This post is authored by Jonathan. Please check out his blog, Jonathan’s Japan(ese) Journal • ジョナサンの日本(語)日記, for more Japanese related articles.

Many of you out there have wrapped up your summer studies and are enjoying your summer vacation. With all that free time, what a perfect chance to recommit yourself to your Japanese studies! And to that end, I’ve prepared for you a lesson in positive thinking.

初志貫徹
しょ・し・かん・てつ
(first / intention or plan / pierce / penetrate or clear)

Sure, it looks like it’s a bit of a doozy, but don’t get overwhelmed by the seeming difficulty of the characters. The meaning of the phrase is simple: to see one’s original intention to the end.

Let’s go ahead and break this thing apart first. (As always, Japanese readings are in hiragana and Chinese readings are in katakana.)

初
はじ（めて）、はつ、ショ
first time, beginning

(Pro tip: When written with its leading kanji, はじめて, meaning “for the first time,” is written 初めて and not 始めて. 始 is the character for the verb はじめる, which means “to begin.”)

志
こころざ（す）、こころざし、シ
intention, plan, resolve, aspire, motive, hopes

貫
つらぬく、ぬく、カン
pierce, penetrate, brace

徹
テツ (That’s right—no Japanese reading!)
penetrate, clear, pierce, strike home, sit up (all night)

I find the use of two characters that can refer to piercing through something to be the most interesting angle of this compound. If you were to interpret the whole expression in an over-literal way, you could say that they mean “to hold on your first intention and then pierce and pierce your way to the end.” (貫徹 is actually a word in its own right meaning “accomplishment, realization, penetration.” Kind of this “piercing your way to accomplishments” meaning, it seems.)

With that said, let’s look at a simple example sentence, which I found online:

やるなら初志貫徹でやり通せよ。
(やる　なら　しょしかんてつ　で　やりとおせ　よ)
Literally, “If you’re going to do, carry out your original intention and do it.”
Less literally, “If you’re going to do it, do it all the way.”
(遣り通す means “to carry through, to achieve, to complete.)

“If you’re gonna be in it, be in it to win it!” is the way that I like to look at this sentence. In a basic sense, that’s what it’s saying. Grammatically, it’s interesting to see that you can use 初志貫徹 with で and attach it to a verb. I would imagine that you often see this with verbs that can translate to “do,” such as する, やる, and of course, 遣り通す.

Let’s look at another sentence.

私は何があっても、初志貫徹の決意で頑張ります！
(わたし　は　なに　が　あって　も、　しょしかんてつ　の　けつい　で　がんばります)
Literally, “No matter what happens, I’ll do my best with the determination of seeing my original intention through to the end!”
Less literally, “I plan to see this through to the end no matter what!”
(決意 means “decision, determination. 頑張る means “to persist, to try one’s best.”)

Wow, I like that speaker’s attitude. As you can see, 初志貫徹 can be used with 決意 to emphasize your mindset and commitment to getting things done.

This compound is a wee bit complicated, so be sure to practice it. I recommend writing down the compounds and kanji that we present and even posting them on your wall so that you’ll have constant reminders of them.

日本語を勉強するなら初志貫徹の決意でしてくださいね。

This post is authored by Jonathan. Please check out his blog, Jonathan’s Japan(ese) Journal • ジョナサンの日本(語)日記, for more Japanese related articles.

Recently, we examined 日, the kanji for Sun, so today, since we’ve started with heavenly bodies, let’s go ahead and examine the kanji for the Moon:

月

There are two primary meanings for this kanji: (1) the Moon and its light, or other planets’ moons; and (2) one month. (There are other, more obscure or archaic meanings, but they are rather outside the scope of this article. Let’s keep it simple for now.)

The Japanese reading for this kanji is つき and the Chinese readings are げつ and がつ.

“Moon”

This kanji is used to refer to the Moon or to its light. On its own, it is usually read つき, as in the following sentence.

今日、月はかなり明るいですね。
(きょう、　つき は　かなり あかるい ですね)
“The moon is rather bright today, isn’t it?”

今日 (きょう) = today

かなり = fairly, considerably

明るい (あかるい) = bright

Here’s another, slightly more complicated sentence:

そのとおり。月は地球の周りを回っていて、時々太陽を覆い隠すんだ。
(そのとおり。　つき は　ちきゅう の　まわり を　まわっていて ときどき たいよう を　おおいかくす んだ)
“Exactly. The Moon revolves around the Earth and sometimes covers the Sun.”

そのとおり = expresses, literally, something like “it is just like that” or “it is just as you say”

地球 (ちきゅう) = the Earth

周り (まわり) = surroundings, the area around something

回る (まわる） = to turn or revolve; also, to visit several places, to function well, to pass a certain time

時々 (ときどき) = sometimes, from time to time
々 has many names, but I’m most familiar with のま. It means that you should double the preceding kanji. Thus, 時々 can also be written 時時.

太陽 (たいよう) = the Sun

覆い隠す (おおいかくす) = to mask or cover (something)
This is a compound verb, created from 覆う and 隠す.

Pretty straightforward, right?

In many, if not most, compounds involved the Moon, 月 often takes the げつ Chinese reading. For example, 満月 (まんげつ) which means “full moon,” as you can see below:

満月は良い天気をもたらす。
(まんげつ は　いい てんき を　もたらす)
The full moon brings good weather.

満月: full moon

満 (マン): full or fullness

良い (いい or よい) = good, excellent

天気 (てんき) = weather

もたらす = to bring about

月光 (げっこう)—a combination including 光 (ひかり; コウ), which means “light”—is another word that takes the げつ Chinese reading, but since it comes before the “k” sound of こう, it changes to げっ.

月光を浴びながら祈っているエミリーさんはかわいかったです。
(げっこう を　あびながら いのっている エミリーさん は　かわいかった です)
Emily looked cute as she prayed while basking in the moonlight.

浴びる (あびる) = to bathe or bask in

祈る (いのる) = to pray or wish

かわいい = cute or adorable, but you almost certainly knew this word!

Historically, the Moon has been regarded by the Japanese as one of the symbols of the beauties of nature. This is evidenced by the following two expressions which idiomatically mean “the beauty of nature”: 花鳥風月 and 雪月花. Both of these look interesting and are worth knowing for both linguistic and cultural reasons, so let’s break them down one at a time.

花鳥風月

（か・ちょう・ふう・げつ）
(flowers | bird | wind | Moon)

雪月花

（せつ・げつ・か）
(snow | Moon | flowers)

There are a lot of good kanji in there worth getting to know!

As I mentioned before, 月 applies to other moons, or satellites, as well, not just our own.

木星の月も大きいですか。
(もくせい の　つき も おおきい です　か)
Is Jupiter’s moon large too?

木星 (もくせい): Jupiter, though it can be called ジュピター as well

大きい (大きい): big, large

And, of course, you’re likely familiar with 月曜日 (げつようび), right? That’s Monday and, yes, it is essentially the day named after the Moon. You can read more about the weekday naming conventions on Wikipedia, if you’re interested.

“Month”

Due to both the Moon’s revolution and rotation both being approximately one month, the meaning of “month” has also been applied to 月. This is quite apparent in the names of the months of the year, as they all use with this character and all use the がつ Chinese reading.

私の誕生日は一月十日です。
(わたしの たんじょうび は　いちがつ とおか です)
My birthday is January 10th.

私の (わたしの): my

誕生日 (たんじょうび): birthday

一月 (いちがつ): January—that is, the first month

十日(とおか): the tenth day of the month—note the special reading!

Likewise, spans of time expressed in months use the same character, but using the げつ reading again:

ひろ子さんに会えなくなって、もう六ヶ月です。
(ひろこさん に　あえなく なって、　もう ろっかげつ です)
It’s already been six months since I’ve become unable to meet (or, see) Hiroko.

会う (あう): to meet or encounter (someone)

なる: to become

六ヶ月 (ろっかげつ): six months
The construction for “〇 months” is “〇ヶ月.” Note that “ヶ,” a special character, is read as “か” and not “け.”

月 is also used with a variety of words to indicate that whatever it is attached to is a monthly event. For example:

料金は月払いです。
(りょうきん は　つきばらい です)
Fees are paid monthly.

料金 (りょうきん): fees, charge

月払い (つきばらい): monthly installments/payments
Note that ばらい is the voiced form of はらい, a Japanese reading, which is why the つき reading is used. The verb はらう means “to pay.”

Here are a few more such words:

• 月給 (げっきゅう) means “monthly salary.” As you can guess 給 means “salary”
• 月末 (げつまつ)—末 meaning “end or close (of)”—refers to the end of the month
• 月利 (げつり) means “monthly interest”
• 月刊 (げっかん) means “monthly publication”

I imagine that the pattern is clear by now!

That ends our tour of the Moon, as it were. This is a kanji that you’ll see a lot, so keep an eye out for it.

This post is authored by Jonathan. Please check out his blog, Jonathan’s Japan(ese) Journal • ジョナサンの日本(語)日記, for more Japanese related articles.

Last time, we looked over the Sun kanji, 日, and the various meanings that it holds. We’re going to continue our study of this character today by looking at some 四字熟語 (よじじゅくご)–that is, four-character idiomatic compounds. What a great day to commemorate the new 四字熟語 deck here at Read The Kanji!

As you have hopefully surmised from the term itself, these kanji compounds are expressions composed of four kanji. Many of these were imported from China or various classical works, but some of them are unique to Japan. Since they generally are Chinese in origin, however, you’re likely to find that many of them use the Chinese readings (音読み) of the kanji. Makes sense, right? As such, in all of today’s expressions, 日 is read either にち or じつ.

The characters in 四字熟語 means, respectively:
四: four
字: character
熟: ripen, mature, acquire skill
語: word, speech, language

四字 is pretty straightforward, but 熟語 is a bit more of an abstract term. When you put these two kanji together, they come to mean “kanji compound; idiom; idiomatic phrase.” So then, “four-character idiomatic phrase” is pretty much an exact translation.

That’s pretty much how these things work, so let’s jump in it with our first expression, shall we?

一日三秋

いちじつ・さんしゅう or
いちにち・さんしゅう

(one / day / three / autumns)
Definition: to look forward eagerly to, each moment seeming like an eternity

The literal translation of the Japanese definition of this phrase can be rendered as “not meeting for even one day feels like not meeting for three autumns, or three years.” That really drives home the strength of the expression, which carries the nuance of very strong yearning.

Interestingly, you can see that this phrase can be read two ways—either starting with いちじつ or with いちにち. In normal everyday Japanese, 一日 is generally read いちにち, but these are somewhat special circumstances and it seems that いちじつ is actually the more traditional reading for this phrase. Choose whichever is easiest for you, though. Everyone will understand what you’re saying regardless and you’ll look pretty cool to boot. (Not guaranteed.)

The first three kanji are pretty obvious, but in this expression, the 秋 stands out. 秋 is the kanji that represents the season of autumn. Its Japanese reading is あき and its Chinese reading is しゅう. In this expression, though, it’s indirectly pointing to the passage of an entire year.

So let’s try using 一日三秋 in a sentence:

彼が海外出張から帰ってくるのを、彼女は一日三秋の思いで待っている。
She is eagerly looking forward to his return from his business trip overseas.

• 彼 (かれ): he; or one’s boyfriend, depending upon the context
• 海外 (かいがい): overseas
• 出張 (しゅっちょう): business trip
• 帰ってくる: to return home (where the speaker is)
• 私 (わたし; or わたくし in formal contexts): I, me, myself
• 思い (おもい): thoughts
• 待つ (まつ): to wait

Ah, young love. At least, that’s what I imagine when I read that sentence. The usage of the term here is 一日三秋の思いで待つ. This idiomatic expression often appears in the form 一日三秋の思いで. Likewise, 待つ is among the most appropriate verbs to use with an expression referring to the pain of waiting. Let’s remember that! 一日三秋の思いで待つ.

(Note: 一日千秋 (いちじつ・せんしゅう) is a variation of this phrase that replaces 三 (さん, three) with 千 (せん, one thousand). Thus, it’s an even stronger way to express the same thought.)

Let’s move on to our next expression.

旭日昇天

きょくじつ・しょうてん
(morning-sun / Sun / rising / heaven(s))

Literally: Full of vigor and vitality

The kanji might look a bit difficult at first glance, but if you break it apart and look at them individually, you’ll see that it’s actually fairly straightforward: “The morning sun rising into the sky,” more or less an elegant way to say “rising sun,” it seems. However, this is called an idiomatic expression for a reason: there lies a less obvious meaning behind it as well.

The idiomatic meaning here is “full of vigor and vitality” and you use this expression to describe someone’s actions. One can understand why the Sun rising in the sky would be a symbol of great power, I think, in a country that’s called the Land of the Rising Sun.

Here’s an interesting sentence for us to dissect:

日本は高度成長時代、旭日昇天の勢いで発展していった。
During the era of high growth, Japan developed with great vigor.

• 日本 (にほん): Japan
• 高度 (こうど): strong, advanced, rapid
• 成長 (せいちょう): growth
• 時代 (じだい): era, period
• 勢い (いきおい): force, vigor, power
• 発展 (はってん): development, growth, advancement

A more literal translation might be “During the era of high growth, Japan developed with the force of the rising sun.” Nice and dramatic.

Also, it seems that this expression appears often as 旭日昇天の勢い. Here’s another sentence in which it appears like this:

田中さんは、旭日昇天の勢いでプロジェクトを完成させようとしています。
Tanaka is vigorously trying to make the project a success.

• 田中 (たなか): a Japanese last name
• 完成 (かんせい): to succeed (完成させる means “to make a success”)

Again, more literally: “Tanaka is working with the vigor of the rising sun to make the project a success.” With that kind of praise, Tanaka’s likely to receive a bonus or something when the project ends, I’d imagine.

And with that, let’s move on to our final four-character compound today!

日進月歩

にっしん・げっぽ
(day / advance / month / walk)
Definition: To continue without fail as time goes on

This expression uses the にち Chinese reading of 日, abbreviated to にっ due to its being following by an “s” sound. The meaning of this expression is “to continue without without a pause; steady progress; rapid advance; fast-evolving.” An overly literally translation might be “to continue daily, to walk on monthly” or something like that. In other words, to never stop.

医薬技術の研究は日進月歩だから、癌やエイズの特効薬もいずれ開発されえると信じている。
Medical technology is advancing steadily, so I believe that a wonder drug for cancer and AIDS will be developed someday.

• 医薬 (いやく): medicine
• 技術 (ぎじゅつ): technology
• 研究 (けんきゅう): research
• 癌 (がん): cancer (often written in hiragana or katakana)
• エイズ: AIDS
• 特効薬 (とっこうやく): wonder drug, specific remedy
• 開発 (かいはつ): development
• 信じる (しんじる): to believe

An nice optimistic sentence chock full of interesting words. It looks like the basic construction for this phrase is 〇〇は日進月歩だ. What are some other examples of words that might fit with this term? How about 発展 or 改造 or 工事?

• 発展 (はってん): development
• 改造 (かいぞう): remodeling (of a building, etc.)
• 工事 (こうじ): construction work

There are certainly cases in which it seems these just never end—especially construction work! (At least, that’s what they say here in Texas.)

Here’s a final 日進月歩 example sentence for you:

道路の工事が日進月歩だから、このお店はまだ改造ができないらしいです。
Due to the continual roadway construction, this store can’t remodel yet.

• 道路 (どうろ): highway
• 工事 (こうじ): you should remember this one, since it’s only a few lines above!
• お店 (おみせ): a store

I hope that you enjoyed this introduction to 四字熟語. Try to make opportunities to use them in conversation to keep them fresh in your mind. Make them an in-joke with your friends, if that helps. Just try to find ways to use them as much as you can so that they’ll permanently lodge themselves in your mind.

See you next time!

This post is authored by Jonathan. Please check out his blog, Jonathan’s Japan(ese) Journal • ジョナサンの日本(語)日記, for more Japanese related articles.

If you want to get good with kanji, you need to really jump into it and face it head-on. You need to grapple with it and, in the end, you need to tame it. Sure, it looks scary from a distance, but if you just take a close look at it and stare it down, you’ll find that, really, it ain’t all that bad. (If it helps, think of kanji like Pokémon that need to be caught in the wild and trained into submission. Or something like that.)

And with that in mind, I’d like to introduce you today to my sunny little friend, the character for Sun:

This kanji has four basic meanings:

It looks like you’ll get a lot of mileage out of this fairly simple character, right? We’ll go over the definitions as we go along. First, we’ll start with the “day” meaning and also look over the several readings for this character.

(Note that I won’t be using romaji, so I hope you’re up on your kana! If not, I suggest you review.)

“Day”

This kanji has two native Japanese readings: ひ and か.

日, when read as ひ, is actually a standalone word meaning “day.” The character is often read か as part of dates. Let’s look at an example sentence:

Quite a nice example sentence I found—it uses both Japanese readings in one sentence.

Near the end, you can see 日 as part of the phrase てつどうのひ, meaning “Railway Day,” apparently an actual day set aside for the appreciation of railways, which certainly are one of the lynchpins of Japanese society. In this phrase, 日, obviously, is the “day” part of things.

Now check out “10月14日.” This is how Japanese dates work: you write the number of the month followed by 月 (pronounced  ツ
here, but also read つき and meaning “Moon”), and then the date followed by 日. (The readings for dates can get a little complicated, as there are a lot of irregular ones. That’s a too bit complicated to go into here, however.) Thus, June 21 is 6月21日 and January 1 is 1月1日. Pretty convenient, that!

Perhaps the easiest place to see the か reading for 日 is in the seven days of the week, which, if you’re not familiar with, you might want to take the chance to commit to memory.

The characters in the front of each day mean, in order, Moon, fire, water, wood, gold, earth, and of course, Sun.

日 also has two Chinese readings: にち and じつ. Being Chinese readings, you’ll be more likely to see these in kanji compounds, called 熟語（じゅくご）in Japanese. Let’s examine a few of these.

So this essentially means “celebration day.” Makes sense, right? Here’s a good sentence for you to see it in action:

Definitely a situation none of us wants to find ourselves in! (Remember that because 祝日 is used as a time, you use に as your particle!)

Let’s look at another term:

Now here’s a double whammy for you, as 日 will appear twice in the same sentence with the same reading (more or less).

See how cleanly kanji fit together? And people say it’s frightening!

Note that 日 is using the にち reading in both words, but in 日記, the reading changes to にっ because it comes before a “k” sound. This, as you’ll see, often happens to つ before k, t, s, or p sounds. (Let me know if I’m missing any!) But this is still the にち reading—it’s just a bit abbreviated.

So moving on, let’s use both of these words in one sentence:

“Daytime”

In a slight extension from “day,” 日 is also used to mean “daytime.” So the character can mean both a 24-hour day and just the part of the day when the Sun is out. Trust me, though—this isn’t nearly as complicated as it might sound.

Here’s one with a normal ol’ にち reading again:

Boy, this にち reading is pretty popular, it seems! So this time, we’ve got a kanji for daytime—日—and a kanji for nighttime—夜—placed together. This combination, most appropriately, refers to both daytime and nightime. True, 日, in its “24-hour day” meaning, kind of means the same thing, but when you use 日夜, you’re somewhat emphasizing “both day and night.” For example:

Now there’s a sentence that I can relate with.

“Sun”

日 also can refer to the Sun. Indeed, that’s what its shape is supposed to resemble, though I’ll admit that 日 looks little like that familiar furnace in the sky. (It used to look a bit different, though!)

Let’s look at another kanji compound:

Another straightforward combination: sun + light! And there’s our にち reading becoming にっ again too!

Here’s another great word that you’ll probably never forget. See if you can guess what it means?

Can you guess how to say “lunar eclipse”? Here’s a hint: the kanji that you need to put next to 食 appeared earlier in this lesson. The answer will be at the end of this article.

“Japan”

Remember when I said that 日 can also refer to Japan itself? Well, we’ve all heard the expression “Land of the Rising Sun,” right? That phrase originates with this kanji combination, which is how you write the country’s name in kanji:

This post is authored by Jonathan. Please check out his blog, Jonathan’s Japan(ese) Journal • ジョナサンの日本(語)日記, for more Japanese related articles.

As you’ve likely already lamented since before you began your Japanese studies, kanji are a bunch of symbols. Quite a far cry from our comparatively simple set of 26 letters, right? You need to know a lot of these if you want to read or write most Japanese material, so how in the world are you supposed to remember them? There are thousands of these things after all!

There are various methods for this—and I’d certainly like to hear what you have to say as well—but today I’d like to discuss the method that I’ve started using more consciously recently: mnemonics, words or sentences that you associate with characters.

In the past, I haven’t used mnemonics very much—not because I think that they aren’t beneficial or anything, but because they haven’t seemed particularly necessary for me until recently. I was able to memorize most kanji that I came across just by studying them and seeing them around Japan constantly. However, I’m exposed to kanji a lot less these days and I’ve recently found that mnemonics can be quite useful for making kanji that are fairly complex or aren’t so common stick in your mind a lot better.

Let me give you a few examples that I use to remember kanji that I might otherwise find difficult to remember:

滝
たき, meaning “waterfall”
“Water dragon”
In this kanji, the three-stroke radical on the left is something of an abbreviated form of 水 (みず) and means “water.” The radical on the right, 竜 (りゅう) means “dragon.” Well, what cooler thing is there to associate with waterfalls than dragons? I suppose they can look like dragons made of water if you use your imagination a bit, right? (To help drill it into your head, feel free to actually call waterfalls “water dragons” in English when you get the chance. Bonus points for annoying your friends and family.)

額
ひたい, meaning “forehead”
“When I heard that the next customer was a large shellfish, I slapped my forehead.”
Clearly a bit nonsensical, there is a method to the madness. This character is comprised of both 客 (きゃく), meaning “customer, guest,” and 頁 (おおがい), meaning “large shellfish.” (If you haven’t noticed yet, you’ll see 頁 as a part of kanji a lot.) As you can see, I was a bit limited with what I could work with, mnemonic-wise, but this sentence works pretty well for me. I’m sure I’d be tempted to slap my forehead if someone said something like that to me!

胞
ほう, meaning “placenta”
“Before birth, the placenta wraps around your body.”
This sentence isn’t even correct, according to my limited knowledge of how pregnancy works, but it was the first thing that I thought of when I was trying to think of an easy way to remember this character. 月 can refer to both the Moon and, as in this case, to the body; and 包 means “to wrap (around).” Personally, I’m willing to sacrifice some biological accuracy for the sake of remembering this character. (Unlike the “water dragon” thing, you might want to resist saying this sentence to people, though.)

蚕
かいこ, meaning “silkworm”
“Silkworms, the heavenly bug.”
天 means “heaven” and 虫 means “bug” or “insect.” Well, that’s pretty straightforward, right? Sometimes they just give them to you. Despite the simplistic nature of the character, I suspect that Japanese people would be impressed that you know it, as it’s not often seen, in my experience. And speaking of bugs …

虹
にじ, meaning “rainbow”
“Bug-engineered rainbows.”
For whatever reason, “rainbow” is made by slapping together 虫 (which I hope you’ve not forgotten already!) and 工 (こう), meaning “craft, construction.” My sentence is another bit of obvious insanity. These mnemonics get even more insane if you start letting your mind wander on them.

凍
こお（る）、こご（える）、トウ; meaning “to freeze”
“It’s frozen to the east.”
The two-stroke construction on the left means “ice” and 東 (ひがし; トウ) generally means “east.” Put the two together and you’ve got “freeze.” Straightforward, right? However, you might be wondering why “east” would be a part of this kanji. I certainly didn’t know either, but according to my sources, 東 can also hold the meaning of かさなる—that is, “piling up.” Oh ho! Thus, this kanji—凍—carries the image of ice piling up, which certainly sheds some light on things.

曽
そう (and a few others), roughly meaning “formerly, once, before”
“It’s already happened.”
This one actually comes from an experience with a Chinese friend to whom I sometimes turn for assistance or comments. I asked her to clarify what this kanji meant and, after some time trying to find the right phrasing, she simply said, “It’s already happened.” I, for some reason, found this explanation amusing and, thus, these words are now forever associated with the character in my head. Not all mnemonics need to be made-up nonsense, nor do they necessarily need to directly reflect the construction of the characters. Sometimes you can just draw from memorable conversations or experiences. These might be the best mnemonics of them all. Make the associations as natural as you can. The more you’re thinking about them, the less organic they’ll be.

Anyway, you get the gist of things by now, I’d imagine. If you use these sorts of mnemonics as you study, I’ll bet that you will find yourself able to remember characters that gave you a lot of trouble before or otherwise would give you a lot of grief.

Do you remember any of the kanji that I introduced above? “Bug-engineered rainbows”? “Water dragons”? “Frozen to the east”? Can you write these characters now? If so, then you might have found a good method for you to use!

If there are any mnemonics that you have thought of that you’d like to share, I’d like to see them. Feel free to share them in the comments.

This post is authored by Jonathan. Please check out his blog, Jonathan’s Japan(ese) Journal • ジョナサンの日本(語)日記, for more Japanese related articles.

For native English speakers, Japanese is not a particularly easy language to learn, nor is the kanji writing system an easy system to master. It takes a lot of time and effort, but don’t get discouraged. It takes Japanese folks years of study and experience to get it down as well, and you could argue about how “down” some of them actually have it, I’m sure. Many, if not most, native English speakers aren’t really as proficient as they could be in English, after all.

I’ll spare you a detailed history lesson, since Wikipedia can explain it far better than I, but in short, the kanji were imported from China into Japanese several centuries ago and incorporated into the Japanese language. This led to Japanese having two sets of readings for kanji: the kun’yomi (訓読み), which were derived from Japanese words that were applied to kanji of the same meaning; and the on’yomi (音読み), which are readings influenced by the original Chinese pronunciation of the character.

Individual kanji can, and often do, have multiple kun’yomi or on’yomi. As an example, check out how many readings there are for the character 行, which usually means “to go”:

On’yomi: コウ、ギョウ、アン
Kun’yomi: い（く）、 ゆ（く）、おこな（う）、くだり

Seven readings! And that doesn’t even include additional special readings for names!

“Okay, we get it,” you might say, exasperatedly. “The real question is, how the heck do I know which reading to use when I see these characters? How do I read this stuff?” Fortunately, there is a fairly straightforward method for this: the great majority of the time, you can expect that words that contain a single kanji will use a kun’yomi and that kanji compounds will use an on’yomi.

For example, the general Japanese word for “eat” is たべる. With the infusion of Chinese, the Japanese inserted 食 to the front of the word and it is now generally written as 食べる, though it can still be written as たべる. It’s the exact same word and is pronounced exactly the same–it’s simply written a bit differently. This is the kun’yomi. However, various Chinese compounds using 食 also entered the language: 食事, 定食, and 飲食, to name a few. In all of these terms, 食 is pronounced しょく (shoku), which is an on’yomi for that character.

Notice how all of the on’yomi terms are compound constructions (called 熟語—じゅくご—in Japanese)? That’s normally how things go, but this is in no way an absolute rule. In my experience, there are no fewer than two exceptions for every rule in Japanese, no matter how absolute it is said to be, and this is no different. Take 薬屋—read くすりや—for instance: this is a two-character term but it actually is read using the kun’yomi for each character. Generally, though, you can often count on two-kanji compounds taking the on’yomi reading.

So returning to 行, our kanji for “go” from a few paragraphs up, can you figure out which type of reading–the on’yomi or the kun’yomi–should be used for the following words? (Don’t worry about the readings themselves.)

1. 行く
2. 旅行
3. 行う
4. 行事
5. 現行犯
6. 行かない

There are no trick questions here. Maybe this is too easy? In any case, the answers are at the end of this article.

There’s still the matter of how to discern which kun’yomi or which on’yomi to use in situations of kanji with multiple readings of each, however.

This is generally easy with kun’yomi. The secret to discerning this is to use the okurigana–that is, the hiragana that follow the kanji in kun’yomi words.

Take 食, for instance. The most common kun’yomi for this character are たべる, くう, and くらう. When you write them with the kanji in front, they become 食べる, 食う, and 食らう, respectively, with the okurigana for each being the べる, う, and らう. As long as you are familiar with the readings that 食 has, you can pretty easily tell which word is which with a glance, right? If the okurigana are べる, then it must be read たべる! You just need to look past the kanji at the entire word before you can read it correctly.

In the case of on’yomi, things aren’t necessarily so simple because there are no obvious clues. Look at 行事, 行楽, 行脚, and 行方. These words are read ぎょうじ, こうらく, あんぎゃ, and an irregular ゆくえ. 行 is pronounced differently in each word. To be honest, when it comes to on’yomi, you just have to know the words in the question to a large extent. There are some patterns, though, and once you study enough, you’ll come to see them and be able to at least make very educated guesses for words you don’t know.

That’s where the time and effort comes in. Stick with it, though, and you will see results. If you have any tips to share, feel free to share them in the comments section.

Finally, the answers for the reading question involving 行 above: (1) kun’yomi; (2) on’yomi; (3) kun’yomi; (4) on’yomi; (5) on’yomi; (6) kun’yomi. How’d you do?

See you next time! がんばって！