Kanji and Japanese aren’t the same. At least that is how I see it in my head, for better or worse. It is very odd to see it that way so it takes some explaining.

One day I plan to learn Chinese after I learn Japanese. Since kanji is from China originally and the Japanese incorporated into their culture way back a long time ago many of the kanji seem to still be about the same. So it is actually helping with both languages to learn kanji therefore, to me, Japanese is not synonymous to kanji.

If you want to go SAT test with it. Japanese is kanji, but kanji is not necessarily Japanese. So the two are kind of separate, well at least enough that it can help make Japanese easier.

For simplicity sake we will say Japanese is made up of 3 alphabets.

• Hiragana which is phonetic sound for native Japanese words
• Katakana which is the phonetic sound for foreign words, most of the time
• Kanji which is a character that associates a meaning to it

Generally we see kanji as this hard nut to crack because it can have several readings to the meaning. When you combine the kanji in certain orders the original meanings might have almost nothing to do with the word, but the reading is what matters. Basically lots of circular logic that kills your head when learning. While it can be a pain there is hope.

The article title says Kanji Makes Japanese Easy, but all I have described are the complications. So what I want to say is its not really that bad. Learning the meaning of the kanji can go a long way which is why Hesig’s book Remembering the Kanji is so popular and used so much. Because at the end of the day those kanji mean something.

The best way for Kanji to make life easy is to realize that Kanji have a meaning and when you are lost and confused you can use that to your advantage. Lets look at some examples.

私は魚を好きです

The above is a sentence that is kanji and hirigana. The kanji are 私, 魚, and 好. Roughly I, fish, and like. So we can probably infer that the sentence means I like fish, right. Well yes. That is what that sentence is.

Now the next thought is, well not all sentences are going to be that easy and short. I know, but that doesn’t mean you cant try to infer meanings of sentences and pick out parts of sentences to try to better understand things.

One sentence that helped me realize this was this one.

アンは詩を書くのが好きだ。

I still don’t have any idea how to read this sentence properly I always seem to mess it up. However, I know that there is poem, write and like. Along with those plus さん I know that someone likes to write poetry.

And here is another example of looking at kanji meanings and getting the sentence.

秋が好き。

秋 is autumn and 好 is like so the inference is liking autumn.

Another great thing about kanji is it helps shrink the size of what you read and get words in an easier understanding way. Look at the following both the hiragana and the kanji.

Hiragana: わたしのはははえいごはなしません。

Kanji: 私の母は英語を話しません。

The first thing I see is a ton of kana and it kills my eyes for a moment. After that I see the 3 は. After that I have to sound out the sentence and try to figure out the words and manually separate them since there are no spaces like in English. The kanji is what allows you to have those “spaces” because the kanji can be your words so there aren’t any need for spaces per se.

Also notice that the only things that aren’t kanji are particles and conjugations. This lets you be able to break the sentence into words easily and is the true power of kanji which makes reading Japanese a lot easier.

There is one final thing to look at and take note of. While the above is true there are times where picking things out isn’t so easy. Lets see why.

彼の自転車は青い。

This sentence says the bicycle is blue. However, without knowing that 自転車 means bike then this sentence will leave you stuck until learn what it is. So kanji is not a silver bullet to Japanese, but it can help a lot especially as a beginner.

Finally, there are many words that have the same “spellings” in hiragana but mean completely different things when seeing it in kanji. Take kanji for example here are two meanings.

Sentence Hiragana: いいかんじ
Sentence Kanji 1: いい感じ
Sentence Kanji 2:　いい漢字

The hiragana sentence is the same as the others, but without content you don’t know which. Kanji 1 is “Good feeling”. Kanji 2 is “Good kanji(Chinese character)”. So kanji is definitely beneficial when trying to figure out what is being said. As you learn more vocab kanji helps you keep it straight. Plus the more kanji meanings you know there are quite a few kanji readings which will miraculously fall into place all of a sudden. 誰 (だれ) or who was one of those which just fell into place.

Conclusion

Basically when it comes down to it learning Japanese is all about approach. Learning Kanji separate from grammar and vocab can have different outcomes. I like to think it makes things easier. Since starting to focus more and more on kanji it has sped up my learning Japanese to the point some of the manga I have is getting easier to read without looking everything up.

So remember the 4 key components to kanji making Japanese easier are:

• Meanings of Kanji can help you to figure out sentence meanings
• Kanji helps you to find ends of words and beginning of new ones for an easier time reading
• A lot of times kanji is only used for words whereas particles and conjugation are in hiragana; and katakana is foreign words or pop-culture spellings.
• Kanji is used to distingiush words to help figure out context since many words can have same spelling/phonetic sounds

keeping those in mind learning kanji is a very beneficial thing to do from the get-go. Also of note is that the AJATT method has you learn kanji meanings first using Remembering the Kanji. So this definitely isn’t an idea out of left field.

As a note these are my observations from my learning Japanese for the last year and half along with thoughts from others discussing this very thing. So please give your opinion too about your experiences in learning kanji along with Japanese

Kanji: 私
Kana: (kun) わたし (on) シ
Meaning: I
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Kanji: 今
Kana: (kun) いま (on) コン
Meaning: now
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Kanji: 田
Kana: (kun) た, �
Meaning: Rice Field
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Kanji: 女
Kana: (kun) おんな (on) ジョ
Meaning: Woman
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Kanji: 男
Kana: (kun) おとこ (on) ダン
Meaning: Man
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Usage

私
私 (わたし) I
私立大学 (シリツダイガク) private university

今
今 (いま) now
今日 (きょう) today
今晩 (コンバン) tonight

田
田中さん (たなかさん) Mr./Ms. Tanaka
山田さん (やまださん) Mr./Ms. Yamada
田んぼ (たんぼ) rice field

女
女の人 (おんなのひと) woman
女性 (ジョセイ) woman

男
男の人 (おとこのひと) man
男性 (ダンセイ) man

Kanji: 山
Kana: (on) サン (kun) やま
Meaning: Mountain
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Kanji: 川
Kana: (kun) かわ, がわ
Meaning: River
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Kanji: 元
Kana: (on) ゲン
Meaning: Origin
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Kanji: 気
Kana: (on) キ
Meaning: Spirit
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Kanji: 天
Kana: (on) テン
Meaning: Heaven
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Usage

山
山 (やま) mountain
富士山 (フジサン) Mt. Fuji

川
川 (かわ) river
小川さん (おがわさん) Mr./Ms. Ogawa

元
元気な (ゲンキな) fine

気
元気な (ゲンキな) fine
天気 (テンキ) weather
電気 (デンキ) electricity

天
天気 (テンキ) weather
天国 (テンゴク) heaven

Kanji: 上
Kana: (on) ジョウ (kun) うえ
Meaning: up
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Kanji: 下
Kana: (on) カ (kun) した
Meaning: down
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Kanji: 中
Kana: (on) チュウ, ジュウ (kun) なか
Meaning: middle
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Kanji: 半
Kana: (on) ハン
Meaning: half
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Usage

上
上 – (うえ) – top; above
上手な – (ジョウズナ) – good at
屋上 – (オクジョウ) – rooftop
下手な – (へたな) – poor at

下
下 – (した) – under
地下鉄 – (チカテツ) – subway

中
中 – (なか) – inside
中学 – (チュウガク) – junior high school
一年中 – (イチネンジュウ) – all year round
中国 – (チュウゴク) – China

半
三時半 – (サンジハン) – half past three
半分 – (ハンブン) – half

Kanji: 水
Kana: (on) スイ, (kun) みず
Meaning: water
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Kanji: 木
Kana: (on) モク, (kun)き
Meaning: tree
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Kanji: 金
Kana: (on) キン, (kun)かね
Meaning: gold; money
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Kanji: 土
Kana: (on) ド, (kun) つち
Meaning: soil
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Kanji:曜
Kana: (on) ヨウ
Meaning: weekday
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Usage

水
水曜日 – (スイヨウび) – Wednesday
水 – (みず) – water

木
木曜日 – (モクヨウび) – Thursday
木 – (き) – tree

金
金曜日 – (キンヨウび) – Friday
お金 – (おかね) – money

土
土曜日 – (ドヨウび) – Saturday
土 – (つち) – soil

曜
日曜日 – (ニチヨウび) - Sunday

Kanji: 日
Kana: (on) ニ, ニチ (kun) ひ, び
Meaning: day; sun
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Kanji: 本
Kana: (on) ホン　(kun) もと
Meaning: book; basis
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Kanji: 人
Kana: (on) ジン, ニン (kun) ひと
Meaning: person
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Kanji: 月
Kana: (on) ゲツ, ガツ　(kun) つき
Meaning: moon; month
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Kanji: 火
Kana: (on) カ (kun) ひ
Meaning: fire
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Usage

日
日本 – (ニホン) – Japan
毎日 – (マイニチ) – everyday
日曜日 – (ニチヨび) – Sunday
母の日 – (ははのひ) – Mothers Day

本
本 – (ホン) – book
日本 – (ニホン) – Japan
日本語 – (ニホンゴ) – Japanese Language
山本さん – (やまもとさん) – Mr./Ms. Yamamoto

人
日本人 – (ニホンジン) – Japanese people
三人 – (サンニン) – three people
一人で – (ひとりで) – alone
この人 – (このひと) – this person

月
月曜日 – (ガツヨウび) – Monday
一月 – (イチガツ) – January
月 – (つき) – moon

火
火曜日 – (カヨウび) – Tuesday
火 – (ひ) – fire

The above usage takes into account the various usages for each kanjia nd how they are integrated into words to start heping you get an idea of how they are used in forming words.

Here is week 3 of our Kanji to learn.  It is going to get a bit harder now, but not too hard.  Again doing kanji for JLPT 4, so lets get started.

Kanji: 百
Kana: (on) ヒャク,  ビャク,  ピャク
Meaning: hundred
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Kanji: 千
Kana: (on) セン, ゼン
Meaning: thousand
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Kanji: 万
Kana: (on)マン
Meaning: ten thousand
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Kanji: 円
Kana: (on)エン
Meaning: yen; circle
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Kanji: 時
Kana:  (on) ジ  (kun) とき
Meaning: time
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Usage

Here is some usage of the above kanji.  Remember for the first 4 look at Numbers in Japanese, With Kanji post, for the last two look below.

円 – How much something is in yen.

Japanese – ニ千円
English – 2000 yen

時 – What time it is

Japanese – 六時
English – 6:00 o’clock

You might notice I have changed stuff a bit.  In the kana I have started using the appropriate onyomi and kunyomi kana and pronunciations.  This is important to know as it can mean different things depending on the context of what you are reading.  I am still learning the differences and when to use what, but I am told it eventually comes second nature to people. Also asking my sensei she said that you just have to memorize both meanings and try to use what fits.

Hope you are keeping up or know these already any comments ore help would be appreciated.

For week 2 we have another 5 Kanji to get us to the JLPT 4. These are still numbers so please refer to my first post on numbers(Numbers in Japanese, with Kanji) to get usage examples.

Kanji: 六
Kana: ろく
Meaning: 6
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Kanji: 七
Kana: なな
Meaning: 7
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Kanji: 八
Kana: はち
Meaning: 8
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Kanji: 九
Kana: きゅう
Meaning: 9
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Kanji: 十
Kana: じゅう
Meaning: 10
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Next week we will start to get the last of numbers for now and get into more interesting kanji. I hope this helps please let me know if I can improve.

またね

I am wanting to take the JLPT 4 in December this year so part of that is learning about 100 kanji.  So to start I am going to learn 5 kanji a week and going to post them up here.  I figured I could easily learn 5 a week as long as I keep up with it.  So you know I am starting with the kanji in Genki 1 so the first few are fairly easy and are japanese numbers.

Kanji: 一
Kana: いち
Meanings: One
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Kanji: 二
Kana: に
Meanings: Two
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Kanji: 三
Kana: さん
Meanings: Three
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Kanji: 四
Kana: よん
Meanings: Four
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Kanji: ご
Kana: 五
Meanings: Five
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For some usage please visit my post on numbers:

Numbers in Japanese, with Kanji

If there are any ideas where I can improve please let me know.  Also if you have any study ideas I would love to hear them.

またね

Here are some of the basics.  From these we can get pretty far along with building some big numbers.  I recommend learning the kanji, but the hirigana is there to help on pronunciation.  I recommend learning hirigana and katakana I was able to learn both the flashcard way in about 2 weeks of solid concentration.

Now lets look at combining these together to make some higher numbers. Lets start with teens.

How you do teen number is 10 followed by the single digit like 4, 1 or 9. Combining them is how you make the larger numbers. So lets just look at a bunch of combination. I am doing these all in kanji as it is important to know. Notice what is common in them; the pattern basically is take the number and add something between each main one where a 10, 100, 1000, 10000, etc… goes You can get really big. It is all about recognizing the pattern. If it is a 1 then you don’t need ichi because it assumes it already since the man, sen, hyaku are all a type of 1 to begin with.

2 digits

3 digits

4 digits

5 digits

Again just pay attention to the pattern and you can can star to understand and follow nubmers.  Sorry I can’t make this easier to learn but unfortunatly it seems to be one of those tings you just have to practice to get, but hopefully the charting can make it a bit easier on how to build up the larger numbers.

またね