Did you know there are 218 Chinese radicals? Although that sounds like a lot, many of them have a very specific meaning and can be extremely useful when learning to read (and write) Chinese characters. Often, a radical will ‘connect’ all the characters with that same radical, which helps you to remember them. For example,… Read More
Chinese Radicals This is another in a series of articles that takes a closer look at a specific Chinese radical. Radicals are the ‘building blocks’ of the Chinese language and help students of Chinese to learn to read Chinese characters. The root radical shows us the meaning behind the character. For example, if a character… Read More
Continuing on with our ‘radical’ series, I decided to give you some more information about 草字头 (cǎo zì tóu), the grass radical. 草字头 (cǎo zì tóu) means ‘grass on the head’ and is always found on the top of a character. I really like 艹 because unlike some radicals, most of the characters featuring this radical… Read More
木字旁 (mù zì pang) or the tree radical, is seen in many Chinese characters with a ‘natural’ meaning such as trees 李子 (lǐ zi) plum tree, fruits such as 橙子 (chéng zi) orange and even wooden objects, such as 柜子 (guì zi) cabinet. It can also be seen in less obvious characters, some of which are featured below. Here are… Read More
To continue with our radical-ly themed blog posts and to show a bit of love to all of you Written Chinese followers, 心字底 (xīn zì dǐ), or the heart radical is this week’s choice. The heart radical can be written in two ways; either at the bottom of a character as in 想 (xiǎng), 忘… Read More
Radicals are the building blocks of Chinese characters and show us the meaning or sometimes pronunciation of a character. If you’re interested in learning to read and write Chinese characters, radicals are an integral part of the learning process, and you can check out our article, The Radical Truth, to find out why learning radical… Read More