Page 19 - Japanese Character Writing for Dummies

IN THIS CHAPTER
» Taking a first look at four types of
kanji
» Getting familiar with the concept
of on’yomi (Chinese readings) and
kun’yomi (Japanese readings)

» Understanding radicals

» Appreciating strokes and stroke
order

Chapter 2

Exploring the Nature

of Japanese Kanji

n this chapter, we explore the essentials of kanji, and also go over the mechanism of kanji to
facilitate your kanji learning. This chapter provides information to help you recognize the parts
Iof kanji, to understand how each kanji should be constructed, and to write a beautifully bal-
anced kanji!

Getting to Know the Four Types of Kanji

When you look at kanji, they might appear to be just a bunch of lines creating a shape. But there is
a useful way to categorize kanji into roughly four types, based on the way they’re formed:

» Pictographs
» Simple ideographs
» Compound ideographs
» Phonetic-ideographic characters

How many kanji do you have to know to read a Japanese newspaper or magazine? The Japanese
government designates 2,136 commonly used kanji, called jōyōkanji.

Pictographs

Some kanji are pictographs that are visual representations of things. In Japanese, they are called
象形文字 shōkēmoji (literally, characters that represent things). There are not many of them,

CHAPTER 2 Exploring the Nature of Japanese Kanji 13