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Summary:
Japanese for Busy People is the most popular Japanese language textbook series in the world. With over 20 components including texts, workbooks, CDs, videos and teacher's manuals, it is also one of the most comprehensive. Now, a decade after its first revision, the entire series is being redesigned, updated and consolidated to meet the needs of 21st-century students and businesspeople who want to learn natural, spoken Japanese as effectively as possible in a limited amount of time. The book features not only a sleek, new design but also a unit structure that groups thematically linked lessons together, making it easier than ever to learn Japanese. Moreover, it now comes with a CD containing audio for the dialogues and listening exercises from the text. The exercises in the book have also been thoroughly revised to incorporate more comprehension and production tasks. Many of these exercises are illustrated, making for a stimulating learning experience, and the purpose of each one is clearly stated. This first of three volumes introduces "survival Japanese"-the absolute minimum amount of Japanese needed to live in Japan. Thus, the vocabulary and grammatical items it introduces are limited to about a third of what is typically introduced in a first-year course. In addition, the book features notes on Japanese culture intended to expand the learner's understanding of Japan, its customs and people. Japanese for Busy People I is available in two formats: romanized and kana. The Romanized Version uses romanized Japanese throughout, with kana in the Opening Dialogues of each lesson. The Kana Version-exposing students to hiragana and katakana from the very beginning-uses only kana.The content of the two books is otherwise exactly the same. The companion volume, Japanese for Busy People 1: The Workbook for the Revised 3rd Edition contains a variety of illustrated exercises for mastering the basic sentence patterns presented in the main text.
Customer Reviews:
Average Customer Rating:
Better texts available
Customer Rating:
I have used this text for my introductory course, and must say that compared to Genki, I find Busy People I to be lacking. The vocabulary is alright, and if you get the kana version it is superior to trying to muddle through with the romaji crutch. However, I find the exercises to be repetitive and non-educational. For each exercise, an example is given. All the student is asked to do is fill in the blanks to repeat the same thing with different people / places / things for the 3 exercises that follow. That is great for practicing writing kana--but not much else. A person can literally complete the exercises without learning the grammatical point that is supposed to be learned in the section.
Unless your class requires this book, I'd suggest looking at Genki or Minna no Nihongo--both far superior books that I've relied on as supplements. An added advantage with those texts is early introduction to kanji.
effective time-saver
Customer Rating:
This is a book for someone who can't spend 2-3 hours a day on studying a language.
This book uses only Kana script, so you need to be a fluent reader in both Katakana and Hiragana. But you can easily learn Kana in just a month, so don't panic ! To learn Kana I recommend either Japanese for Busy People: Kana Workbook Incl. 1 CD or the cheaper Guide to Learning Hiragana & Katakana (Tuttle Language Library).
What is great about this book is that: > each chapter can be completed in 15-30 minutes > the excercises are challenging and effective > you learn a practical vocabulary > the grammar is explained with no-nonsense clarity and with as little linguistic jargon as possible
It is true that alot of the vocabulary focuses on business terminology, so in a way this book seems to be aimed at business people and other professionals (scientists, teachers, diplomats...) who plan to visit Japan for a business visit or longer working stay.
Because each chapter is so short and relatively easy to go through (compared to Japanese for Everyone), it is very smooth to progress through this book.
I highly recommend this book, and the whole series, for people who want to reach intermediate/advanced-level Japanese as smoothly as possible, without the dramas of being overpowered by vocabulary, grammar and technical jargon.
Introductory Japanese That Will Stick
Customer Rating:
This book aims to share the Japanese language in a systematic, but introductory, manner. It is aimed at beginners, and does a fair job in the reading/writing portion. The audio has a little more difficulty in keeping to a pace conducive for a beginning learner. The workbook relies heavily on drawings to identify relationships and aid in memory, which was helpful to me.
The book is a workbook, with space provided for writing answers, thus avoiding the need for another notebook. Though I usually am averse to writing in books - I felt quite comfortable and enjoyed the ability to drag this copy around without thinking I would need a book-bag to carry it and another notebook. However, the provided space is regularly not quite enough for the work to be done, causing some headache.
I did appreciate that this version is in kana. Though written Japanese is written with the addition of Kanji characters, making kana not as regular as this book might suggest to the uninitiated, I definitely appreciate the repetition that aids recognition. This workbook is offered in English, using transliteration; I would avoid that if this version is available.
This workbook is certainly not exhaustive. A few particles had yet to be covered, while many verb formations were never even touched on. Nouns receive treatment from start to finish. Both -i and -na adjectives were covered, but spread out over an extended portion of the text. Counters and numbers as well as calendar and time words are covered. Both sentence particles and clause particles are addressed, though I would say both depended greatly on examples and were not entirely clear on distinctions where a shared English preposition is used in translation (e.g. the distinction between the use of / for "at" and the use of // to express variation in the thrust of a sentence.
In most other Japanese books I've seen, verbs are divided up into many more patterns - based on the consonant in the final syllable. This book does not use that mechanism for distinguishing verbs, relying instead on a two pattern system with an additional category for the two irregular Japanese verbs. This made some of the descriptions on conjugation less than precise, and hard to follow and remember as a whole.
I really enjoyed it, but there were a number of issues (like the short amount of writing space) that sometimes made it difficult. The measure of a language book should probably relate to the proficiency of the reader at completion; I can say that I am much more comfortable with identifying katakana characters on sight (I was already fairly comfortable with hiragana). I haven't gotten any better in listening for comprehension or conversation. And as a final note, I feel that this book has made me hungry to learn and develop my Japanese more, to keep going rather than run screaming into the night.
It's not for busy people
Customer Rating:
This book is not for busy people. The book is almost written completly in Hirigana. If you haven't mastered this your sunk. The CD is not much help as well. Much too fast with very little explination.
Great for what the book claims it does.
Customer Rating:
You will not learn any kanji in this book but, assuming you purchase the Kana version of JfBP I, you will get plenty of practice reading hiragana and, to a lesser extent, katakana, since all of the dialogues and exercises employ those scripts. Nota bene: the kana version assumes that you have already learned hiragana and katakana: there is a workbook for this purpose associated with this series. Kodansha also publishes "Let's Learn Hiragana" and "Let's Learn Katakana," two texts with which I am unfamiliar but about which I have heard favorable comments. Do not try to use this text before learning hiragana, at the very least.
The authors claim that this book is for "survival Japanese" and they deliver on that promise. The student will learn the basic vocabulary and structures to function well on a vacation or during an extended homestay.
Because of the limited vocabulary and grammar covered--and because the exercises are answered in the back of the book--JfBP I is great for self-study. Another helpful feature is the DVD that is included with the text. The dialogues are clearly enunciated by native speakers at near-natural speed. It is good practice to listen to them to accustom yourself to the rhythms of official (ie, Tokyo) Japanese.
Finally, I noted that the book is great for people planning a vacation or an extended homestay. It would also be a great text for first-year non-Japanese residents. This group of people will find the demands of living in a foreign country materially lessened by the skills this book teaches. I can easily see how a city-hall based language class could use the text as an introduction to both the language and the beautiful country in which it is used.
I learned Japanese using a previous edition of this book and bought this text out of curiosity. It is a real improvement on an already excellent text.
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