Books for studying Japanese

Before giving more info on Japanese dialects I thought it would be useful to share some books I used for studying Standard Japanese or 標準語 (Hyoujungo) so that one might have a parameter to compare.
When I started studying Japanese at UFRJ I used the book Shin Nihongo No Kiso I, which was used in the first and second year. For the third and fourth year Shin Nihongo no Kiso II (Honsatsu Kanji) Vol. 2 (in Japanese).

The only problem with these books is that one can't use the books effectively until one learns to read in Hiragana and Katakana. In order to avoid that I started using the book Japanese for Busy People I: Kana Version includes CD (Japanese for Busy People Series), which allows the student to start studying without knowing any Japanese writing system until he/she is able to read.

An introduction to Japanese dialects

Hey everyone!!
Today I decided to do something different and did some review about what I studied during my master's at Osaka University: Japanese dialects.
Even though it's a lot of stuff to cover I tried to create a podcast and talk about something that still blows my mind when I travel to other regions of Japan and struggle to understand what people are saying.

Should you have any questions or comments, please let me know.

ほんなら　左様なら

Need Japanese lessons or translations?

How about learning the language of the world's SECOND biggest economy and have an asset that will help you increase your opportunity to do business. Japan is still a place for new endeavors but communication can be a barrier if you speak only English.
Japanese is also a language to enjoy the ancient culture of Japan or something more modern like ANIME (cartoons), comic books and the booming OTAKU (geek) culture.
Whatever you're interested in learning about the language and/or culture, let me help you do it.

My name is Júlio Pereira and I'm a Brazilian guy living in Japan since 1998.
I have a bachelor's degree in Portuguese/Japanese taken at UFRJ(Rio de Janeiro Federal University) and a master's degree in Japanese/Sociolinguistics taken at Osaka University.

I'm a multilingual professional and besides Portuguese(native) I speak FLUENT Japanese, English and German.I also have good communicational skills in Spanish. Since I know what it takes to learn a language I can guarantee that you will learn to speak Japanese in no time. Of course you will have to do your part in order to do that

Besides extensive experience teaching Japanese I have experience working as a full-time translator at SOS KINDERDORF in Rio de Janeiro translating Portuguese, English and German and at Honda Motors translating Portuguese, English and Japanese.


Should you have any questions on my services/fees don't hesitate to contact me by E-mail or