Seiyuu Senryaku

About 2 years ago I begin to follow some people, either via tumblr or twitter or soup or some such, who post pictures of seiyuu. As more and more radio shows and events get broadcasted via Nico or Ustream or whatever, more images have been popping up beyond the usual semi-pin-up scans from the various seiyuu magazines, blogs, and what have you. Actually with things like twitter and iPhone proliferating in Japan, there has been a lot more images floating out there just because. There are even more seiyuu mags nowadays compared to 2 years ago.

I’m not sure why this is the case, but as I alluded previously there is a distinct 2.5D advantage for seiyuu. The recent seiyuu boom, at any rate, coincides with me trying to learn the names of all the “popular” voice actresses via following image blogs. You know, the average blog might label the people in the photos, and half the time it’d be written the way it is. And it’s as good of a time to learn it as any.

It was somewhat of a learning curve since as far as recognizing kanji it is not a big deal for me. What was the big deal is remembering what the name is suppose to spell out as. Names are tricky after all because they don’t always say what you think they say. I still remember when I first started I probably recognize only 20% or so of what’s out there. Now?

Here is a list of popular voice actresses that I saw this morning (sorted by the # of roles they had in 2011 I believe). And I can recognize them all now! This is notable because for the longest time I have followed the seiyuu scene (albeit from afar) but it isn’t until recently that I started recognizing their names in Japanese.

I might still make fun of people learning Japanese through anime, but I don’t doubt its impact (which seems to be proportional only to how much effort you put in learning and working with the foreign language). Perhaps, this is more a demonstration of the power of mokkori in the educational context. I think.

 


3 Responses to “Seiyuu Senryaku”

  • Caitlyn

    My kanji is awful, but for whatever reason committing people’s name kanji to memory isn’t too hard for me. I think it’s because kanji are more like pictographs. For example I don’t strictly “know” either of the kanji in Asumi Kana’s surname, but my brain still remembers roughly what they look like, and when paired with 佳奈 I know it has to be Asumiss’s name.

    I can read all the names in that list and my kanji is probably a lot worse than yours.

    I didn’t ever make a concerted effort, it just kinda happens via osmosis. The bigger goal for me is being able to recognize more people’s voices by ear… The biggest reason I pick up name kanji is because I’m constantly checking the ED credits during shows.

  • schneider

    I only recognize about seven, and most of them have hiragana in their name lol. The ones whose kanji I could recognize are HanaKana, Tomatsu Haruka, and Nana orz

  • omo

    @Caitlyn
    The force is strong with you.

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