Kansai Japanese: The Language of Osaka, Kyoto, and Western Japan

Rating:
Summary: Well structured and INTERESTING
Review: This is one of the best books on Kansai Japanese. It is very structured, and can help you learn to understand - and speak the Kansai dialect. The pronounciation is different from standard Japanese, so i'd recomend using the book more so you can understand it rather than speak it, but anyway, it is filled with examples and situations, using dialogs in English, 'standard' Japanese, and 'kansai' Japanese. Learn Japanese the way it was supposed to be spoken! After all, if the capital hadn't been moved to Tokyo, this might have BEEN the standard.

Rating:
Summary: A great read, and informative
Review: Typically, a proper review should wait until you've read a few books on a certain subject and are able to properly compare all the books about that subject to each other.

... So I say, but really, since when do you see books around about Kansai-ben? Maybe I'm just not looking around enough, but I've only found two English books on Kansai-ben (this being one of them). So a word of advice: if you're looking for books on Kansai-ben, grab 'em when you get your first chance!

Anyway, as far as the book goes, it has a leaning towards example phrases. There are many for use and study in this book, and the author does us all a great favor by not only presenting these in regular Kansai-ben with the obligatory English translation, but by also giving us the translation into regular Tokyou-ben. Of course, all the proper explanations to follow these examples are provided. All chapters end with a dialogue, summing up the content of the chapter quite neatly. It should also be noted that although all text in this book is in romaji (Japanese spelled with the English alphabet), the words and phrases used in this book dictate that you have a working knowledge of Japanese words and grammar already - vocabulary and grammar (and thus, sentence deconstruction) is left primarily to the reader. As an aside, I personally prefer regular Japanese script with furigana, especially when the book is directed towards those who should already know some basic Japanese, but that's just me.

As the chapters progress, this book covers basic Kansai-ben, then moves to cover each of three regions with three chapters (Kyouto, Hiroshima, and Oosaka). From there, it moves towards macho-man speak and curses, then to the cool little colloquial words and phrases to talk people (or things) down or up.
Of the whole book though, I found the last chapter particularly interesting. "Kansai Grammar and Special Expressions" is its title, and it essentially distills much of the grammar work you'd ever want to make into one concise, easy to understand chapter. It gives many abbreviations of certain Japanese constructions and explanations on the use of certain particles in Kansai-ben.
About the only thing that I'd actually wish for more of is more detailed explanations and perhaps some examples and phrases that deconstruct the grammar and words used (not too many though, as I realize how tedious it can be). And, of course, Japanese text.

However, such complaints are really minor ones - as far as books go, this one's pretty solid, informative, and interesting. It's very reassuring that even though there's only an Okinawa-sized island of books about Kansai-ben in a sea of other books regarding Japanese language and culture, there's at least one thing there that makes it worth stopping by.