Learning How To Write Hanzi Through Self-Study

[Glenn]

Well, Hoffman's case is a bit different than yours, chinopinyin. He already knows a lot about hanzi and a lot of them and he know Cantonese and Mandarin. If you're just starting out it may take writing the basic ones 5 times to get a feel for them, but as you go on you'll get better at recognizing parts and you'll have a character vocabulary to build off of. That's why learning about the characters (how they're constructed and how they function) and learning to break them down is helpful. By doing that you'll be able to internalize new characters much more easily, so you can get to the point where writing a character more than once or twice is more to help you write it well than it is to learn/remember it.

Incidentally, I just came across 玥, saw that it refers to a supernatural pearl in legends of old, and I'm pretty good with its reading and writing for the time being (I haven't written it once). I don't know how long it will stay there, though, because it's really rare from what I can tell and I doubt I'll have much occasion to use it, or even see it, but it's obviously 玉 (jewel, abbreviated to 王) and 月 (moon), and 月 is the phonetic in this case, and the reading of 玥 just happens to be exactly the same as the reading for 月: yuè. So, it's two parts that can be easily committed to memory (should you see fit) because they make sense: a jewel read yuè, which was a supernatural pearl in legends of old. See the link here, if you wish: 玥 on 百度 (mostly Chinese, but with English glosses).

[Xuesheng123]

Does a character stick in your memory by writing it less than 5 times (if you examine it thoroughly)? Really?

It's all about how you concentrate while writing the character. The harder you work your brain when you try to remember something, and the longer you hold that focus, the more you can get past your 30 second short term memory and into your infinitely large long term memory.

[Altair]

I think that everyone eventually makes use of more or less the same strategies in learning characters, even native speakers. We all use some drilling, some mnemonics, and some exposure in context. Where we differ radically is in the precise tools and methods we use, and especially in the relative emphasis we give to the various strategies. What works best for a given person has to do with their learning context, their learning style, their learning goals, and the phase of learning they happen to be in. Of paramount importance is remaining motivated.

My main strategy is the use of mnemonics based as often as possible on the actual etymology of the characters. If the actual history is not at all helpful as a mnemonic, I try to create one that at least is not to far away in spirit, since this often helps in understanding why certain phonetics are chosen for other characters. Currently, my main sources are Wenlin, www.zhongwen.com, www.chineseetymology.org, and my own brain. Although there are many characters that have more or less useless etymologies (e.g., 今），I have found that most etymologies are useful as long as I am creative and flexible.

I do not ask the etymologies to do everything, but focus on whatever I find difficult about learning a character. Most often what I find difficult is remembering how to start the distinctive part of the character when I write it. If this is the case, I focus on the part of the etymology that will come most readily to mind and embellish the story to cement the connection.

Sometimes, there are particular details of a character that are hard to recall. In this case, I focus specifically on the logic that explains the particular strokes.

If the memory issue has to do with sound or the tone, I will include something in the mnemonic to remind me of these.

I virtually never write out a character by hand, but will frequently trace it in the air with my finger.

I find that using this strategy means that I usually do not learn characters singly, but rather in families. I have to learn all the components and sometimes have to consider related characters with different radicals. I ignore the pronunciation of characters or components that are obsolete or unlikely to be useful even for an accomplished learner; however, I find that all the different connections help my recall. It also helps to be coninuously reminded of previously learned characters and to "drill" them in a more interesting way than using only flashcards or SRS systems. Recalling one character helps to recall the entire character family.

Often characters have changed meaning over the years; however, often the old meanings either remain viable or else remain relevant for other characters that retain a more ancient form.

I find that even simplified characters are rarely completely arbitrary, but usually have some aspect of meaning or visual similarity that still make knowing something of the etymology relevant or useful. Often, I have been able to reconcile what seemed like unrelated meanings, by understanding the etymology.

Examples:

京 (jing1) represents a tall (高）building in the capital with columns in the front; but 景 (jing3) represents the sun that illuminates the entire scene in the capital. 影 represents the traces (彡） of shadows that the sun casts.

亦 (yi4) might represent a person with one side emphasized and then again the other side. 夜 (ye4) might represent a person lying on his or her side at night with the moon shining down (tucked under one arm). 液 (ye4) is the liquid that flows from the underarms when you are hot and sweaty. 腋 (ye4)represents the armpits from which the sweat flows.

然 (ran2) is a puzzling etymology, until you find out about 燃 (ran2). One way to remember them is to think that burnt dog meat is just so so, but carefully roasted dog meat is a delicacy for some. The real story is that 然 was probably originally used for both meanings, but that 火 was later added when the meaning of "roast" became less clear. Such reclarification by adding a character is quite common.

般 (ban1) makes little sense, unless you think of it as the original form of 搬 (move/transport). This latter character is most likely a reclarification, where the hand radical has been added to a picture of a boat being paddled by hand to transport goods by river. Once this connections is made, it is easy to make up an appropriate mnemonic for 般, such as "to move (搬) to a high-class neighborhood, you need to paddle (殳）over your furniture with your yacht/boat (舟）." Another possible mnemonic might be: "All sorts of goods were moved (搬) up and down the rivers of China.

假 (jia3/jia4) has some unusual shapes to remember. Using the etymology, you can learn that 叚 (false/borrowed) and 皮 were originally the same character, except that the former has two additional strokes on the picture of the skin (You could think of it as a chicken drumstick to help remember the shape). The right side could be a hand holding a scraper. 叚 is simply "two skins." 假 is then simply a person who borrows a second skin 皮 to present a false face to the world. If 皮 is itself a problem, just see it as a hand (又） plucking a hair from the animal skin (皮) to make it smooth.

冠 (guan1/guan4) could represent the cap given (寸）to adolescent boys in China to symbolize there completion (完）of all steps necessary to reach adulthood, but you have to remember that it is actually a hat (冖), rather than a (宀), that is placed on the head (元). 完 （wan2) could help suggest the sound /guan/; however, how to remember that this word has two tones with slightly different meanings? I think of capping/crowning as involving placing the cap from high to low, which implies fourth tone /guan4/; whereas when you already have a cap on, you want to keep it straight and level, which implies first tone /guan1/.

Sometimes I make use of the fact that a phonetic probably used to begin with a consonant cluster. For instance, I do not think of 各 as being /ke/ or 僉 as /qian/, but rather as something like /kle/ and /qlian/. I also recognize that an intial k, g, x, h, and y may often share the same origin and that e, o, ve, and uo are often allophones. Knowing these facts helps memorize characters such as:

客 (ke4): A guest/stranger goes hesitantly (夂）from house to house asking to be fed (口） and for shelter (宀）.

络 (luo4): Its stop and start (夂）to build a network of acquaintances.

略 (lve4): To survey the outline of farm fields (田）, you have to walk around the boundaries, stopping and starting (夂）, and yelling orders (口） to the survey team.

落 （luo4): Grassy willow leaves (艹） fall into the Luo River (洛).

僉/佥 （qian1): Many people (人） discussing (口） so that they all can reach a unanimous conclusion.

脸 (lian3): A teenage girl wants to get her face all together (佥) before going out to party.

捡 (jian3): To pick up dropped coins, you will want to gather them all (佥) into one hand.

验 (yan4)： They say never to look a gift horse in the mouth, but I think you should test all aspects before riding it if you don't want to be thrown.

This method works for me. I study Chinese as a hobby and don't want to turn it into drudgery. It might not work for many, especially at the beginning of study when learning a whole family of characters seems more daunting then just one. I do not think it is a magic system and probably requires almost as much time as any other strategy, since it takes time to research etymologies and to think up good etymologies. I just find it more fun and more enriching than simply drilling isolated characters. If you happen to read a lot by computer, it can, however, be quite convenient as you quickly see etymologies through Wenlin or paste characters on online sites with appropriate etymologies. It is certainly quicker than stopping to write a character out by hand twenty times.