What is the difference between Japanese readings and Japanese names?

For example. I looked up an individual kanji character and it lists the readings, then there's a section for names that use the kanji character, and the names appear somewhat like readings. Are those relevant to learn alongside readings?

Which dictionary are you looking at?

Probably that is a list of readings of the kanji that are used in names (of places or people). I wouldn't bother learning them separately; there's too many of them and with just a list you don't know which ones are rare or common. Most of them are used only in names (at least in modern Japanese).

While さくら is written 桜 in kanji when it is a tree/blossom, there are well over 700 ways to write it in kanji when it is a name.

http://jisho.org/words?jap=%E3%81%95%E3%...ct=enamdic

And no, you definitely don't need to learn them!

I'm looking at the dictionary http://beta.jisho.org/ that CureDolly told me about in another thread I made. I also saw a similar thing in another dictionary that I can't remember.

I was just setting out to look for kanji readings in all forms so that I can review them and decide which ones to learn and which ones not to learn, but at the same time I didn't want to leave anything out where I'd have to go back and relearn something.

That's more or less why I wasn't sure if the names were relevant enough to learn alongside kanji readings.

Okay, thank you. That's a relief, tbh. I'm just trying to cover all my bases before I delve into kanji readings. I don't really want to leave anything out only to later find out that I should've learned it.

CureDolly Wrote:While さくら is written 桜 in kanji when it is a tree/blossom, there are well over 700 ways to write it in kanji when it is a name.
http://jisho.org/words?jap=%E3%81%95%E3%...ct=enamdic

In the link you provided, it's 122 not 700.

Now that really is extremely strange, because when I hit that same link the number is 777 and the results run to 30 pages.

Here is the screenshot just to prove I am not hallucinating:



I am not sure what to make of that.

Anyone else want to try the link? You may get the Lucky Number and gold coins will come out of your パソコン.

If you go to page 5 you can see where the results for さくら stop. The 700+ results reflect　さくら*, which is what the engine interprets when you type さくら.

そうですね。

Mystery solved then. That's what you get for putting a doll in charge of a keyboard.

I must confess though that I am disappointed. I thought perhaps we had stumbled on a really first-class mystery that might end up with fairies or the Fifth Dimension or something.

And it turned out to be just another boring old Dolly 失敗.

Of course it might turn out to be one of those twist-in-the-tail stories and someone does get gold coins from their パソコン just when we thought it was all explained.

You know, one of those. It was all a dream after all...

or was it?

Kind of endings.

I like them, don't you?

Anyway, 122 Sakuras is still a bigly lot. You couldn't get them all into a taxi, or probably even a bus.

TsugiAshi Wrote:

CureDolly Wrote:

Okay, thank you. That's a relief, tbh. I'm just trying to cover all my bases before I delve into kanji readings. I don't really want to leave anything out only to later find out that I should've learned it.

It sounds like you're setting yourself up for a difficult time -- you should be learning words, not readings. Also, how do you expect to decide yourself which readings are worth learning and which aren't? You're never going to be able to learn all the readings of all the kanji in a dictionary.

I would agree with Yudantaiteki-san here. I didn't say anything because I didn't use the Heisig method (I was very influenced by Heisig-sensei in breaking down the kanji and making stories but the whole thing of learning kanji in the abstract without knowing the readings didn't appeal to me at all).

Consequently I don't really know how Heisig people tackle readings, but I never "learned a kanji" in my life. I learned words.

Yudantaiteki-san suggests learning words and I would too, because in those lists of readings in the dictionary are some really important ones that you will use all the time, some less usual ones and (especially where there is a long list) quite a few that you will probably never use at all and many Japanese people don't know.

I think it is important to be aware of on and kun readings (the on ones are usually in katakana because they are "foreign" - ie originally Chinese). On readings are most used in combination words (where there is more than one kanji).

Other than that, if you learn words you will very quickly start finding the same kanji in different words and getting the different readings for it with meanings to pin them to.

I won't say more because hybridizing my methods with yours might not be a good recipe. I only mentioned it at all because Yudantaiteki-san did, so I am assuming that learning words doesn't clash with Heisig.

You may want to look at this:

http://kawaiijapanese.wordpress.com/2014...sterhoods/

It's a little funny, but I find it invaluable. It only affects some readings, but surprisingly many and I find as I get used to how the Sound Sisters work I am using them all the time.

To a certain extent learning readings is OK, but you should never learn a reading without a word to go with it, and you definitely should not take a dictionary and try to learn every reading of a kanji at once. It won't work.

Thank you both for your posts. I have been learning vocab words in my Japanese studies, and it has helped my overall knowledge of the language.

My train of thought for learning the readings, though, is this: it's not really about taking something impossible or impractical and spending a large amount of time focused solely on that one task simply to stress myself to a burnout. It's more about breaking the Japanese language down into separate, digestible pieces -- kana, kanji, vocab, grammar points, etc -- and learning those individual pieces over time.

And since kanji can be one of the most intimidating parts of the Japanese language to go through, and since there are so many individual kanji (at least 2,000-3,000 most used), as I'm learning them more through RTK and the like, I'm compiling all of the readings to go alongside them.

Mostly because my mindset is that if I'm going to spend a relative life-time keeping my Japanese polished in general, it actually wouldn't hurt to learn the readings of the kanji over time as I'm spending time going through kanji anki reviews over the course of my life.

And I'd rather compile everything necessary in the first go, so that down the road when my studies become shorter, smoother and easier, I won't necessarily have to find things and go back and add them... because I already added them earlier on.

It would seem that learning the readings is a daunting task (even unnecessary), but as I'm keeping up with kanji reviews over the years, it really wouldn't hurt to have that extra bit of information. So I'm basically taking the concept that I initially learned in Heisig's Remembering the Kana and beefing it up over a period of years, etc.

TsugiAshi Wrote:It would seem that learning the readings is a daunting task (even unnecessary), but as I'm keeping up with kanji reviews over the years, it really wouldn't hurt to have that extra bit of information. So I'm basically taking the concept that I initially learned in Heisig's Remembering the Kana and beefing it up over a period of years, etc.

Personally, I do think it's unnecessary. You'll learn readings for each kanji as you learn enough words that include them, but even then you often won't be able to reliably guess readings of new words. It's far easier to pull out your smartphone than spend time double guessing. Learning readings separately offers no shortcut or other meaningful advantage that justifies the massive time investment in it.

I'd say that input/output is far more important (and probably interesting and fun), and will offer way more advantages over the timespan you envision. Even 10 minutes a day can have massive benefits over a period of years, and isn't something that should be underestimated. When your decks start growing, you'll really appreciate any extra time you have to spend away from SRS or textbooks/dictionaries, especially on busy days.