Authentic Japanese: Progressing from Intermediate to Advanced [New Edition] (Japanese Edition)

As my title indicates, this is a great series for students who have just finished up Tobira (or equivalent, i.e. 800-1000+ kanji and familiarity with many of A Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese Grammar points) and still feel like they want a bit more textbook-learning. At this point in a student's Japanese-learning career, he or she should be branching out into native materials, of which there are many great sources (my personal favorites are the two "Read Real Japanese" books and "Breaking into Japanese Literature"). However, this task can be a little daunting as there always seems to be more kanji and grammar than one can handle. That's where this textbook comes in.Each chapter is broken into your typical textbook format--pre-reading exercise, reading, key grammar and phrases, more exercises...--and is accompanied by an audio CD, which admittedly I haven't listened to yet. Many of the essays come from various real articles. Topics range from individualism to environmental and working-class issues. There aren't many exercises in this textbook as compared to other series, but there is a workbook students can also buy, and the main textbook makes for great reading material.The text's biggest strength is that it's entirely in Japanese, excluding snippets of English in the "important expressions" sections. By now, students should be familiar enough with the language to comprehend most of what's going on without having it to be translated for them.Unfortunately, this is also leads me to one of the biggest weaknesses of this textbook. Some of the "important expressions," use vague English translations, which could have been supplemented with explanations in Japanese as well. Instead, you'll get explanations like "~''' / '''N = in one's own way / N that is in one's own way," and that's it. Luckily there follows two or three example sentences, but it would be nice to have further explanations in Japanese sometimes. EDIT: I overlooked the booklet that comes with the textbook. There are in fact explanations in Japanese for every grammar point. As such, I've bumped my review from four stars to five.For all of you who have been skimping out on learning kanji, be warned: this textbook will test your knowledge. Most of the kanji in the textbook does not have furigana, nor are you provided with any vocabulary lists. That said, there is a pamphlet that comes with the book that gives you the readings for kanji-compounds in each reading section. However, you will not be given English translations or definitions. This is probably for the best, as it gives you extra practice for looking up things in a dictionary.I realize this course says "intermediate," so some of you may be wondering about overlap between this and other "intermediate" textbooks. Rest assured, there isn't much overlap between Tobira or Integrated Approach to Intermediate Japanese (although I can't be certain with Azora), but even considering the small amount of overlap, it's not anything to get hot over. This is definitely an upper-intermediate textbook. In fact, if I had to rank the major Japanese textbooks in order from easiest to most difficult, it would go something like this:1. Japanese from Zero 1+2 (Probably best if skipped altogether as this series is slow going).2. Genki 1 and 2 (Absolute Beginner to Upper Beginner)3. Integrated Approach to Intermediate Japanese (Lower Intermediate).4. Tobira (Mid-level intermediate)6. New Authentic Japanese: Progressing from Intermediate to Advanced7. Images of Japan (mostly for more reading practice)8. Kanzen Master N2 Series? (Honestly, there might be some grammar points here that neither Tobira nor this textbook covers).9. Kanzen Master N1 seriesI definitely recommend this text to those who can "almost" read newspapers, or those who already can but might still struggle with finer grammar points. However, I wouldn't recommend this for people looking for additional speaking exercises. The book leans more on listening and reading.

Perfect Addition to your Japanese learning collection specially after getting done with Tobira or Equivalent like Integrated Approach To Intermediate Japanese.

I first want to start off with a few things I found disheartening when purchasing this set of books, the Kyoukasho (Textbook) and the Work Book. I reviewed all of the chapters and realized the only English throughout is in two portions of the lessons: throughout each chapter there are grammar lessons that have English associations, and there is one section that teaches how to convert some English words into Japanese katakana. That is all. Yup. Kind of kicked me in the kintama right there.Secondly, there are no new kanji lessons throughout. There are new words and new kanji, but no kanji stroke orders, words containing said kanji, sample sentences, etc. The vocabulary is listed in the back under the kana form associated to the kanji form only; no English translated words. You'll find this trend throughout both the kyoukasho and the work book.What's the good news? Well, honestly, these lessons put the learner at a disadvantage if used directly after Genki II. Genki was more graphic intensive with stories and images, whereas the kyoukasho and work book here are data and academic intensive using graphs and charts as the only images. Great if you have completed an intermediate course in Japanese and ready to move up to using the Japanese you've accumulated to continue learning Japanese. So if you have completed Tobira, then this is the next set of books for you. I am grateful that I bought this series. I now know to continue using Tobira, and that once completed, these will be waiting for me to pick up where Tobira leaves off.

hard i like it a lot all in japaness

This is from the same publisher as the Genki books, and it's far more advanced than the Genki series. I think it's good for students who wants to make it to the advanced level. It's well written and each chapter is interesting. I would highly recommend this book, but it's not for beginners.

この本は良いと思います。

専門教員ではありませんが、日本語の読み書きを生業としている関係上、中国人の友人に日本語指導を頼まれ、当該教材を用いて指導しています。JLPTが多肢式試験であるため、１級保持者でも「アウトプット」という点での言語運用に問題があって悩んでいたところ、この教材に出会いました。各課とも、ウォームアップ→インプット→アウトプット・応用という形で順に内容を身につけていけるようになっており、特に活用や慣用表現の習得について有意義であろうと思いました。友人もこの本をかなり気に入っています。対象者としては、必ずしもJLPT1級レベルである必要はないと思いますが、ある程度の文法知識と語彙はある必要があると思います。特に、「基礎はあるけど使い方がわからない」くらいのレベルの方が挑戦すると、ちょうどよいチャレンジとなって、レベルアップの助けになると思います。また、自習でも使えると思いますが、指導教材として用いた方がより効率が良いと思います。

I worked through this book after finishing Quartet I and II.Each section begins with some questions related to the section's reading's theme to get you warmed up for the main reading. The main reading is quite challenging in some chapters, mainly due to vocabulary - I've had paragraphs with 15-20 words that I didn't know. This is good, because it forces you to have contact with new vocabulary, but at the same time it takes a lot of effort to go through the text sometimes. After the reading you have some reading comprehension questions - "In line X it said 'bla bla bla', what does this mean?" - and another activity related to the reading, usually a text about a related topic, with reading comprehension questions following it, too. It is worth noting that the vocabulary for the reading is in the detachable booklet in the order in which it appears in the text, but without a translation, so you'll probably have to look it up a lot.After the reading, the book describes some grammar points which appeared on the text: each grammar point has a simple english translation and a couple of example sentences, with two "complete the phrases" exercises. There are full grammar explanations in the detachable booklet, but they are in japanese - this hasn't been a problem for me at this level, but occasionally there are unknown words which you'll probably have to look up. Additional grammar exercises for each grammar point are in the workbook, which I can also recommend, as it also brings additional reading/writing/speaking activities.After the grammar section, there is a "Useful expressions" section, which is pretty much just an exercise list (whose answers are on the back). In my opinion, this was the hardest section, but also the most useful, as the contents are a mix between what was taught previously in the section, common sources of confusion (like verbs ending in ~込む, or nouns ending with -家 or -屋) and miscelaneous grammar points. One criticism is that not all content in these exercises are presented in the book, so you'll probably have to look it up a few times. For example, I already worked through Genki, AIATIJ and Quartet, and in none of those books I had learned about -げ, so I was a bit confused when an exercise about it popped up in this book without any explanation.Coming from Quartet, I would say that content-wise this was a proper follow-up, and after self-evaluation I'd say I'm just short of N2. The themes of each chapter are enticing and worth giving a thought in a way that I was never really bored, so I'd say it is worth working through this book once you've finished Quartet or Tobira or something equivalent.

嫁が外国人のため、日本語学校に通っております。その日本語学校で教科書として、使っているものでした。学校で直接買うよりもアマゾンで買った方がいくらか安いので、アマゾンで買いました。

手配が早い。本はいい、それに、別のことはありません。とりあえずよい。