I am also learning Chinese and the dictionary app Pleco has been amazing due in large part to being able to see the exact meaning of each part of the word.
An example of what I’m meaning is in Japanese the name for ‘seahorse’ is 竜の落とし子, but dictionaries won’t tell you its name is literally ‘dragon’s illegitimate child.’ The same with ‘glove’ being ‘hand-bag.’
This is true for other languages as well, such as German, where ‘glove’ is ‘hand-shoe,’ but since those are English cognates an English learner will pick it up immediately.
Does anyone know of any dictionary for Japanese where you can break down words like this?
by mcholman1254