(I was going to title this post “My Hero Academia”, but that would get angry anime fans leaving nasty comments. So I didn’t.)
So what is his background? How did he achieve mastery over pitch accent? Did he achieve mastery over pitch accent?
Let’s answer the last question first. Native speakers on YouTube have confirmed how good his Japanese is.
So how did he get this expertise? Basically, he started back in undergraduate university. He began in Washington, and then got to study in Tokyo.
He also decided to only focus on native pronunciation in his studies. This kind of laser-like intensity paid dividends, at the cost of maybe being behind the curve on reading and writing. (Although then later he focused on improving his reading and writing, so now he is the all in one package.)
So here we can see that he:
- initially made pitch accent his focus
- has confirmation from more than one native Japanese speaker that his command of the language is very good
- is offering a “course” on Patreon
Clearly his credentials aren’t in question. So is the “course” good?