Learn Japanese with our free Japanese lessons in podcast format. We use examples from anime and everyday conversation to teach you Japanese that is useful for everyday life. Hitomi-sensei is from Tokyo and will teach you to speak with the most common Japanese accent. If you are watching an anime now and want to know more about a word or phrase you have heard, post a comment or send us an email.
I’d also really recommend, just from personal success:
Japanese Step by Step by Gene Nishi
Just for those who are very very serious – it’s gotten me sooo far, so far
Woops. This is page I was looking for! After trying various dictionaries, including Kodansha’s Furigana dictionary, I have found what I think is the fastest way to look up Kanji that you find in Manga. Use the Kanji Fast Finder (Laurence Matthews, pub Tuttle) to find the Kanji. Take the radical number that you get from the fast finder and look up the Kanji in the Kanji Learner’s Dictionary (Kodansha) in the radical index. That will give you the four digit number of the kanji which you can quickly look up. This dictionary has tons of compounds and possible meanings listed (as well as the strokes to draw the Kanji) Alternatively, the furigana can be looked up in the ON-KUN index, but this doesn’t work as often as the first way.
-Erk1024
I really like Japanese in Mangaland. they have a series of 3 books now andi believe a workbook for at least the 1st one. seems to slightly be aimed towards someone with a bit of japanese experience.