Japanese/Introduction/About
From Wikibooks, the open-content textbooks collection
This Wikibook project on the Japanese language was started on August 11, 2003. It is an ongoing project that evolves as users contribute to the content and layout of pages.
The end goal of this project is to create an online textbook that will enable people who are self-studying Japanese to be able to speak Japanese. We will attempt to encompass all aspects of the Japanese language, including pronunciation, reading, writing, and grammar.
Many textbooks and travel guide phrasebooks use rÅmaji (Japanese transliterated using Latin characters) as a quick and easy aid to pronounce Japanese. Because the Japanese scripts match the language better and reveal grammatical structures and vocabulary, as well as being a valuable tool in of themselves, these will be used throughout this book, though a few introductory parts will use Latin characters to introduce pronunciation and the like.
[edit] Current work
In the five years since the first edits to this wikibook, it has gone through several rewrites. After considerable discussion the current emphasis has moved away from constructing a single book-wide lesson plan. This book has seen all too few new contributors keen on picking up the torch where past editors have left it and rather choose to construct their own. This has left us with several layers of rewritten material.
Waking to that reality, we came up with the categorisation scheme now present on the main page. The Japanese/Contents page does not conform with that scheme as it is more an inventory for editors looking for existing material to work with (be it merging, re-factoring, deleting, or rewriting), rather than an index for learners.
Since June 2008, a good deal of merges and rewrites has been done. As a result we've managed to delete over a hundred pages of unnecessary or duplicate material, navbars, printable versions, and templates. See Removal Suggestions for deletion proposals and discussions. For pages to be merged, see the Books to be merged category for a list of pages in this book that have been suggested be merged.
There hasn't been much discussion lately on the actual content since active editors (currently Retropunk and Swift) have been working on somewhat separate aspects of this book. We have a section on pages on structure, lesson plans and syllabus. How much to teach and Levels might also be of interest for those so inclined. For active development of a consistent curriculum see Retropunk's User:Retropunk/Japanese Curriculum.
Finally; every contributor seems to have a different take on the purpose of this book, much to the its misfortune. Learners will benefit from various v:learning paths. Until we have fully functioning paths, lesson pages accessible through a simple categorisation scheme will greatly benefit users while allowing users to contribute without having to conform to a predefined form.
That said; pick your path and be bold.
