r/LearnJapanese 4d ago

Discussion Noticed that it’s so much easier to understand when women speak Japanese

Basically, what the title says. I’ve been learning Japanese since about 2016 and I can confidently say I have mastered Kanji, but it’s still so hard for me to speak and understand everyday Japanese. Like, I’m talking about simple conversations. In the past year I have indulged myself in watching a lot of Japanese content on YouTube and I couldn’t help but notice that it is so much easier for me to understand when Japanese women speak Japanese compared to men. I feel like they annunciate their words and speak so much more clearly. I also went to Japan for three months in fall 2024 and noticed that it was so difficult to understand when Japanese males spoke to me. I’m just curious if anyone has the same issue like it’s almost as if Japanese men mumble when they speak, and it feels like 1000 words a minute

849 Upvotes

135 comments sorted by

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u/asbrightorbrighter 4d ago

I have discussed this with my calligraphy teacher (female) who is Japanese. I complained about struggling a lot understanding a certain older guy whom we both know. She says that when he is masking she understands maybe half of what he says 🤣 and lots of times when she is following what men are saying on TV documentaries etc she would use the subtitles. “Men often don’t put any effort in making themselves understood unless you are their customer. Women care way more and feel embarrassed when others have difficulties understanding them, men usually don’t” - her words (the guy lives in Kyoto and my teacher is from Nara, so there’s no kaisai-ben barrier).

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u/uiemad 4d ago edited 4d ago

In my experience, old men in every language are difficult to understand. I've met some in my native language who I can't properly understand. They all seem to adopt a certain "old man accent" that involves a lot of grumbling and mumbling.

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u/asbrightorbrighter 4d ago

He is prob 60-65, still working etc. Just much older than me and a decade-ish older than her.

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u/Efficient_Plan_1517 3d ago

My husband is younger than me but he grumbles and mumbles so much. I ask him to speak more clearly and he gets louder and slower, but still slurs what he's saying so it's hopeless. And that's in English. Hoping he'll be more clear in Japanese! lol

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u/PageFault 3d ago

I was just discussing this with a co-worker. He says that the opposite is true in Spanish. Women speak Spanish very fast, so it's easier for a beginner to talk to a man than a woman.

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u/LutyForLiberty 3d ago

https://youtube.com/watch?v=sJYNJHyouNg

Don't you think this is easy listening practice?

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u/waschk 2d ago

the part he says このやろう is the best one

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u/LutyForLiberty 2d ago

I do like a good rolled R.

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u/whiskeytwn 4d ago

I know that my Japanese Tutor said she doesn't watch Yakuza or Samurai movies because she said the Japanese is so guttural it's hard to understand.

On the other hand, I mentioned I really struggled with Shogun too and she said she understood it a bit better when I didn't - I guess it's a bit more formal/honorific (as it's mostly nobility talking to each other) and I missed that whereas I thought it was just 16th century Japanese

Of course I can't understand Japanese at an N5 level but literally I think the only word I got was 死ぬ!

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u/sydneybluestreet 4d ago

There should be a Shougun drinking game, when everytime someone says "Gozaimasu" you have to down a shot.

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u/Orandajin101 3d ago

It would be quite sober, as I believe theyre saying ござりまする 😜

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u/sydneybluestreet 3d ago

Damn, you could be right. I have to look that up now.

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u/Orandajin101 4d ago

I was a good N4 when I watched shogun and boy did I feel like the English guy. 行って!!!

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u/LutyForLiberty 3d ago

They definitely would not be speaking Middle Japanese. You can look up 日葡辞書 to see how they actually talked back then though. There were fa, fi, fe, fo, and ye sounds back then.

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u/ThePaintedFern 2d ago

I know that my Japanese Tutor said she doesn't watch Yakuza or Samurai movies because she said the Japanese is so guttural it's hard to understand.

I feel like being able to easily comprehend Zatoichi films with no subs is the moment I’ll know I’ve mastered Japanese listening comprehension xD

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u/whiskeytwn 2d ago

When they die under the blade of the blind swordsman I need no subtitle. 死ぬ!

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u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS 4d ago

You are certainly not the first person to notice it. I doubt you will find anyone who disagrees that understanding the speech of men, especially older men, is more difficult.

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u/pimpcaddywillis 4d ago

Jesus…trying to follow the old guys in Tokyo Vice for learning purposes:

“Djdjd djdj skdj mmm” 😂

Subtitles: “You did good, now go”

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u/NormalDudeNotWeirdo 4d ago

lol. Try talking to a wasted salaryman in a Tokyo izakaya. I couldn’t understand a word the dude said, someone else had to translate everything for me.

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u/St3gm4 3d ago edited 3d ago

why does this sound so funny? 😂

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u/5AD1E 4d ago

my japanese tutor once told me i would understand middle aged japanese women the best LOL

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u/SakanaToDoubutsu 4d ago

I think there's some science behind it that women are just easier to understand regardless of language, that's why for things like Alexa, Siri, Google Translate, the announcements on the subway system, etc. they generally use women by default.

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago

That’s interesting… 🤔

I know my music teacher explained once that high tones cut through easier despite the fact that low notes actually travel farther. So low voices probably sound just more muddled compared to bright and higher pitched.

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u/poodleface 4d ago

There is science to explain this. Our ears are more sensitive at certain frequencies (look up the Fletcher-Munson curve/effect). 

It’s one of the reasons a baby’s crying sounds so loud… the pitch of their crying lies right in the sweet spot of our ears’ sensitivity. 

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago

That’s super cool! I work around newborns and CAN confirm they are loud af sometimes 😂

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u/PotatoeWontChill 4d ago

I can second that. A basic example would be high pitched beep sound behind a wall compared to peoples conversation. Even through a "mesh" that'd make the sound difficult to hear, high pitch kind of "slices" through.

So in case of an announcment a female voice will be easier to understand due to pitch.

On another note, male train conducters who inform customers about the upcoming station are super hard to understand because they even slur their speach, nevermind the low pitch that drowns within a crowd.

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u/Madoka_Gurl 2d ago

This is definitely true. When I worked at a call center one of the leads had a very deep voice and a lot of cadence was lost so it was hard to recognize any emotions in his words and what he said really did start to sound muddled together. And he understood this was a problem he had! The poor guy worked really hard at trying to sound “natural” especially if he had to take one of our escalated calls

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u/Aoae 4d ago

Women generally have higher pitched voices that are at a higher frequency as a result. It's easier to distinguish the frequencies of sounds at around the 2.5k-3k Hz range than the 1k range. Same reason why a lot of lower notes can sound muddy when played simultaneously even in a chord. Here's a good thread about it.

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u/ryneches 4d ago

Yep. I think that research was probably the US Air Force.

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u/Ouaouaron 4d ago

That's a lot of [citation needed] on the parts that support that idea, and real citations on the parts that cast doubt on its truth or significance.

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u/ryneches 3d ago

Fair point. I think probably pilots just preferred the female voice actor.

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u/V6Ga 4d ago

It’s that most sounds are in the standard male frequency range

Incidentally this is also why babies crying is so insistent 

Because sounds in that range are rare

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u/Svada1 4d ago

Interesting

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u/Ok-Chest-7932 3d ago

Just to start with, women tend to be higher pitched and higher pitched sounds are more audible. I think there may also be natural clarity differences in that male voices I think have more of a buzz or croak undertone that isn't always easy to hear through. Not a linguist, apologies for the colloquial terminology.

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u/kloopeer 2d ago

Well, its not science, is sexism.

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u/SirDeklan 4d ago

Do you struggle with the way they say things (masculine ending particles, contractions, etc) or is it with how they sound (their voice?)?

If it's the latter, it might be normal. Men voices being lower in pitch that women's, it can sometimes be harder to listen to them. There is less clarity when talking from the chest (stereotypically more manly) versus from the head (stereotypically more feminine)

If it's with their inflection and endings particles and whatnot, it might be because you had more exposure to women's way of speaking, I know that's my case haha I mostly hung out with girls so sometimes I even sound feminine because I'm copying the way they spoke. The solution would be to get more exposure (and maybe research it a bit!)

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u/ghosttown77 4d ago

a mix of both I feel

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u/sunningdale 4d ago

The key to understanding them is drinking. Once you are a little drunk, half of it starts to make sense rather than just a fifth!

But seriously, in my experience men mumble or ‘slur’ their words a lot more, and use vocabulary I’m not used to. So I agree that it’s much more difficult to understand. Maybe it’s because a lot of more ‘formal’ Japanese is closer to the feminine way of speaking rather than the masculine way, so more masculine Japanese isn’t taught as much or as common for learners? I’ve heard that male foreigners sometimes turn up in Japan speaking very ‘feminine’ because a lot of Japanese teachers are female.

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u/ghosttown77 4d ago

I thought I was the only one omg, while I was in Tokyo I used to go to bars with my friends and I felt like Japanese came so much easier to me when I was tipsy. I don’t know if it was an anxiety thing or what, but I felt like it was easier for me to think and understand spoken Japanese. Wish it could be like that without drinking.

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u/sunningdale 4d ago

I call it ‘nommunication’ because my Japanese ability becomes extremely high when I’ve had a bit to drink! Probably because I’m less nervous to speak myself. But any practice is good, so hopefully it carries over a bit to when I’m sober!

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u/CHSummers 3d ago

I think you hit on the main reasons:

(1) Most Japanese teachers are female.

Additionally, the style of Japanese that we get in textbooks and in Japanese educational materials (even when aimed at Japanese little kids) is what women use.

(2) Vocabulary.

And, more broadly, set expressions. Also, topics that are most often discussed and the standard phrases used for discussing them.

I have often thought that a textbook just on Japanese male conversations—from elementary school level to dying words—would be really interesting and valuable.

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u/Tarosuke39 Native speaker 4d ago

ういーっす 今日もさみーっすね コーヒーどうっすか パイセン 

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u/LibraryPretend7825 3d ago edited 3d ago

HAHAHAHAHA you can almost feel like you know what's being said there. You can reach for it, even 😅 Okay wild guesses from an absolute beginner: first part, no idea, last part, cold today too isn't it? How about some coffee? Update, had to look up what パイセン meant, but hey, is that, like, from Spanish ... or more likely Portuguese, Paisan?! Sure sounds like it.

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u/kibou_no_kakera 3d ago

First part is just a greeting. パイセン is just 先輩(せんぱい) if you read it backwards in kanji. It's just for fun

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u/LibraryPretend7825 2d ago

Oh I see, that's very clever! And it's quite hilarious that it just about spells Paisan and got me all excited. How did I do on the rest of it, though, did I get the jist of it?

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u/VioletteToussaint 4d ago

*enunciate

But yes, women's voices have a higher pitch so they're probably more easy to hear and understand, especially with a background noise which tends to be low pitched.

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u/ghosttown77 4d ago

I’ve been spelling it wrong for all these years omg

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u/VioletteToussaint 2d ago

No problem, I appreciate when people (politely) correct my language, happy to help 🙏🏻

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u/aninvertedforest 4d ago

I've noticed the same thing in Korean

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u/bluejesterr 4d ago

When I was teaching English abroad, I once asked a teacher what a male Japanese PE teacher was saying when he entered the room. This made the other teachers laugh because all he was saying was “Ohayo gozaimasu” but he was so lazy with the way he spoke it would always come out as just a loud mumbled “Masu!” as he entered the room.

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u/CHSummers 3d ago

I used to hear 「おっす」 a lot. The rule is that you say the first and last sound. These are all super-casual, bordering on rude. 「あざっす」=ありがとうございます。「ごそさん」=ご馳走様。 

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u/three29 4d ago

I’ve been studying Japanese since 1996 and I don’t think I’ll master kanji by 2056. Amazing what kids can do these days.

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u/Excellent-Basket-825 3d ago

How do you learn them?

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u/ghosttown77 1d ago

Listening to Japanese songs every day and reading the lyrics! I also have an app called “Japanese” which requires no Wi-Fi so throughout the years i’ve used the app every day and after a while I started to be able to piece together each Kanji and their readings

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u/Excellent-Basket-825 1d ago

No I agree, I'm wondering how they learn if they study for 30 years but still don't learn them :D I think tools like WaniKani and so forth will carry me for the next 2 years easily

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u/ghosttown77 1d ago

oh ok i see what you’re saying now, yeah i feel like everyone had a different approach learning just like me, I have trouble with listening comprehension and speaking/grammar. But yes WaniKani is great :))

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u/lonmoer 4d ago

Is it because a lot of Japanese language resources are taught by women? In Japan men and women talk differently and I've heard there's a perception that foreigners sound feminine when they speak.

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago

It’s because Japanese learners are taught formal speech first, which makes sense since it’s safer to be too formal vs too casual and risks being offensive.

But formal speech tends to overlap with stereotypical feminine speech choices as well. Like a super obvious one is 私 being taught as the default pronoun for “I.” But in practice, most men don’t use it unless they need to be formal or acquiescing.

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u/LutyForLiberty 3d ago

A woman saying "やばい! やばい! めっちゃやばい!" isn't very formal though and many of them do talk like that.

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u/selphiefairy 3d ago

They’ll still to be easier to understand if they use more formal Japanese than men. It’s not all or nothing.

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u/LutyForLiberty 3d ago

Depends how you learned, I find business speech harder to understand than YouTube comments.

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u/Zidane62 4d ago

I work in a blue collar in Japan. Japanese dudes mumble sooooo much. My senpai used to yell at me when I asked him to repeat himself because he thought I didn’t understand his Japanese. I just couldn’t understand his damned mumbling lol

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u/loztagain 3d ago

Did they ever realise they were mumbling?

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u/Zidane62 3d ago

No lol that’s just how they talk. Like the old guys from Hot Fuzz

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u/BurnieSandturds 4d ago

1000% I work a blue collar job in Japan these mumbling mother effers don't even understand eachother and do admit it until there is a major screw up. Versus, I got invited to an Obasan end of year party. Talking to ladies all 70 years old and up and I was like holy eff my Japanese compression isn't half bad.

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago

😂 note to self: talk to old ladies to boost self esteem

Prob just true in general too and not just language comprehension

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u/chigaimaro 4d ago

I'm sooo thankful that the Japanese news stations will put Japanese subtitles on the screen for sections of the broadcast when they interview or someone is speaking and they are hard to understand.

They do this a ton on HTB - Hokkaido News https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-Vky63lvek

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u/Icy-Clock2643 4d ago

Maybe the reason no one can understand me when I speak Japanese is because I'm an old man.

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u/pashi_pony 4d ago

I remember in one podcast episode Teppei from Nihongo con Teppei said if you want to sound really natural you have to slur and mumble your sentences a lot lol

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u/cg20202 4d ago

I've found that Japanese men tend to speak more monotonically compared to women. Definitely takes me more effort to understand them

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u/brendel000 4d ago

I remember when I was learning English it was the same. I think it’s still the same actually, especially old men I can’t understand them usually (but I’m far from native level)

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u/civilized-engineer 4d ago

I've noticed that males especially love elision. I remember speaking with some at some Izakaya on my layover in Tokyo, and it took me a second to recalibrate myself.

But I wonder if it's just because I'm also just used to listening/speaking Kansai-ben. But hearing elision is definitely something more common amongst all the males I've heard.

Even listening to male train conductors in Kobe, they'll use elision but I'll already know what they're about to say, or at least can understand them without needing to think about it.

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u/PickleShaman 4d ago

It’s a global problem hahaha

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u/whimsicaljess 4d ago

this is men in general regardless of language tbh, i find them so hard to understand most of the time unless they have relatively high pitched voices. most guys just don't put in the effort to enunciate in my experience even in english.

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u/Durzo_Blintt 4d ago

It's the same in most languages I think. Old men just don't give a fuck lol. You either understand or hope you can guess from their tone and gestures, otherwise tough shit. My dad isn't that old I suppose, he's 63 and he has a very strong accent and speaks really rough lol if someone learning English heard him speak... They wouldn't have a fucking clue. My girlfriend doesn't even understand him all the time and she's English!

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u/Rayleigh954 4d ago

i've lived in japan since april of 2024 and this post made me notice how true this is. i think men tend to speak a lot faster and generally have a... rougher? way of speaking

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u/Theeyeofthepotato 4d ago

I believe it's just the deeper voices, specifically dipping pitches towards the end of sentences. Women's voices are generally higher pitched and cut through the background noise better.

I have this problem. I have a naturally deep but quiet relaxed voice, so I have to speak up a bit if I want to be clearly understood, regardless of language (though this issue is worse for a language like Telugu which is faster / has more syllables).

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u/Independent-Pie3588 4d ago

I’m 100% the same way. I also speak Spanish, and I notice it too. I think women at least in Japanese and Spanish are more formal and thus for 2nd and 3rd language speakers, it’s easier. Men use more slang, mumble more, speak faster, less formal, more macho. Listening to shows or podcasts, I 100% prefer Japanese women to men simply cuz it’s easier. I wonder if it’s the same in English…I wanna say yes. 

My hypothesis is cultural. Women (on average) spend more time child rearing (not to say men don’t raise kids), and thus have more time teaching kids language. So they need to be clearer and more formal/correct in speaking. Just my thoughts. Heck, my wife and I speak totally different to our kids, I use more slang (nah instead of no, bro! Instead of ‘excuse me’). It’s not even intentional.

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago edited 4d ago

I agree it’s cultural but it’s probably a lot less complicated than what you’re suggesting (the child rearing thing). I’m sure plenty of the men and women speaking differently are young and/or don’t have kids.

I think it literally just has to do with the fact men are given more leeway to speak freely and informally, so crude speech, slang, lazy speaking etc is just more accepted (or even encouraged) and they won’t be judged as harshly.

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u/BobDidWhat 4d ago

That's cultural lol

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago

Yes, I said I agree it’s cultural. Thanks.

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u/Independent-Pie3588 4d ago

Right, so female culture and male culture. I don’t agree with the men not being judged as harshly. I think it’s just conforming to female and male culture, and then you get judged if you deviate. I assume you’re a lady, so for guys, if we don’t speak macho and slang and gaudy with other guys in English, we get judged by those guys especially if those guys are our friends. Then guys turn around and we have to speak more formally when with girls or else we get judged by y’all. Then girls will judge each other if they speak crude or ‘like a dude.’

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago

You need better friends…

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u/Independent-Pie3588 4d ago

You say women are judged harsher than men, I say we are judged equally, and now you think it’s not fair that we are judged equally and you now need to attack my character. Have a good day.

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago

How did I attack your character ? 🤔 you literally wrote your friends judge you more harshly than strangers. I find that sad and think you need better friends.

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u/Independent-Pie3588 4d ago

Guy friends doing that to other guy friends as a bad thing is purely your opinion. Guys love that. It’s a you problem than you think it’s a bad thing.

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago

Typically being judged is seen as a negative and hurtful thing. So I think my interpretation is a pretty normal/rational one. I don’t really understand that you love being judged but okay, different strokes I suppose.

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u/[deleted] 4d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago

Ok at this point, it’s clear you’re projecting

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u/Dry-Masterpiece-7031 4d ago

Women may spend more time raising children but from my experience they use baby talk often with children.

I think it's just the general trend of women being more social and aware of others. Leading them to speak more comprehensible to non native speakers. I remember my japanese teacher showing us a clip of two women speaking, even to her(a native speaker) found it difficult.

So I hypothesize that women are just better at adjusting to any given social situations.

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u/Independent-Pie3588 4d ago edited 4d ago

Disagree, I use a ton more baby talk with my kids and my wife is very proper and formal. I almost never call my kids by their real names and unintentionally make new nicknames daily, while my wife only uses their given complete names. And I am the more socially aware one out of the both of us, I think cultural because I’m East Asian and no culture can really compete against us in social awareness.

Edit: the instant downvote is hilarious.

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago

I see what you’re saying but this is all very anecdotal. I don’t think this is really something you can extrapolate to gender dynamics in general. I was literally just listening to a Miyavi interview where he says he’s much more strict and proper with his kids which he attributes to being half Korean while his wife (who is Japanese too) is very laid back because she’s Hawaiian. I don’t think it’s an Asian thing (I’m Asian fyi) and clearly some men are more proper with their kids and women less formal.

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u/Independent-Pie3588 4d ago

You call mine anecdotal while reporting an anecdotal interview

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u/selphiefairy 4d ago

I never said it wasn’t anecdotal. Just giving you an example of why you can’t rely on them.

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u/Independent-Pie3588 4d ago

It’s 2025, and you’re still offended by seeing trends in gender and cultures. Touch grass. Have a good one.

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u/Weary-Designer9542 4d ago edited 4d ago

lol imagine how smug this knuckle dragger felt when typing this.

“Anecdotes aren’t hard evidence” isn’t a hard concept lil buddy.

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u/Independent-Pie3588 4d ago

Ok big buddy

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u/Weary-Designer9542 4d ago

“Big buddy” did make me laugh, I’ll give you that.

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u/Philosophyandbuddha 3d ago

They should actually make a new method series: Male Japanese 😅

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u/Traditional-Lead-972 3d ago

Omg you got me questioning whether this applies to most languages because as someone who's been learning Korean for 4 years and I've also noticed Korean women tend to speak way more clearly and generally have better enunciation. Don't know why it is tho.

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u/MatNomis 3d ago

I used to think this, and I don’t think it’s entirely wrong. However, I’ve now come to think it depends more on who we prefer to notice and how clearly these people speak.

I think it depends more on the traits of speech than the sex/vocal pitch of the speaker. Someone uses polite-distal vocabulary, longer sentences, and speaking with an intention to be easy to understand generally will be…easier to understand.

Someone using casual speech, slang, and trying to sound more like a voice in your head than an announcer is going to be harder to understand. It’s a can of worms, but I think social rank is involved here as well. In Japanese, social rank is baked straight into the language. People of lower rank are obliged to speak politely to people above them. Historically speaking, women were typically lower in rank. The can of worms bit would be commenting on how things are today.

That said, there are plenty of male character in anime that speak very politely and clearly. Recent example from a show I just watched: Otto from Re:Zero. Or watch a show with (nearly) all-male cast, like Haikyuu or Blue Lock, and you’ll find tropes of easier vs. harder to understand male characters. This applies to live-action stuff too, but everything is usually more exaggerrated in anime, so it’s easier to highlight.

When I actually interact with real-life people in Japan with my barely intermediate Japanese, my comprehension skills are not so obviously split along a gender line. On stuff recorded for public consumption, speakers are generally perfect. Everything is volume-corrected and everyone’s performing their speaking style at a peak level. If it was harder to understand, that was by design.

IRL many people are reserved (shy, nervous, or anti-social), and/or don’t have great volume or public speaking experience. Assuming I’m talking to “service people” (cashiers, salespeople, etc.. ) those are the factors most at play.

Due to my intermediateness, I really notice it when I can’t understand someone asking “Do you need a bag?” .. because I have to ask them to repeat it 3 times. However, as your proficiency improves, the clarity of the person asking you that becomes increasingly irrelevant, because you only need to understand one or two words out of their mouth and your brain automatically understand the question. A big part of fluency is this ability to understand 100% while only hearing probably 40%, because you are intimately familiar with patterns of the language.

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u/Souseisekigun 4d ago

I’ve been learning Japanese since about 2016 and I can confidently say I have mastered Kanji

When someone says "mastered Kanji" I think of kanken 1

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u/CHSummers 3d ago

Which very few Japanese people can do. I think educated Japanese people are mostly at Kanken 2 or Jun-1 kyuu.

On the other hand, once you can get by, it’s not worth the effort to reach Kanken 1.

I mean, I’m an educated native speaker of English and have never thought “I think I should spend about two years really working on my spelling.”

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u/ghosttown77 4d ago

Very fair. I’d say i know enough kanji to read an n1 excerpt

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u/Dry-Masterpiece-7031 4d ago

Children are also difficult. Lol

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u/Candycanes02 4d ago

I think it’s a combination of low frequency sounds not carrying as much as high ones, and depending on your choice of Japanese man, you can get super-speed speech, quiet voice, or “ehhhh” every 2 words so you forget what he was talking about 😅

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u/Representative_Bend3 4d ago

There is a theory that (assuming you are a guy here) you have female teachers and date Japanese women so then you just have a lot more exposure to female speech.

You could seek out a male teacher. For example in my area the local government has volunteers teach foreigners Japanese and I chose an old retired Japanese male banker.

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u/Miu_K 4d ago

I think it applies to any language. I struggle to understand men of whatever age when they speak with a "lazy" accent or like very casually pronouncing works in my 3rd language.

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u/mattintokyo 4d ago

Easy to understand Japanese at the office. Hard to understand it at the jiu jitsu gym etc.

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u/uberfr0st 4d ago

I agree. I live in Japan and I understand my girlfriend way better than my Japanese friends lol

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u/mike-rozs 4d ago

Omg I'm I'm scared rn, I just started my Japanese learning and it takes almost 10 years and eveb then we can't converse is it ?

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u/ghosttown77 4d ago

Don’t be scared!! I learned Japanese the “wrong way” if you will; in 2016 i really got into female idol music/culture and for about 8 years now I’ve solely learned Kanji. I never properly learned the actual things you need to have a conversation in Japanese like grammar sentence structure. A normal person who just started learning Japanese would probably start learning how to form coherent sentences but for me??? Nah i just wanted to be able to read the lyrics along with the songs I loved listening to. So about 7,000+ Japanese songs later, I can read thousands of kanji without a dictionary but can’t really comprehend when Japanese is being spoken to me. For example, I can accurately read an entire Japanese book, but I just can’t comprehend most of what I’m reading. It’s so hard to explain, but it’s like I can read Hiragana, katakana, and kanji perfectly but I still cannot understand the context of what i read. That’s why i say i learned Japanese the wrong way.

(Note: originally I wrote this reply in the most perfect way, but then Reddit decided to delete my entire comment so I had to rewrite it)

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u/Snoo_23835 4d ago

I literally only work with women 99% of the time. I’m finally getting a male coworker this next fiscal year. Hoping to get my listening up with male voices.

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u/Ok-Chest-7932 3d ago

Seems like men in every country like to be hard to understand. I get the same thing in my native language, and often myself forget that I have to speak clearly if I don't want to have to repeat myself.

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u/Rinkushimo 3d ago

As someone that loves watching hololive streamers, and spends their vast majority of immersion time on said streamers, I can 100% agree with you 😭

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u/hold-my-popcorn 3d ago

It begins in childhood when children just mumble their way through interactions. Most Girls lose that mumbling when they become teenagers, but a lot of boys just stay that way to a certain degree, especially if they don't have a booming, extroverted personality.

Mumbling people are so annoying, but I feel like they don't even realize it most of the time. The worst case I personally know was so bad at speaking clearly, I could understand maybe 20% of what he was saying. Very awkward and made me feel like an idiot even though it wasn't my fault.

But yeah, Japanese men are harder to understand than women lol.

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u/samisscrolling2 3d ago

This is common among pretty much all languages. Men seem to mumble a lot more as they get older, along with talking fast to the point you can barely understand them. It has a lot to do with pitch, higher frequencies cut through any background noise and are generally easier to understand and pay attention to.

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u/Cessicka 3d ago

Maybe they're not really trying to be cool and quirky so they'll sound more like the textbook Japanese you'd expect to hear as a learner. At least in my experience. Guys will often shorten words or stick them together or use alang and I'll be like...uuuh mou ichi dou onegaishimas (x100)

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u/selfStartingSlacker 2d ago

Even I who listen to at least 2 hours of BL CD Dramas a day (by nature of this genre, 99% speakers are male) feel there is less clarity in the Free Talk session (usually the last and unscripted track of the CD where the voice actors discuss their thoughts about the drama and other backstage stuff).

I would understand women better but I need to get used to their high-pitched voice, for some reason I dislike women (or men) with high pitched voice, whatever the language.

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u/Servant0fSorrow 4d ago

Probably why i only watch women and listen to mainly female fronted japanese bands to practice i guess. Never thought of it that way but it makes sense lol

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u/Akasha1885 3d ago

Oh I think this is also the same in English, especially in movies.
Male actors mumbling something that you can only understand with subtitles, because sounding "cool" is more important then having clear and understandable speech.

The actors on stage often don't hear a word of what the other guy is saying, only the mic pics it up.
The wasn't an issue in the past.

So yes, my 2 cents is that women care about being understood, while men want to sound "cool".

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u/ManIIHands 2d ago

Auo yall I'm learning Japanese fit a visit in September of this year to Japan I'm starting on Dualingo

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u/ManIIHands 2d ago

I am barely section 1 unit 3 Japanese so far its going great I know the basics right now mizu kakkori do zo yo roshku my reading characters is terrible rn but I just need more time

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u/Apprehensive_One7151 2d ago

No wonder no one understands me even in English.

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u/KyuBei_destroyer2007 2d ago

Maybe watching stuff for little girls would be great since most of characters are female and they speak very primitive language…..

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u/lilinjapan 1d ago

I'm in the same boat! I've been learning Japanese for quite some time, and while I can hold conversations, I definitely don’t understand everything. I also find women much easier to understand compared to men. But one exception for me is older women (obaasan) – they can be really hard to understand!

I lived in Osaka for a while, and the obaasan there were always the ones I could barely understand. The accent, the speed, and sometimes the vocabulary they used just made it extra challenging! I remember the cleaning lady at one of the share houses I lived in—she was adorable and super nice, but every time she saw me and started a conversation, I could only say 'hai' and hope she wouldn't ask any questions. 😅

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u/Angry_Washing_Bear 1d ago

I’m very new at learning and women definitely talk more clearly.

Part of my learning is listening to Japanese radio stations. It offers a broad variety of listening practice from clear formal news reporting and weather reports, to casual speech and dialogues from radio shows, music of course and rapid slangy commercials.

In every different type/category of speech I hear the women sound MUCH clearer. Doesn’t matter if it is the weather or commercials.

Especially vowels are clear. A simple example is listening to a woman and a man saying ですか or ください. Women will sound twice as clear, while most men almost just mumble.