Hi!

I looked up the kanji 漫, from frame 830, on the edict dictionary (http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/cgi-bin/cg...c?1MKU6F2B), and found the meanings cartoon; involuntarily; in spite of oneself; corrupt, which are very different from the keyword loose found on the RTK book.

I found another source (http://tokyoahead.com/main/staticpages/i...bi_id=2762) translating it to in spite of oneself, somehow, without knowing why, vaguely. The closest to loose here is vaguely...

Anyone knows if this is a problem with the keyword chosen by Heisig? Or a problem with the edict entry? Or a problem with me (maybe it's something I'm not getting right)?

Thanks for any info!

[ファブリス]

I suspect he was short of available keywords (with other kanji with similar concepts), and he chose "loose" because of the water primitive.

In this compound, "loose brushstrokes" I like to think of comics as a "loose" representation of reality.

漫画 【まんが】

In this compound

漫談 【まんだん】 (n) chat, desultory conversation, (P)

the idea seems to be present as well, chat = "loose conversation"

冗漫 【じょうまん】 (adj-na,n) verbosity

verbosity here is your mouth "superfluous and loose" with words

漫ろ歩き 【そぞろあるき】 (n) stroll

When you take a stroll, you "walk loose".

放漫 【ほうまん】 (adj-na,n) whimsy, looseness, indiscretion, laxity

here we have looseness, to be "set (oneself) free and loose"

Seems like the keyword is doing its job

Quote:and found the meanings cartoon; involuntarily; in spite of oneself; corrupt, which are very different from the keyword loose found on the RTK book.

So yes I think if you look up compounds (it;'s very quick and easy in a freeware program like JWPce), you can see better how the keyword relates, and sometimes, for very different meanings, which one Heisig went for.

I also use the JWPce as my dictionary / kanji lookup. It works well since you can also look up on, among others, the heisig index. I also noticed that the first meaning given for a Kanji is typically the heisig keyword, but from the 3rd edition. The "loose" character was labeled as "cartoon" in the 3rd edition and that is the first meaning JWPce gives. I guess Heisig chose this meaning as related to the compound 漫画, manga / comic / cartoon. "Loose" of course has wider connotations but is also a bit vague as a keyword.

Loose is vague? haha, good one indeed

Hehe. Pun not intended though

ファブリス Wrote:I suspect he was short of available keywords (with other kanji with similar concepts), and he chose "loose" because of the water primitive.

Hmm... is "cartoon" (or anything similar) used as keyword?

ファブリス Wrote:Seems like the keyword is doing its job

I understand what you said, but I disagree. It's like fitting the world to the description of an encyclopedia, and not the other way around. I mean that we can make the word "loose" fit almost everywhere... (everything "loosely" resembles something else).

ファブリス Wrote:So yes I think if you look up compounds (it;'s very quick and easy in a freeware program like JWPce), you can see better how the keyword relates, and sometimes, for very different meanings, which one Heisig went for.

I look up kanji definitions and compounds all the time, and that's why I thought the keyword could be "wrong". I think that a keyword like "random" is a better fit from all the compounds that I saw, but "cartoon" is almost guaranteed to stick to the minds of any manga fan!

[ファブリス]

On a reader reply on kanjiclinic.com James Heisig said he chose the older meaning of the keyword, most of the time.

Imho, "cartoon" is a restricitve keyword, because it's based on one particular use of the kanji. "loose" is more helpful for learning compounds. It may not have a clear image, but it is a clear concept to me.

There are many other abstract keywords such as this in RTK I. The trick is to turn them into clear images. It's often helpful to use play of words for example "to break loose", and take them literally, to make interesting images. or you can associate a word that has a clear image, which sounds very similar to the keyword. In this case I dont have a good idea, but out of my head, why not imagine a new cartoon called the "LOOSEy tunes" (instead of "Looney Tunes"). Then when you see the abstract keyword you can by association find the image. I also like to adapt that associated image so that it can convey the concept of the original keyword as well.

Quote:everything "loosely" resembles something else

I'm not following you here. If you have for example a photograph of someone, it is a clear representation of that person, it's not "loose". A "loose" representation would be a Van Gogh portrait for example (a very "loose" one ). Again, I think "loose" is a really clear concept. And all the expression that use the word all share some of that concept : "to break loose", "to loosen up", ...

Another good trick is to lookup the definition of that english keyword in a dictionary. Then you have a good description of what "loose" means, and you can find inspiration for images as well.

ファブリス Wrote:

Quote:everything "loosely" resembles something else

I'm not following you here. If you have for example a photograph of someone, it is a clear representation of that person, it's not "loose".

Again, I understand your reasoning, Fabrice... I think we just have differents PoVs about this subject. For instance, I think that a photograph of someone is two dimensional and static, so it's not a perfect representation of someone, but just a very limited capture of a very small portion of space and time. My avatar picture in this forum is a picture I shot of myself... and I'm not just a pair of foot.

All your examples are correct and probably work fine, but for me, "loose" is... well, kind of vague. I understand the concept, but it's too abstract. The "LOOSEy Tunes" is a fantastic idea, but in the end, it's still "cartoon" and I think it works better for me. When I think of "冗漫 【じょうまん】 (adj-na,n) verbosity", I think that "verbosity is superfluous in a cartoon (manga)". If I read the kanjis as "superfluous" and "loose", it would be much harder for me to get the meaning "verbosity", because those are not so restrictive.

But one thing is sure: I won't forget "LOOSEy Tunes" so soon...

Fabrice and everyone, thanks for your comments!

One guy (James Hester from sci.lang.japan) changed "incorrect" heisig meanings with the ones from Jack Helpberns kanji dictionary - here's his list of corrections:

http://groups.google.com/group/sci.lang....a82879c4e8

I'm not going to change anything about Remembering the Kanji though, we still have to learn all the other meanings of the characters in time anyway.

Very interesting info, krusher - thanks for the link!

My interpretation of the Heisig system is that we are not learning the "meaning" of the kanji, just learning a sort of mnemonic device. I think of the Heisig keywords as convenient hooks to hang the kanji on until I can put then in the proper place. The keywords are for me an aid to learning, and not something worthwhile in themselves.

That said, prior to starting Heisig I compiled a list of the 2048 RTK1 kanji and appended my own "comments" based on the Kanji Learners Dictionary. For that reason I find it hard to use the quiz portion of this site. I'm pretty sure it wasn't worth the extra effort, but if you want a copy of my list, let me know.

cjon256

What kind of comments are they?

To clarify, I 'll just post a some of them here:

乙 "fish guts" second H0071 KLD2104 KiC1908
召 "seduce" summon H0086 KLD1261 KiC1691
...
斤 "ax" kin = 1.32 lb H1125 KLD1871 KiC1914
康 sane i.e. (mentally) healthful H1159 KLD1994 KiC1054
...
循 "sequential" circulate H1854 KLD0423 KiC1387
逓 "parcel post" transmit in stages H1858 KLD1979 KiC1941
...
罷 "quit" be removed from office H2032 KLD1676 KiC1671
屯 barracks i.e. station troops H2033 KLD2156 KiC1918

cjon256

While I agree that some keywords could have been chosen better, I haven't bothered to learn other meanings for the Kanji at this stage. The most important thing is indeed having a hook to uniquely identify a Kanji, and additional or other meaning can confuse that as new primitives are introduced. That said, I also much prefer keywords that are close to the sense of the Kanji, and I think this is also a valuable aspect of Heisig, but secondary to the 'hook' aspect.

As someone once put it. RTK1 keywords is like a zip file you put into your mind. Once there, you start extracting the contents of each kanji and it unfolds and gains more weight and varied meanings.

[ファブリス]

Here's a short song, it's called "keywords" :

"Don't you worry about the keywords.
Don't you-hoo worry-hee about the key-hee words

Just get down and study some more,
Hooo hooo"

Not a very catchy song, but I agree very much with its message.

I fully agree that the exact set of keywords used is not really important, but I think it makes many newcomers nervous. I also don't think it is any harder (since we have computers to do the grunt work, etc.) to memorize a compound keyword like "fishguts" (second) for the Kanji 乙 (I actually find it helps differentiate some of the too-similar kanji).

Does it matter that many of the keywords are a bit off? No, not really. But I perceived it as a weakness when I was starting out (I'm around 1800), and I'm sure some other beginners do too. I also think that not addressing it gives Heisig's critics a free win. I would more favor providing a well vetted list of 'corrections' and then also saying that it doesn't matter much if you use them.

The critics of Heisig say "Some keywords are wrong, so the system is flawed" and "straight memorization was good enough for me." When we say, "Some keywords are wrong, but it doesn't matter," it ends up as a he said/she said argument. Are we also going to say, "it was good enough for me"?

When talking to beginners worried about wasting the kind of time and effort involved in the Heisig system, I'd kind of hoped we could do better than that...

cjon256

My recommended revision for FRAME 830: Revise to COMIC

My story: primitive elements: water (laughter) at sight of mooning (or literally ala RKT, "risk of the crotch")

mooning = someone "gives a moon" AE (displays buttocks by bending over)

Use the above if you like. I have always believed that keywords ought to match as closely as possible actual Japanese words. (e.g., RTK frame 1: "one"). Sometimes RTK keywords seem arbitrary. For me, comic is more appropriate than lose.

The actual meaning of this character is: aimless, random; involuntary. The keyword loose here is a little bit of a stretch; by this Heisig means something like "loosely defined."

Some words that contain 漫 :
散漫 - vague, loose, desultory
漫然 - random, rambling, discursive
漫談 - idle talk, chat

When you see these examples, the meaning of the keyword becomes clear, but I really think Heisig should have done a better job of clairifying this in the book. So, there you guys go. You're welcome.

KANJI Wrote:My recommended revision for FRAME 830: Revise to COMIC

My story: primitive elements: water (laughter) at sight of mooning (or literally ala RKT, "risk of the crotch")

mooning = someone "gives a moon" AE (displays buttocks by bending over)

Use the above if you like. I have always believed that keywords ought to match as closely as possible actual Japanese words. (e.g., RTK frame 1: "one"). Sometimes RTK keywords seem arbitrary. For me, comic is more appropriate than lose.

See above post. The meaning of 漫画　(manga) is "random (or whimsical) pictures" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manga); but the character 漫 by itself does not carry the meaning of "comics."

Look up Nelson for the range of uses and meanings of the kanji in question. As I did years ago, I found that comic (not "manga" but the humorous sense) made a good match.

Yes, ideally one-to-one correspondences like RTK frame one would be most helpful. But those are few. Sorry for not elaborating that but I thought it was already evident.

In my previous study of RTK, I usually did so beside a copy of Nelson. I wanted keywords to fit the range of semantic meanings for the kanji being studied. RTK does a pretty good job but is not infallible.

KANJI Wrote:Look up Nelson for the range of uses and meanings of the kanji in question. As I did years ago, I found that comic (not "manga" but the humorous sense) made a good match.

Yes, ideally one-to-one correspondences like RTK frame one would be most helpful. But those are few. Sorry for not elaborating that but I thought it was already evident.

In my previous study of RTK, I usually did so beside a copy of Nelson. I wanted keywords to fit the range of semantic meanings for the kanji being studied. RTK does a pretty good job but is not infallible.

Hey KANJI, since you seem to be open to changing keywords, what do you think of the idea I posted the other day?
1) Use the most common meaning for the keywords
2) When you have duplicate keywords, add a second word (the name one of the primitives) to distinguish them. Example: likeness & resemblance become resemblance(woman) and resemblance(flesh).

Sorry I had missed that. I am in complete agreement with the tenor of your post.

A fact is that there is no pubished book without surface or content blemishes. In other words, no book is perfect. RTK is a great work, but the nature of kanji having a wide range of individual use surely challenges one single keyword.

RTK has an internal consistency and we need to make sure that our new keyword does not cause conflicts. We are probably safe if change is made only sparingly.

Yeah, in fact I finished RTK1 some time ago, and have no desire to change any of those keywords. But I've been using this method for new kanji, and it works great. I'm going to use this for RTH (hanzi) when it comes out. Whew - there's no need to use a keyword that's not the number 1 meaning anymore.