Kanji

9 comments

1. no, don’t memorize readings. memorize words. as you pick up vocabulary, learn the kanji spellings for the words. but kanji on their own are not words, don’t have a purpose in the language. at no point do you ever “decide how to pronounce a kanji character”, you only ever “read words”. common misconception. so just learn words as you go, organically, and as you learn them, also learn their proper kanji spellings. do absolutely learn proper stroke order for kanji characters, and i do recommend learning the names and meanings of the radicals that make up kanji, but they won’t substitute for memorizing vocab, they just provide a framework for better being able to distinguish and remember characters in the future.

2. Heisig (Remembering the Kanji) is a waste of time. Get a grasp of basic grammar, then when you get to a point where you feel comfortable with basic sentence structure (around the time you finish your intro text(s)), think about starting Kodansha Kanji Learner’s Course or Kanji In Context (I used the latter, but KKLC starts lower and goes higher). Learn vocabulary, not individual readings, and do so with context. Kanji and vocabular build off of each other, so you should think in terms of learning them together.

3. https://youtu.be/TgRte6oSoF8

4. I personally use Kanji Study(an app) where I tend to look at words that share a specific kanji. It gives me the general understanding of how the kanji is typically pronounced as well a loose understanding of its meaning. It also teaches stroke order, has the meaning for the words and can directly add them to anki.

5. Wani kani is an amazing service and 100% worth the money

6. You do realize they teach you all of the readings in “Remembering the Kanji 2”, right?

7. RTK is a goddamned cult.

   Steer clear of that shit. Use some good proper textbooks (not reference books) to get you through the basics. Kanji will come along with it, bit by bit, as you go. When you’ve finally got enough familiarity with the basics and a context for understanding how the language and the writing system work together then the task of learning kanji becomes much less daunting.

   Why everybody is in a rush or thinks they have to “learn” 2000 kanji right away is a mystery to me. Especially since you’re not *learning* them with that RTK nonsense anyway.

8. >Where do I learn the readings from and should I learn all the readings?

   If you are very, very, very, intellectually interested, after you become a super advanced learner, then, you may want to choose to buy some 漢和辞典 kanwa-jiten, dictionaries to check *some* kanji (etymology, etc.) to satisfy your intellectual curiosity.

   Since 漢文 kanbun, eh, classical Chinese texts (punctuated, analyzed, to be translated into some kind of classical Japanese developed to kinda sorta read classical Chinese texts, in Japan, thus, 漢文 kanbun is a part of Japanese language) are learned in high schools in Japan, some students are intellectually very much interested, love the subject and buy 漢和辞典 kanwa-jiten. But I would say vast majority of Japanese people do not use 漢和辞典 kanwa-jiten, eh, at least not every day. Even if you have one, probably 99.9% of ordinary Japanese users may check some kanji, once in months or something.

   That is like you are interested in etymology, Latin, Greek, etc.

   There is absolutely nothing wrong about the intellectual curiosity, so, you CAN check some kanji…

   You will see then one kanji can have multiple *single kanji on-yomi* (音読み), such as 古音 ko’on, 呉音 go’on, 漢音 kan’non, 唐音 to’on, 慣用音 kanyo’on, whatever they mean :D.

   You will then see nobody tries to memorize all the readings of a kanji in Japan, it is not just unnecessarily but probably impossible.

9. You can also always use jisho.org