Learn the radical for "human leg," 儿
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| Hi everyone. |
| Welcome to the Japanese Kanji video series. |
| In this lesson, you'll learn the "human legs" radical. |
| Take a look at these kanji characters. Can you guess what they mean? |
| 元、光、見 |
| (pause for 4 seconds) |
| By the end of this lesson, you'll be able to grasp the meaning behind these kanji characters. |
| First off, can you spot the radical that's common in all of these kanji characters? |
| (pause for 4 seconds) |
| It's this part here. It looks like a pair of legs. |
| 儿 |
| This particular radical is called... |
| にんにょう or ひとあし |
| It's the "human legs" radical and it's used in some of the most common of all kanji. Let's take a look at it in more detail. |
| Meaning |
| In some of the previous lessons, you learned that some radicals are kanji characters on their own. |
| This is the first radical we've encountered that *isn't* a kanji character in itself. This basically means that you'll only encounter it as a component in *other* kanji characters. |
| The meaning behind *this* particular radical, is "legs," particularly those of a person. |
| Unlike the previous radicals that we've learned, the meaning of the "human legs" radical is less literal. It generally alludes *more* to the sense of structural support that our legs provide us with. |
| From left to right, the first kanji means "origin" or "foundation," the second means "light" or "to shine," and the third character means "to see." |
| If you think of these kanji characters from the viewpoint of "support," the meaning of each character makes much more sense. |
| The first kanji has the "human legs" radical at the bottom, which is connected to a wide horizontal line, with a smaller, parallel horizontal line on top. The wide horizontal line represents the body, and the smaller horizontal line represents the head. Notice how the legs are connected and are *supporting* the body. |
| The legs that are supporting the body and head, represent the "foundation" or "basis," which is the meaning of this kanji character. |
| The second kanji has the legs on the bottom once again, with what appears to be a fire burning on top. Fire evokes "light," so the meaning of this kanji is "light." And the *foundation* or *origin* of the emitting rays, refers to the point source. Light emanating from a source means that it's "shining," so this kanji can also mean "to shine." |
| The final kanji has "human legs" on the bottom, supporting the character for "eye." An eye that is *mobile* is one that can see. So this kanji character means "to see." |
| Common positions |
| The "human legs" radical will *always* be at the bottom position where it's supporting something. |
| Just remember where your legs are on your body and you won't forget it! |
| *Where* are your legs? |
| On the bottom! |
| Okay. Now let's learn how to write this radical. |
| Stroke Order |
| The "human legs" radical only has two strokes. |
| The first stroke, starts near the center and curves from right to the bottom left. |
| The second stroke, also starts near the center, but it goes straight down, and then flattens out at the floor, only to flick upwards slightly. |
| The beginning of each stroke usually connects to another radical, so keep that in mind. |
| And that's it! You're done! |
| Common Readings |
| The "human legs" radical isn't a kanji on its own, so you'll only see it as a *part* of another kanji. |
| In the case of the original examples, common readings are... |
| ゲン、もと |
| for the "origin" or "foundation" kanji 元. |
| コウ、ひかり |
| for the kanji meaning "to shine" 光. And... |
| ケン、み |
| for the kanji meaning "to see" 見. |
| Lesson Review |
| In this lesson, you learned about the "human legs" radical. |
| The idea behind the "human legs" radical, is "support." |
| This radical isn't a kanji character on its own, so you'll only see it in other kanji characters, such as the "foundation," "shine," and "see" kanji characters that you learned in this lesson. |
| You'll always find this radical in the bottom position. |
| And it's written with two vertical strokes, one curved stroke, and one that flattens out and flicks upwards slightly. |
| In the next lesson, you'll learn about another common radical used in some of the most common and basic kanji characters, the "ten" radical. |
| See you in the next lesson. Bye! |
| Bye~! |
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