Exploring Different Types Of Japanese Reading Materials

When someone like me tells you do just “do more reading” that isn’t exactly the most helpful of responses, so here I will go through the different types of reading material you can find in Japanese.

Now you can at least have some areas you can go and investigate and find something that will suite you needs.

Really there is an endless supply of reading material in Japanese and you will always be able to find something you like and that is also at your comprehension level.

You Can Find These Different Types Of Reading Material Online

I think it is important to remember that you can read online. Everything I am going to mention here is available in both physical and digital versions.

I would always say the physical copies are superior, but the reality is that you need to be in Japan to get hold of these, or at least be paying for a lot of shipping if you are not.

You should be trying to read a lot, so if you are outside of Japan then the digital option is just going to be what you have to do to actually end up reading a lot.  

(You can read more about – Tips For Beginner Japanese Learners: How To Start Reading Japanese Texts)

Manga

Manga is a great reading material for beginners as it is a form of “visual novel” …or really we can just call it a comic book.

Manga really is just a comic book with Japanese aesthetics; in the same way that anime is just a cartoon with a Japanese aesthetics. The fact that they are visual means there is maybe not as much text as other forms of reading material …but this helps us.

You can easily understand what is going on even if you don’t understand all the words, as the pictures give a lot of context and tie everything together.

You can buy actual physical manga online and have them shipped to you, or you can read them digitally online.

Although, you have to remember that you kind of read them backwards. The story usually goes from right to left so it can feel a bit strange at first.

These are usually aimed at kids and young adults, so the stories kind of reflect that, but no matter your age or ability in Japanese you will find some manga to enjoy.

Novels

You can obviously get novels in Japanese. You will find ones written by Japanese people as well as ones that have been translated into Japanese.

These translated ones can be pretty useful as you have probably already read them in your own language, so you kind of already know the story and this makes things more comprehensible for you.

A classic example of this is the Harry Potter books. They love these books in Japan and they make an excellent book for a learner as you probably already know the story.   

Although, you are going to get more Japanese culture form the ones written by Japanese people, so you shouldn’t ignore them. 

Light Novels

Light novels are very popular in Japan and are kind of a mix between Manga and a novel. Usually you will find that one page will be drawings, like the manga, and the other page will be the text, like a novel, so you kind of get the best of both.

It is often a misconception that these are really short, the word “light” makes people think they are short stories or something like this. They are not exactly super long, and are pretty similar to a normal novel in length.

These are often aimed at kids and teens so the story lines in them reflect this, but they are still great learning tools, especially since they are illustrated which can help make them a little more comprehensible than a straight up novel.

Newspapers

When I say newspapers, I mean news websites, but the information is going to be the same in both.

Really if you want to read physical Japanese newspapers, you are going to have to go to Japan which isn’t viable for everyone. 

The good things about reading the news is that you are probably going to have a rough idea of what is going in, especially if it is an international story.

You are also going to find these reports will usually only contain the Joyo kanji. Of course you will find the occasional one falls outside of this, but most of the time they keep to the main kanji.

This is because everyone in Japan is expected to know these, so by using only these kanji they can make sure that the news is accessible to anyone.

This is great for us as learners as it means we can use this type of material as great practice and you will also find a lot of the text is quite formal, which can be a good change from reading more casual conversational type Japanese that you might find in manga for example.

Textbooks

I know most people hate textbooks, but don’t totally dismiss them. You of course have the books that are aimed at teaching Japanese. These can ones for English speakers …or the ones that would be used by Japanese children.

Both can be helpful, although you should also look at textbooks that are teaching other subjects …that would be used to teach Japanese students. So for example you would have a biology book that you might find in a Japanese school.

These are extremely useful as they teach us about something like biology …all while using Japanese.

I have a friend who is not a native English speaker …but they owns a lot of textbooks you would find in an English school, such as GCSE maths books.

it seems strange, but it really is a good way to get in touch with your target language, so textbooks on random subjects for Japanese kids can be worth your time. 

General Websites In Japanese

The language of the internet may be English, but there is still plenty of Japanese out there. Pretty much any type of website you want will have a Japanese version and it can be a very good idea to start trying to seek these out.

Any time you want to quickly check something on Wikipedia …do it on the Japanese version.

Making small changes like this can really increase the amount of Japanese you are exposed to on a daily bases and this can make a difference to your over all progress.  

Reading On Social Media

Social media is usually more for videos and pictures, but you can still find some things to read. I guess it really depends on what social media platform you are using, but you can find things to read.

Usually these are going to be quite small chunks of text, such as captions and comments …but this can still be useful.

You are going to see how native Japanese people speak (well, write) and these comments and posts are also quick to read. This means you can get a quick little hit of Japanese reading every time you log in.   

Reading Japanese Subtitles

An often over looked form of reading is subtitles. This is usually seen as listening …which you are also doing, but technically you are doing a type of reading.

I almost don’t want to include this, but it does exist so I should mention it. There is a time and place for subtitles and they can really help you. As a beginner they are going to help your reading and listening at the same time, but eventually this stops working.

In most cases, subtitles become a reading exercise. You end up not really paying attention to what you are hearing and  focus on reading the words. I am not sure why this happens, but it does.

I guess this is good if you are trying to improve your reading …but really are you are watching the movies and tv shows to improve your listening, so ideally you shouldn’t allow yourself to get too dependent on the subtitles and you should actually focus on the listening.

If you want to actually read, you can do this with one of the many other methods I have already talked about above.     

Conclusion

As you can see, there are a lot of different types of Japanese reading materials and the wonderful thing is that you can find them all online or actually printed out.

It doesn’t really matter what kind of thing you like to read, there is enough variety out there that you should be able to find something you like and you should also be able to find something at the level you are in the language.     

(You can read more about – The Importance Of Reading In Japanese Language Learning)