Dealing with Kanji that has too many radicals

What is your personal tactic of dealing with Kanji that has too many radicals? Do you still go with the mnemonics given by Wanikani? Do you ignore one or two radicals in the Kanji to make remembering much easier?

Once I got into my level 20s, I realised that there are a lot of Kanjis that are made up of at least 4-5 radicals. It takes me very long to remember the meaning of a Kanji because of that. What I like to do is to take two or three radicals and join them together to create a bigger radical based on the visual appearance.

Iā€™ve been ignoring WaniKaniā€™s mnemonics entirely and using other sources for pretty much the entire duration and I still go through my levels in 8 days or so.

What I would suggest is writing kanji down on paper, see which ones you confuse between one another, and focus on the difference alone.

This way the crowding doesnā€™t matter as much and you can focus on one radical out of many as a quick check and that should be sufficient.

It helps to have a book that deals with the etymology of kanji or something along those lines that would not only help understand the differences, but also ascribe proper meaning (which in my experience, WaniKani manages to fuck up completely by making them almost arbitrary).

Itā€™s worked for me, I suggest you give it a try.

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That being said, another reason to learn how a kanji is written, the stroke order for it etc.
is because Iā€™ve personally been interested in how to read cursive Japanese.

The ability to take a scribble and make out which kanji it is absolutely requires knowing the stroke order.

I know itā€™s overkill for by far most, but I think itā€™s a very fun thing to be able to do. And learning how to write a kanji and not how to read one not only will help you remember the kanji more clearly and for longer, but will also be more than marginally useful in actuality.

If a kanji is crowded, I know for a fact my eyes glaze over it. Not an option when you write it.

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I donā€™t write them down and I ignore menmonics with more than 3 radicals.

I just brute force them and hope no very similar one comes alongšŸ˜‚

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I usually make up my own mnemonic or find one from a different source (ex. Kanjidamage or Remembering the Kanji) that contains fewer parts to remember, usually by virtue of combining some radicals together.

As a simple example, the kanji ę·· (to mix) could be thought of as ā€œtsunamiā€ + ā€œsunā€ + ā€œcompareā€ or ā€œtsunamiā€ + ā€œinsectā€ and the second option has fewer parts to remember. There are a few complicated kanji that donā€™t break down this nicely, but most do.

Another technique, though it doesnā€™t work as well with the Wanikani system, is to learn similar looking kanji together and focus on the differences.

For example, I was often mixing up ꕙ (teach) and ꕰ (digit / number) until I made an additional mnemonic for myself ā€œwe teach childrenā€ using the fact that ā€œteachā€ has the child radical in it at the bottom left. Yes, the upper left radical is also different (coffin vs rice), but neither of those really lent themselves to remembering the difference for me.

Of course, the downside of this is that you may later encounter another kanji which is also only slightly different, for example ꕦ (kanji not on Wanikani which according to jisho.org means ā€œindustry, kindlinessā€), but by then you maybe have mastered the first ones you were mixing up (or then you can come up with another mnemonic for what makes that one different).

EDIT: I say this technique does not work very well with Wanikani because it often means you have to use another tool look for similar looking kanji ahead of time and learn them out of the Wanikani order (though using a script like ā€œNiai visually similar kanjiā€ helps). Alternatively, you could just wait until one you confuse it with comes up naturally in Wanikani and then look for the difference and make a mnemonic.

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Yeah, I completely agree.

A slight flaw in the WaniKani system is that theyā€™ll introduce to you kanji that are very similar, but like wildly different levels apart.

So a mnemonic you learned in level 12 is suddenly neutralised by a kanji in level 35 that uses most of the same radicals.

Thatā€™s when you have to manually pick those similar kanjis out and focus your study on the differences between them. I wrote down a list on my notes app of all the ā€˜turkeyā€™ kanji I confuse, all the ā€˜geoduckā€™ kanji, all the ā€˜wolverine, under a roof, on a stoolā€™ kanji, etc.

Itā€™s only with the benefit of hindsight and further knowledge that you can tell which kanji are pretty unmistakeable, and which require you to pull out a mental jewellerā€™s magnifying glass to separate them.

Iā€™ve been ignoring 95% of WaniKaniā€™s mnemonics since level 20. Itā€™s better to tailor your mnemonics to your own mental associations.

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Sometimes Iā€™ll make up my own mnemonic that uses the phonetic/semantic components rather than the individual radicals, if I can spot them or Iā€™m on the desktop and able to use the userscript to point them out.

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I mean I kinda memorize them on a case-by-case basis, but Iā€™ve found that the more radicals they have, the more likely itā€™s got a group of radicals that has appeared in another kanji I know, and often kanji have the same reading as the ones itā€™s similar to if that makes any sense. So like almost every kanji with ē„Ø (read ć²ć‚‡ć†ļ¼‰in it is read ć²ć‚‡ć†. There are tons of examples and it doesnā€™t happen every time but it happens pretty often and itā€™s an easy mnemonic (at least for readings). Btw I use almost none of WaniKaniā€™s mnemonics. They just donā€™t work for me. I make up my own for almost all of them

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There arenā€™t that many kanji with more than three radicals are there? I only spotted two on level 29 where you are at present. A lot of the time Wanikani will give you new radicals based on kanji youā€™ve already learned.

I do still find a lot of the Wanikani mnemonics helpful when there are 4 or 5 radicals. 壊 comes up on your current level. I still have the mental image of hanging my clothes out in a net on a cross, and the kayak sending a wave of dirt breaking it. And I learned that one a long time ago.

Having said that, like many others if the Wanikani mnemonic doesnā€™t work for me I make up my own instead. Admittedly thatā€™s using the techniques and radicals Wanikani has taught me over the years.

There was a lot from Level 24 to Level 27. Iā€™m only on level 28 by the way.

What kanji has 5 or more radicals? Even 鬱 only has 3 thanks to the ā€œpsychopathā€ radical.

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This has also been a big problem for me. Would you recommend any resources in particular?

Oops! It looks like I know 1800 kanji but still canā€™t read basic numbersā€¦ :crazy_face: You can look forward to level 29 then!

I think the Keisei-script helps deal with kanji that WK break down too far in their mnemonics. Itā€™s a very helpful script!

Not only does this help me recognize the bigger radical units (less focus on the individual parts), but it also connects them to the correct onā€™yomi reading and how that relates to other kanji that looks similar.

Like I said, this is a very helpful script overall. :slight_smile:

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It really depends on what you call a radical? Hereā€™s an example with four or five ā€˜radicalsā€™ (or components, rather), even if some are repeated: ē–† (恍悇恆). Itā€™s probably not on WK, and itā€™s also probably not very common (in Japanese anyway; I learnt it in Chinese, and I havenā€™t seen it ā€˜in the wildā€™ in Japanese yet), but Iā€™m just raising it for the sake of discussion. Among common, everyday kanji, you might say that ꜝ is a combination of 2十, 1ę—„ and 1꜈, or simply of é¾ŗand ꜈. (To be honest, I have no idea what exactly é¾ŗmeans. Apparently it represents the sun in the midst of grass in ꜝ.)

Anywayā€¦

While learning Chinese while growing up, and even now, when I encounter new kanji, I look out for components that I already know as kanji (because those usually form bigger blocks). Thereafter, I remember the kanji based on the ā€˜sub-kanjiā€™ I recognise. The rest of my ā€˜strategyā€™ tends to involve knowing how to write kanji though, since that helps me remember the position of the components based on their order of appearance in the written form, and I tend to kinda just ā€˜makeā€™ myself remember the reading or the meaning (ideally both) based on something in the kanji, like how it looks.

As an exampleā€¦ OK, in order to remember ē«ˆ (ć‹ć¾ć©, which shouldnā€™t be on WK), I remembered that the bottom component is something like ā€™turtleā€™ (äŗ€, which used to be 龜 ā€“ I know some of the traditional kanji forms, which helps with stuff like this. Truth is though, the bottom component is actually 黽, which isnā€™t ā€˜turtleā€™ at all), then I noticed the 土 inside it, which means ā€˜earthā€™. That makes sense because ē«ˆ refers to a traditional wood/coal stove made of bricks/earth, or a hearth. I know that the thing at the top is basically a small ē©“: you could say thatā€™s the ā€˜cave/holeā€™ radical, which makes sense as well because you need a hole in the wall to put firewood in. Weird stuff like that. I donā€™t come up with all this consciously. Some components just seem more obvious/sensible, and I use them to help me.

I think the original mnemonic for ꎃ used to contain four components: wolverine + cloth + hand + 冖 (IDK what WK calls it, and I canā€™t name it in Chinese either). That comes pretty close to five ā€˜radicalsā€™, and is probably an excessive breakdown, even if itā€™s not hugely problematic since the components are relatively simple. I canā€™t think of any kanji with more than four components that might appear on WK though, aside from 鬱, which youā€™ve already mentioned.

Hereā€™s to hoping that @cringe knows of some in English, because everything Iā€™m aware of is written in Chinese or Japanese. I mean, popular kanji courses outside of WK like ā€˜Remembering the Kanjiā€™, ā€˜The Kodansha Kanji Learnerā€™s Courseā€™ or ā€˜Essential Kanjiā€™ generally have at least a bit of etymology in them, but not all of it is accurate or serious, since some of it is just there for the sake of helping people remember. The one resource I do know of is http://www.visualkanji.com. Not sure how good it is though, regardless of the authorā€™s credentials, because I donā€™t know if sheā€™s an etymology specialist. Another option would be to look at Kayo-sensei (aka @Kayoshodo) on Twitter, because she occasionally posts stuff about kanji origins, in addition to lists of common words and writing tips. Sheā€™s a Japanese calligrapher, but she posts in English. I donā€™t always agree with whatā€™s said by these sources about etymology, but as Kayo-sensei says, there are multiple theories, and since most of my theories come from Chinese sourcesā€¦ well, perhaps some disagreement is to be expected.

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Thank you, for these recommendations. None of them seem to go into the level of detail desired, but Kayo-senseiā€™s calligraphy content is very interesting to me.

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Thereā€™s ę»…. I believe thereā€™s a few more, although not so many. I donā€™t recall any 6-radical kanji.

Hmā€¦ Well, NHK does have the JapanEasy II series, which covers a few kanji along with originsā€¦ Iā€™m not sure how detailed they are though.

OK, after some digging, I found this: Bu Senseiā€™s Kanji Dojo, which is a part of the JapanEasy series. I think Bret Mayer does a good job of explaining all this stuff, even if, again, I donā€™t really subscribe to 100% of the explanations. For example, åæ is explained as ā€˜sharpening the mindā€™ i.e. gaining patience, because 刃 represents a sharpened blade. Thereā€™s a link made to Japanese blade-smiths and the time and effort that goes into their craft. I mean, all well and good, but all this is just ā€˜Japanifiyingā€™ the origins, since almost all kanji are from China (恓恏恘 aside, of course). Chinese sources ā€“ including my late grandfather, who taught himself to write and learnt Mandarin even though he was a Teochew native speaker ā€“ all tell me that åæ represents a sharp blade stabbing/cutting into the heart as one endures the pain. Thatā€™s why it means ā€˜to tolerate, to bear withā€™. In other words, to me, the explanation given by the NHK programme is wrong, even if itā€™s a possible explanation. Chinese legends tend to celebrate a blade itself along with its wielder anyway, and I havenā€™t really heard blacksmiths being celebrated in Chinese tradition the way they are in Japan, so I think itā€™s really unlikely that the meaning is related to ā€˜sharpeningā€™.

Still, I canā€™t deny that the explanations are memorable, so it might be worthwhile to take a look at them. Plus, some of the information is very accurate. The explanation for ę­©, for instance, is truly excellent, especially since the Oracle Bone script version is carefully explained. I donā€™t think there are many people learning kanji as adults who know that ę­¢ is a picture of a foot. Most native speakers probably donā€™t know either. I may not buy everything thatā€™s said, but itā€™s a good programme nonetheless. :slight_smile:

I thought of ęŖ» (恊悊), which is a kanji I came across thanks to an anime and which would probably be split into four components. I donā€™t think itā€™s on WK though. Anything containing the right-hand side of ęŖ» would probably count though. I came across another enormous kanji earlier while looking for examples of kanji with lots of components (ēˆØ), which apparently is another kanji for ē‚Šćļ¼ˆć‹ć—恐ļ¼‰ā€“ to boil/cook ā€“ but I figured thereā€™s no way itā€™s on WK because itā€™s too rare.

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Thank you once again! I really enjoy seeing and understanding the character in its original form and how it gets altered in time. Really helps with memorization. Thank you for doing the digging and supplying this for me ćƒ½(^o^)äøæ

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If youā€™re looking for a good book with etymology, I would recommend Henshallā€™s ā€œA Guide to Remembering Japanese Characters.ā€

Here is a picture of one of the pages so you can get an idea:

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