[atribecalledqst]

I've started to suspect recently that an important secret of being able to sound natural in conversational Japanese is using a LOT of onomatopoeia words. I've considered mining all of them from jmdict and studying them specifically.

[jankcorn]

I have always liked the book "日本語擬態語辞典" by Gomi Taro: <https://bookclub.kodansha.co.jp/product?item=0000193814>

It has great illustrations that quickly get the idea across for Japanese onomatopoeia.

To give an idea of what it is like, here are a couple of example pages: <https://livedoor.blogimg.jp/akky_san/imgs/b/2/b21ad72f.jpg> <https://livedoor.blogimg.jp/akky_san/imgs/3/4/34cf6c82.jpg>

Quite fun to read!

[atribecalledqst]

Whoa! Thanks for the recommendation! This looks like it'll be right up my alley.

[anigbrowl]

That's a great idea. I love them because many of them are evocative of either an actual real sound, or play with some loan word. This makes them easier to remember, plus they don't need any kind of special conjugation.

Abbreviation, repetition, and stacking bits of words together are a big difference between natural vs formal Japanese language skills. It's very Lego-like that way.

[worldsoup]

definitely, you really need to master these to be anything close to native level