Great Kanji words - Printable Version

Great Kanji words - Printable Version

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Great Kanji words - synewave - 2007-01-29

How about a thread devoted to memorable kanji compounds based on their Heisig keywords? Perhaps there are a few cases where keywords could be "better" however a lot of the time they are perfect.

I came across 外交官　（がいこうかん）　yesterday and don't think I will forget it.

Admittedly I did have to look it up in my dictionary coz I couldn't work out what an 'outside' 'mingle' 'bureaucrat' was...pretty obvious though Sad

Doh!

Great Kanji words - ファブリス - 2007-01-30

I'm at work... diplomat ?

Great Kanji words - synewave - 2007-01-30

I bet you looked that up;-)

Great Kanji words - ファブリス - 2007-01-30

No Wink

But I came accross the compounds for "embassy" and other related words before, where 外 often appears. So I thought of someone who mingles in outside/international affairs.

With that in mind, I saw an interesting book at the library, it is like a compound building book, which explains various kanji and what they mean as a suffix or prefix, and all the compounds you can make with them. So for example for this one, it's not so much "outside" of some place, but rather "foreign country". Once you add that meaning to the kanji, then you'll probably guess a lot of other related compounds without looking it up.

edit: here it is, Building Word Power in Japanese. (I should probably go get it now that I think of it, it's one of those books that could complement well with RTK).

pps: Interesting also, perhaps one could prioritize the onyomi readings for these prefixes and suffixes (there are 63 in that book according to one reviewer).

Great Kanji words - synewave - 2007-01-31

That book looks really interesting. What I thought was great is that you can see the list of prefix and suffixes on the Amazon page which is really enough to get going with.

From the 漢字検定 level 7 I came across another blatant compound - 半径　（はんけい）

There's no excuse for Heisig followers not to get that! Not sure how much I'll use it though.

Great Kanji words - fragileshards - 2007-02-26

I found one today at school　that was really nice。。。
手話　－（しゅわ）

Great Kanji words - Jawful - 2007-02-27

fragileshards Wrote:I found one today at school　that was really nice。。。
手話　－（しゅわ）

That one doesn't work as well with the Heisig keywords as it doesn't teach us 話 means speak. But if you know that, those kanji make perfect sense.

Anyway, as I get further into the book, I'm finding myself wondering what all kinds of compounds around me are. It's nice to at least have a platform from which to take a leap from and guess. I only wish I could finish it sooner... I'm very impatient and need to finish before I get bored of it!!!

Great Kanji words - aircawn - 2007-03-18

Came across this one today...

南半球 (South, half, ball - みなみはんきゅう)

Enjoy!

Great Kanji words - ericshun - 2007-03-19

How about eminent ball ＝ping pong ? heheh

Great Kanji words - Wakela - 2007-03-19

My favorite has to be from an adversitement for a discount store:
"激安!"

But seriously, the great thing about this system is how easily the vocabulary falls into place once you know the keywords.

Great Kanji words - brose - 2007-03-19

One of my favorites from Harry Potter: 吸魂鬼(きゅうこんき）, with its two 「鬼」　kanji in a row.

Great Kanji words - Wakela - 2007-03-20

I have a telescope, so I learned some astronomy exrpressions, which are interesting and beautiful:
水星【すいせい】 (n) Mercury (planet), (P)
金星【きんせい】 (n) Venus (planet)
火星【かせい】 (n) Mars (planet), (P)
木星【もくせい】 (n) Jupiter (planet), (P)
土星【どせい】 (n) Saturn (planet)
天王星【てんのうせい】 (n) Uranus (planet)
海王星【かいおうせい】 (n) Neptune (planet)
冥王星【めいおうせい】 (n) Pluto (planet)
星雲【せいうん】 (n) Nebula
銀河【ぎんが】 (n) Milky Way, galaxy, (P)

It's interesting to see where the Japanese abandoned their naming system for the planets and started translating the Western system. It coincides with the planets you can see with a telescope and the ones you can't. Also, throw in the sun and the moon, and you get an interesting correlation with the days of the week. Both Japan and the West named Saturday basically the same thing...evidence of ancient astronauts?

Now that I think of it, this probably reflects Chinese astronomy, and Japan got the names from them. Does anyone know if these are the same in Chinese?

Great Kanji words - fiminor - 2007-03-21

Wakela Wrote:Both Japan and the West named Saturday basically the same thing...evidence of ancient astronauts?

Now that I think of it, this probably reflects Chinese astronomy, and Japan got the names from them. Does anyone know if these are the same in Chinese?

I became really interested in this issue when I started teaching a Japanese family about the Romans and found that origins of the terms for days of the week, planets etc seemed to be the same. I have to admit I was slightly disappointed to discover that it had been imported into Japanese via Chinese from the West. Ancient astronauts would be far more fun! This article is interesting though...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weekday

At work, so can't type kanji, but was amused yesterday to come across this compound:
lunatic dog ill [kana]kyoukenbyou[/kana] - rabies

Great Kanji words - JimmySeal - 2007-03-21

So basically, Japanese got its names for the inner 5 planets (besides Earth) from China, and both countries named the Western days of the week after the planets, sun and moon using the same pattern as Latin and the Romance languages (though the Romance words for Saturday and Sunday do not follow the Latin pattern).

Japan has come to use this system exclusively, but Chinese has not adopted it at all:
http://www.cjvlang.com/Dow/dowchin.html

Days of the week and planets in English, Japanese and Italian:
Monday/moon 月曜日/月　　　　　lunedi/luna
Tuesday/Mars 火曜日/火星 martedi/marte
Wednesday/Mercury 水曜日/水星 mercoledi/mercurio
Thursday/Jupiter 木曜日/木星 giovedi/giove
Friday/Venus 金曜日/金星 venerdi/venere

The names for Saturday and Sunday have been influenced by Christianity in French, Spanish, and Italian, but in Latin and English they are named after Saturn and the Sun
Saturday/Saturn 土曜日/土星　　dies saturni/saturnus
Sunday/Sun 日曜日/日 dies solis/sol

The Latin names for the planets and days of the week, in turn, came from the Babylonians. So there you have it: Babylonians > Latin > Jesuits > Chinese > Japanese. They've come a long way.

Great Kanji words - Wakela - 2007-03-21

Very interesting...though you're right. I was hoping for something a little more exotic than "...and they got it from the Babylonians."

Speaking of stars and history, I recently read that since the constellation Ursa Major (The Great Bear) was thought to be a bear by the ancient Greeks and Native Americans, it is believed to date since before Asians people migrated to the New World through Alaska, making it the oldest man-made thing still in existence. Just another trippy thing to think about next time you have a clear night sky.

Oh, yeah. Japanese. OK, I looked it up, but the Japanese simply call it 七星（しちせい). Not all that interesting.

Though the Pleiades gets its own kanji, 昴 (すばる). That's where the car company got its name, hence the logo.

Great Kanji words - synewave - 2007-04-22

I've not posted for over a day...what's wrong with me!?

Anyway stumbled across what's for me a new kanji compound eyeball mirrors 眼鏡（めがね）

Great Kanji words - synewave - 2007-05-17

horse, deer　馬鹿　－　ばか

Don't quite see why though.

Great Kanji words - Serge - 2007-05-18

synewave Wrote:horse, deer　馬鹿　－　ばか

Don't quite see why though.

That's why:

http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%A6%AC%E9%B9%BF#.E8.AA.9E.E6.BA.90

Great Kanji words - synewave - 2007-05-22

Thanks for the link serge. Nothing like a bit of light reading Tongue

とにかく ALTs will be familiar with 鉄棒（てつぼう） and to get a bit of exercise I'm trying to do a few 懸垂（けんすい） on a daily basis. Calling it a suspend, droop is pretty descriptive but I reckon the English version has a more positive vibe! Anyway, I consider this another 'Great Kanji word'.

Great Kanji words - synewave - 2007-05-23

This isn't just me being vulgar. But in the first few pages of 「リング」 by 鈴木・光司（すずき・こうじ） he writes:

「放尿し終えて、」

Pretty good kanji combo, don't you think?

放尿（ほうにょう）

Great Kanji words - fragileshards - 2007-05-23

鼻歌（う）　－はなうた（う）　－　from a kids book at elementary school. Kind of cute.

Great Kanji words - dilandau23 - 2007-05-24

This one is great, from Chapter 9 in RTK2. 弱肉強食　(じゃくにくきょうしょく)

Great Kanji words - synewave - 2007-06-13

One for the ALTs...

Was speaking to a trainee teacher today and she pulled me up on my use of the word 生徒（せいと）, apparently that's only for Junior High and High school students. When you're talking about Elementary school students (which I was) 児童（じどう） is allegedly a better choice.

Great Kanji words - yorkii - 2007-06-13

very true that Mr. Wave.

a good word:

日曜大工

now that does not need to be looked up surely!!

Great Kanji words - aircawn - 2007-06-13

I'll probably never get sick of this... heh

無関心（むかんしん） Or... nothing - connect - heart