There aren’t even “official” radicals period. Kangxi is the most common convention these days but it’s hardly the only one, and Japan, China, and the rest of the Sino-sphere don’t all use 100% the same. Radicals in the first place were simply arbitrarily picked to organize characters in paper dictionaries, and in fact have changed over time. The Kangxi dictionary wasn’t even done until the late 1600s. The Shuowen Jiezi which is the first known usage of radicals, predates it by ~1500 years. And yet still not the oldest character dictionary.
Not to mention, in Japanese some radicals have specific names, and some (most) don’t, all versions of the hand radical are just called 手偏 while 氵is literally called 三水
Totally agree. While it is important to use the best tools, sometimes people get too much into nitpicking as a way to avoid doing the work (myself included).
Everything becomes so much easier after you give it a try.
And the names do in fact vary based on where and which language you’re looking it. Don’t try to be an expert about something you aren’t. Just because you haven’t seen differences doesn’t mean there aren’t any.
You’re also failing to understand what a 部首 is in the first place and how WK may use the English word “radical” but these are not actual radicals as any given Kanji only has one single radical. But since all non-Chinese discussion is just fake garbage, I will explain it to you in the only way possible: 根据汉字形体结构，把具有同一部件的字归为一部，把这一部字中的共同部件列在全部之首，就叫部首。如“江、河、湖、海、流”等字都有同一部件“氵”，这些字就归为氵部，“氵”就是该部的部首。
手 is hand, that is not. If you’re getting frustrated over that, there are MANY different kanji that look closer together than 手 does to 扌 , the more you resist, the more you’re going to sink. Train your eye.
Actually (i don’t know if have read it) this is not a problem anymore since i use the synonymous feature. And again, my point was that i think it is way better in this case to learn 扌as hand.
I was just exaggerating (trying to be humoristic), if you read my posts i was being polite and declaring just my opinion all the time.
Gotcha. Anyway, I’m gonna agree with those who say that “hand” is already a radical (手) and WK is seeking to lower confusion by not having 扌be a modified form of that and letting it be its own thing. Also the mnemonics from “nailbat” are just colorful and easy to remember for me, personally.
Maybe I’m overstepping here and misreading, but a few of your other posts have me wondering… Do you know what a mnemonic is? It’s not the names WK gives radicals. It just means a memory aid. Is it the WK specific mnemonics you don’t like?
We’re considering doing some revisions to radicals and further incorporating the kangxi names, but that’s a decision ultimately up to Kristen. In the mean time, as others have already suggested, using the synonym feature is a perfectly acceptable way to use whichever names you’d like for a given radical. We have zero issue with that, they just obviously don’t have any mnemonic support when you do it that way.
That said, I think everyone’s stated their opinion already. Since this thread was brought back from the grave anyway, I’m ruling that it’s served its purpose and is getting closed. If you’d like to further discuss radicals, you can start a new thread in the appropriate sub-forum. Threads started just for the sake of arguing, however, will also be closed.