For example ik 訃 means something like report of someone’s death but it’s difficult for me to know that it translates to obituary cause I have never heard that word in English. For context I’m about ~300 or so kanji into RTK doing 25 a day.
Kanji do not really have translations. They do have general meanings associated with them, yes, but it’s the words which really have meaning. So don’t worry if you don’t understand a kanji’s meaning, just make sure you learn the words.
Kanji aren’t words, there is no translation. If it’s not part of a vocab word you’re learning, it’s not really all that relevant
Fwiw this is not a joyo kanji or even a hyougai one, it’s not even on the N1 study list, and there are zero words listed as in common use that use it, at least in takoboto that I use
You need to look these things up in a dictionary. Either online or on a phone, with either drawing input or by inputting radicals or components
Speaking honestly, general meaning won’t help you much with content understanding, at best you will have only some rough guesses. But such approach can help you a lot with learning kanji itself and also a bit with vocabulary, because a lot of words have something related to such meanings. Also it’s probably the best method to learn when people are going to write kanji by hand. There is a big difference between being able to recognize kanji in context and being able to reproduce each kanji stroke.
It’s useful to know the general meanings of individual characters, but as most people will tell you here, the important thing to learn is *words*. Characters aren’t words on their own and their meanings are kind of approximate. They are symbols that mainly represent two things: words from the native Japanese language (“kun yomi”), which existed long before anyone matched them up with a Chinese character and *do* have a precise meaning, and sounds from Classical Chinese (“on yomi”) that represent roots or “meaning building blocks” that aren’t usually words on their own but can be assembled into compound words, just like Latin and Greek roots in English. Those have at least general meanings, but the words they make aren’t always completely transparent. Why should “student” be 学生 (“learn” plus “born”) and not something like school-person or learn-ist or whatever? There are reasons going back through the history of China, Japan, and Korea, but all you really need to know is that 学生 means “student”, it’s a Chinese-Japanese word, and it’s pronounced “gakusei”.
Direct translation, no. There is rarely one to one correspondence anyway.
Instead of an English word you might associate it with a feeling, taste, image, or concept if that makes it easier for you.
When it comes to vocab there might be subtle differences that don’t translate well – e.g. a word can have negative or positive connotations or be more formal/casual or be considered a but old fashioned, etc.
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Kanji do not really have translations. They do have general meanings associated with them, yes, but it’s the words which really have meaning. So don’t worry if you don’t understand a kanji’s meaning, just make sure you learn the words.
Kanji aren’t words, there is no translation. If it’s not part of a vocab word you’re learning, it’s not really all that relevant
Fwiw this is not a joyo kanji or even a hyougai one, it’s not even on the N1 study list, and there are zero words listed as in common use that use it, at least in takoboto that I use
You need to look these things up in a dictionary. Either online or on a phone, with either drawing input or by inputting radicals or components
Speaking honestly, general meaning won’t help you much with content understanding, at best you will have only some rough guesses. But such approach can help you a lot with learning kanji itself and also a bit with vocabulary, because a lot of words have something related to such meanings. Also it’s probably the best method to learn when people are going to write kanji by hand. There is a big difference between being able to recognize kanji in context and being able to reproduce each kanji stroke.
It’s useful to know the general meanings of individual characters, but as most people will tell you here, the important thing to learn is *words*. Characters aren’t words on their own and their meanings are kind of approximate. They are symbols that mainly represent two things: words from the native Japanese language (“kun yomi”), which existed long before anyone matched them up with a Chinese character and *do* have a precise meaning, and sounds from Classical Chinese (“on yomi”) that represent roots or “meaning building blocks” that aren’t usually words on their own but can be assembled into compound words, just like Latin and Greek roots in English. Those have at least general meanings, but the words they make aren’t always completely transparent. Why should “student” be 学生 (“learn” plus “born”) and not something like school-person or learn-ist or whatever? There are reasons going back through the history of China, Japan, and Korea, but all you really need to know is that 学生 means “student”, it’s a Chinese-Japanese word, and it’s pronounced “gakusei”.
Direct translation, no. There is rarely one to one correspondence anyway.
Instead of an English word you might associate it with a feeling, taste, image, or concept if that makes it easier for you.
When it comes to vocab there might be subtle differences that don’t translate well – e.g. a word can have negative or positive connotations or be more formal/casual or be considered a but old fashioned, etc.