Many people who mother tongue isn’t Chinese think it is very difficult to learn Chinese, but I do not think so. I think everybody can learn Chinese easy. Maybe you don’t find effective methods of learning Chinese.

In fact Chinese characters are most difficult to learn compared with pronouncing of Chinese language. As a means of visual communication, Chinese characters are fascinating in their ingenuity and originality. The earliest form of Chinese characters was pictographic - stylized pictures of objects.

Graphic symbols supplemented pictographs to represent simple abstract thoughts. Later, for transmitting complex ideas, ideographs were created from already existing simple Chinese characters, conveying ideas by the juxtaposition of interchangeable elements.

To meet the demand for thousands of new characters, the Chinese resorted to phonetic or harmonic writing, relying on the radical for the sense and the phonetic for the sound.

Today, many complex Chinese characters have undergone simplification to facilitate writing by reducing the number of strokes.

Chinese characters are generally built up from 214 root characters or radical elements. These comprise the basic building blocks for innumerable compound characters. Some of these radicals or primitives are capable of standing independently as characters. Others function as components of compound characters. In combination, they assume variant or contracted forms. By understanding the basic meanings of the elements that form a Chinese character, it is possible to discern the significance of the whole character. Hence, it is importance to learn the radicals.

I will introduce systematically the more commonly used radical elements and the compounds they build up through interesting pictures, together with related or associated Chinese characters. I will introduce this simple, effective and interesting method to learn Chinese characters in the future. As a mnemonic aid, it analyses each character, tracing its evolutionary development from the original seal character to the regular and simplified forms.

Wish everybody can learn Chinese easy and like Learn Chinese Website!

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