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So, I've been in the process of learning French for quite some time and I'm getting pretty good at understanding most of what people say.

As a result, when my French friend introduced me to the French cartoon "Wakfu," I watched it in French, without subtitles, in order to force me to learn better and practice more.

I am personally a subs-over-dubs person FOR THE MOST PART [exceptions definitely exist] because I like preserving the original concepts of character voices; in this case, though, it's also using the language as a tool of learning.

So my question is, are there any of you out there who watch shows in other languages, with or without subs, SPECIFICALLY to learn the language better? It's one thing if you just like the voices, but, like, how many of you have gone no-subs on a foreign cartoon and got the gist, or watch anime in Japanese in order to actually learn the language [moreso than just 'kawaii desu ne']?

Again, I'm not sure if this is applicable to a broad range of you, but I'm curious. Especially since I think that different cultures tend to produce pretty different shows and cartoons so it's kind of interesting to watch the products of those different cultures in their original language, ESPECIALLY if you can actually understand the language.

so yeah

is it just me or can some of you actually relate

I actually tried this with some Garfield and Friends DVDs' Spanish setting when I was 12.

I didn't retain any of it.

It's kind of fun to try though. Like, if you're learning a language and not that good at it, try watching an episode of some random cartoon made in that language and see how completely hopelessly lost you are

I usually will do the same thing DZ does, except I just listen through it. Then, I'll try to say some of it. It's near impossible for me! lol

I almost always prefer subs to dubs. Exceptions are series like Dragon Ball, which I grew up listening to in English (the Japanese voices sound weird to me), and Cowboy Bebop, which just has an amazing dub.

I've never tried listening to animation or films in their native languages to help understand the language more, though. And unless foreign porn counts, I've never picked up any words or phrases by listening to them in their original language.

I'm not competent enough in Japanese to do that yet, but I hope to at one stage. I've got Japanese only reading material to get through...

For a time, I was listening to episodes of Ika Musume season 2 without subs. (Most releases by modern fansubbers are softsubs, which means you can disable the subtitles.) It's a pretty simple show, so I was able to get the gist of what was happening based on the animation and my level of vocabulary.

It's a different experience, too. When you have subs, your eyes are sorta glued to the bottom of the screen.

I tend to prefer subs over dubs, myself. Although if I were actually learning the language, I might actually use shows to help me learn the language (Korean, for me--there's Korean TV shows out there that I watch, and fortunately some of it is subbed so I get the gist of it better and then I can compare the subs with what was said).

If I ever come across something in French, I watch it without subs for the same reason.

Ace Mercury wrote:It's a different experience, too. When you have subs, your eyes are sorta glued to the bottom of the screen.

Exactly. It's just a really cool experience, to be able to watch something-- not READ it-- and actually understand what's going on. Not only do you get to see a better part of the action, but you also feel all super awesome and special because you KNOW ANOTHER LANGUAGE OMG HOW BOSS IS THAT

Anyway, French is the only language I can even kind of get away with doing this kind of thing with. For everything else I use subs, but not really for the purpose of learning the language; it's more like I pick up a bit of the language because of listening to it while watching subs, as opposed to the other way around.

I was just curious if anyone had experienced cartoons-- actual interesting ones, not language learning ones-- as a medium for experiencing other cultures/languages.

Being able to listen also helps with dramatic tension and timing. Japanese is a subject object verb language, where English is a subject verb object language. This can lead to weird sub and speech misalignment and pacing suffers.

I've watched anime without subtitles and got the general idea.
What's more interesting to me, though, is when you watch something with subs and you can tell the subs are translated wrong. Good times.

I sorta know what you mean: it's when the translators take some liberties localizing some of the script. You hear the obvious "sensei" and "chan/san" stuff if you're getting subs from a group big on localizing everything, but there's some other Japanese turns-of-phrase that sorta leave me wondering how I'd translate it into something intelligible by English speakers.