Learning Your Kanji Radicals (7-8 Strokes)

LEARNING YOUR KANJI RADICALS
(7-8 STROKES)

“I can’t understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I’m frightened of the old ones.” – John Cage

As you can see, we’re starting to combine radical sets, which means we’re reaching the end. After this, it’s 9+ radicals, and after that… well, then you get to start the “fun” part, so to speak.

Remember, when you’re going through these radicals do what you can to not think of them like bundles of strokes. Think of these radicals as bigger pieces put together. The bigger the pieces are, the less you have to remember.

Let’s go!

7-Stroke Radicals

Servant: Do you see the Giant radical in there? This giant has chains going from his arms to his body, making him the servant of of a king. What a sad looking giant.

See: When an eye has legs, it can see anything.

Say: See all that paper on top of the mouth? She wrote everything down that she wanted to say to him, taking four whole pages.

Fish Leg House: This house sells fish legs, which is why there is a fish legs sign on top of this fish legs house.

Bean: There’s a bean on the stand, though the bean is covered with dirt.

Hog: You’ll have to learn this one straight-up. There are some hints of hoginess in here (like a similar version of the animal radical), but it’ll probably simpler to just learn it a few pieces at a time.

Clam: The eye has fish legs. Just imagine a clam running around on fish legs, with one giant eye looking around.

Red: The grave started floating away using four magical tentacles (below the grave). As it flew away, it turns bright red.

Leg: Very similar to running man, but this time running man has a head. His head is so big that it’s putting lots of stress on his legs.

Car: There are crosses on either side of the rice field,  where two car accidents took place.

Bitter: Notice the radicals for stand and 10? After she was stood up 10 times by him, she began to become bitter.

Underground Clothes: The clothes (clothes radical) are in the cliff under the ground (i.e. the one radical).

Rice Slide: You remember the rice radical, right? This is the same, but now it has a slide on it. The rice slide is where they send all the rice to go into the truck (or another container).

Empty Rice Field: This rice field is like a grave – nothing growing, and everything is dead, making it an empty rice field.

8-Stroke Kanji Radicals

Gold: In there you can see the King radical. There is a roof over a king‘s head, and gold in his pockets (the two bits in the bottom half of the King radical).

Leader: The bottom half is the clothes radical, and you can imagine the top half being a nicely combed set of hair, folded over from the left. Someone who has nice clothes and combed hair is a good leader.

Gate: This gate is made up of two posts with suns attached to the inside. This must be the gate to heaven.

Emperor: With the important person radical on the left, and an expanded king radical (with a little fancy hat on), we have something richer and more important than a king. We have an Emperor!

Rain: If you think of the upside down box as a cloud that’s open in the bottom, and the “T” shape as a pin poking the cloud open to rain, then you have a pretty strong argument for the rain radical.

Blue: You have moon at the bottom, and the three radical and stick radical on top. “You find three sticks once in a blue moon (normally you only find two).”

Alleyway: See the narrow alleyway with buildings drawn in on the sides?

Mountain Horns: Don’t ask what a mountain horn is (just imagine a mountain with two large horns sticking out of the ground at the top. The Mountain horns are stored inside an upside down box.

Excuse: The sideways sun is running away on it’s legs. You’re trying to catch it in an enclosure, but it’s too small. There’s no excuse for this mistake.

Equal: The figure standing on top of the moon is there to become equal with the sky.

Before You Move On:

9+ Stroke Kanji Radicals →