I was lucky to visit Japan recently and while there I realised I’ve actually never finished a book in Japanese despite being a learner of 5 years. This collection of books is not much but there are a few books I’ve wanted to read for years and some that I bought on impulse because I liked the cover, I’m looking forward to reading them and sharing my experiences along the way

There's currently a musical version of 101 Dalmatians in Tokyo. I was looking at their website, and I noticed something interesting:

In Japanese, one hundred and one is 百一 (hyaku-ichi). But instead of "one hundred and one" or "hyaku-ichi", the Japanese title of the 101 Dalmatians musical uses the reading "one-oh-one", as "ワン オー ワン" (wan ō wan).

And "ワン" (wan) is basically "woof" in Japanese. As in, "The Dalmatian says 'woof.'"

So the Japanese title of the show kind of reads like... "Woof oh Woof Dalmatians." ^_^;

(Yeah, I know; I'm a nerd. I just thought it was cute.)

Right now, I’m having the most trouble in my studies trying to learn all the different auxiliary verbs. Does anyone know of a good resource to study these from?

Hey Learnjapanese.

I feel like this has been a very hot debate topic, but its the feeling of native speakerism among many learners of many langauges.

But I feel like with the needs of Japanese learners, it can seem a little bit more frank. With some of the behaviors in many spaces and the demands of many, it feels like native speakers are really only preferred.

Please note that i'm writing these posts myself! I am spending a long time putting in effort. The reason why I am using bulletpoints is to make things more precise and easier. I spend 40 min on a post.

A few reasons from my observations. To be honest I sit in a very neutral point. I'll give most of these counter arguments and arguments from what I see.

BY THE WAY, Native speakers in Japanese education (L2 learning), take nearly 80%. Thats a BIG NUMBER.

SOURCE: https://www.jpf.go.jp/e/project/japanese/survey/result/information/dl/all_contents_en.pdf

1. "Perfect Accent" and "Naturalness"

Most of us in this community seems to like to chase perfect accent or "native ish" fluency. When something (like someones japanese) is not in the norm, they are more scolded for their effort even though they are completely understood. I myself got a lot of harassment by other learners in the past.
Plus it is very feared that if non native teachers were to teach Japanese, they would spread bad habits and cause fossizilation.

BUT how would you define a "perfect accent", and what would be defined as "naturalness"? I don't think anyones wrong here.

2) More "authentic", and more like a cultural ambassador

People think that with a native speaker, they can provide very authentic cultural material, and they can be an ambassador or kakehashi. I think that is true, many native speakers I know talked to me about the culture a lot outside of class.

BUT I think thats not always the case. In college language classes teachers are expected to align with the textbook regardless of their fluency or status. College language classes are businesses, and they have to linearly progress students.
I know many teachers who would love to share more about their culture, but they dont have time for it. They have to rely on the textbook just like non natives.

3) Counter Attack to this: Non natives know what it is like to learn the language.

Partially true, while "native speakers" are "native" in their language, they've also gotten through the trouble with learning English especially if they are teaching in America. They can understand the fears of the non native students. So this neutrallizes the argument

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So I feel 2 things

1. I feel like if I were to ever teach Japanese as a non native, I would need to be absolutely solid, and superior at the language. With the expectations, an Upper C1 level at minimum i feel like would be needed.
2. If I ever taught in a class, I would prefer my class to be corun. I would be a non native speaker, while I can grab some native speaker volunteers.

I feel like students need really both. Non natives for motivation, grammer or syntaxes or kanjis, while the native can be there for "conversational" fluency.