Introduction

My goal with these guides is to create a compass of sorts for beginners of language learning, as well as a directory for many useful tools and strategies, not to teach the languages themselves, as there are already more than enough resources for that. I will explain some of the more baffling aspects of these languages, if only because some concepts are so weird it helps to explain the underlying history in order to help digest it. Put simply, I want to help guide people in the right direction.

Schools of Thought

Exactly how you're supposed to study is a matter of constant debate; rather than simply placing my own biases on the table, I'd like to give each method its own day in court. The following sections will pretend as though these methods are isolated approaches to learning, but I personally advocate for a hybrid approach, where the ratios employed matter a great deal more than which individual methods you are using. I will provide my suggested ratio towards the end if you would prefer to just know what I think you should do.

Traditional Education

If we look around the world at all of the countries that mandate secondary language education, you will find very little meaningful success in doing so. Take Japan for example: Despite a country having a deserved reputation for having a studious population, the amount of Japanese people who become fluent in English is extremely low despite mandating English throughout the entirety of grade school (I don't view this as a bad thing mind you, but I digress). A more chilling example is Ireland: the country mandates Irish education throughout the country, yet most of the country can't speak it to any meaningful degree. Speaking personally, I have never once met someone who claimed to have learned a language primarily through taking classes in highschool or college. Those who do take such classes will typically fail to remember most of it as the years go by through lack of practice and follow-through. It's proof enough to me that, taken on its own, the value of secondary language education within our school systems is questionable at best.

Reading Grammar Books

Learning in your Sleep

Anki Flashcards

The Three Step Method

Full Immersion

Motivation

I am of the opinion that most people don't need to learn a second language, so many people tell themselves they need to learn Spanish, Chinese, or something relevant to their area and fail to make any meaningful progress as a result. Meanwhile, many people who immigrate to America, legally or otherwise, don't even bother trying to learn English and instead find an enclave for their language/ethnicity. You should feel no obligation to meet these people halfway by learning their language. Study a language of your own choosing and ignore the advice of monolinguals who insist you should be learning something more 'useful'.

Common Pitfalls (Will rework into different sections)

Excessive Formal Studying: There's a really common sentiment shared amongst beginners in fighting games that they need to spend a certain amount of time in training mode or that they need to read up on the game's mechanics, frame data, and other technicalities, before they actually fight against a real opponent online. This is a mistake. You do not know what you need to learn if you have never played against an opponent, you don't even know how the game is really played, what is really valuable to learn. Training mode is great for giving you a chance to practice executing your moves/combos and it's great for trying to understand what the hell happened to you after a fight. Some people are stuck in training mode pergatory.

Likewise, don't be afraid you won't understand something (or anything at all) in your TL when watching a show, don't resort to turning on english subtitles, watch it raw or with your TL's closed captions if possible (studies show this actually increases comprehension substantially). And, while it's always embarrassing, don't be afraid to try and talk to someone in their native tongue, you will get laughed at, or ignored, or even get a death stare in some cases; that's ok, let it happen and look up what you said wrong later; mistakes are some of the best teachers you can have if you let them.

Duolingo gets a section all to itself: Take it from someone who has spent quite a lot of time using it -STOP- it doesn't work. Never in my life have I met ANYONE whose primary study method is the green bird actually become competent in their TL. CAN you learn that way? Anything is possible I guess, but it gamifies learning a language in a simultaneously unnatural and boring way. It gets credit for pressuring its users to maintain "streaks" since that's exactly the kind of consistency you need to actually learn something. But I will tell you in no uncertain terms, I made virtually no progress in Japanese, Spanish, or Korean using it. You gain vocubulary and an understanding of grammar when it is placed in contexts you are familiar and/or engaged with. It utterly fails at being engaging, so any genuine lectures it provides during its monotonous drills are frankly wasted.

Vocabulary Drills: This is a bit of a reluctant warning, since I do flash card drills for learning writing systems (you damn near have to do this if you're learning Japanese or Chinese), but I generally think it's a mistake to grind vocabulary for most languages, if only because the words you pick up from context clues while consuming media in your TL stick in your head far easier than 5000 words that you have yet to prove to your subconscious are actually useful. Vocab drills do not count as practical experience, which is what you should be focusing your time on.

General Resources

Specific resources for Japanese, Spanish, and Korean will be provided in their respective sections, but there are some general tools that are universally applicable across most languages, assuming you aren't attempting to learn something too obscure.

The Offical Language Learning Guide on /int/ is a go-to Wiki when researching a language you are considering, providing a breakdown of its general history, relations with other languages, difficulty, and number of speakers. /int/ itself is basically a dumpster fire, being a watered down version of /b/ where the shitposting is multilingual; the Japanese Language Learning threads tend to be ok though, but that's not at all beginner friendly.

Torrents! Pirate anything that has multi-language options; most mainstream anime, cartoons, and movies will have a dozen different dubs to choose from. I won't provide any torrent sites for fear of being nuked from orbit, but just remember this: do not torrent anything owned by Paramount without a VPN on, they will have your ISP send you an angry letter in the mail.

Many video games will give you the option to change the language in the options menu, with a lot of modern games having dubs for each major language. If you prefer playing older games and don't mind doing a bit of scrounging, there are many fan translations of older games you can use as well. In this case, ROMhacking.net is your friend.