will defeat the whole purpose of what you are trying to do. Also, if you try to take notes, such as what specific words intonations are or whatever you will not only be paying less attention but you will be telling your brain that it does not need to learn. By taking notes you are telling your brain that it can forget now. The point is to just sit back and let yourself absorb everything. Then, over time you will naturally start to mimic the intonation.
Optional Ideas
If you want to you can shadow by moving your lips or speaking to yourself while you watch. That will train your muscles to produce the right sounds. You can also use the back button to go back 5 seconds and listen to the same phrase over and over. Be careful though with these two ideas. It will be more work to actually listen to the Channel and you may get tired out sooner and want to stop.
