Kanji Mnemonic Free Resource

Japanese
#1

Does anyone have any free resource tips for learning the mnemonic of kanji? I’m currently trying to learn the N1 Kanji (although need to relearn/refresh N2 kanji as well). I tried using ChatGPT and the results are ghastly. For instance:

  1. 揺らぐ（ゆらぐ）– "To tremble / To sway / To wobble / To waver"
  • Mnemonic:
    A hand (扌) rocking a child in a crib (𢇇 / right part that resembles a wobbling thing) → “something that sways or wobbles”

The second Kanji 𢇇 is not similar at all to the original. This has happened with other kanji too.

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#2

Hi. You could try https://kanji.koohii.com. You have to register (it’s free) but then there are a lot of mnemonics written by the community for each kanji. For example: Sign In - Kanji Koohii

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#3

You can use (without any subscription for all of these websites) the mnemonics from Wanikani (they also have mnemonics for some vocabulary words)
Or from JPDB or Marumori but they have fewer mnemonics.

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#4

This is absolutely not a job for AI. :cold_face: It can’t count the number of “r”’s in strawberry. Asking it for a detailed breakdown of kanji radicals is a very similar thing. It wasn’t trained or built to be able to break things down that far. It views things as entire words, or sometimes as individual kanji if you specifically enumerate them, but even that is rare.

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#5

There are some good suggestions for readymade mnemonics already so I’ll mention another option. If you’re at the point of studying N1 level materials then I would suggest leveraging your existing knowledge. You could do this by simply making your own mnemonics for kanji that you feel need them, or you could check the actual origin/make-up of the kanji using a source like 漢字知識 and referring to the 成り立ち section of a kanji. Probably you’re already familiar with most kanji components (if not all) by this stage, so there will be many cases where you can use the real formation of the kanji as a mnemonic instead of relying on fake or dubious components and formations, which learner resources tend to use quite heavily as a necessary evil.

A good middle ground could be to download one of the many Anki decks that has readymade mnemonics and then replace them with your own ones whenever you feel they aren’t working for you. Good luck and enjoy!

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#6

If you’re in for actual learning the actual evolution of the characters, check out

Character decomposition 字形分解 [?]:
Compound 摇 from hand-left 扌 shǒu and phonetic container 䍃 yáo simp 搖.

Character decomposition 字形分解 [?]:
Compound 䍃 from container 缶 fǒu and (rem- 爫 zhuǎ) from phonetic ribs 肉 ròu. (name- container 䍃 yáo)

Decomposition notes 字形分解说明 [?]:
(- in Japanese kanji, 爫 frequently means meat)

Kenneth Henshall’s kanji mnemonics
Used copies are pretty cheap, $5 bucks.
https://www.amazon.com/Guide-Remembering-Japanese-Characters/dp/0804815321

Shirakawa Shizuka, Kanji Etymology

#7

Wanikani is known for its pretty good mnemonic approach to kanji learning, you can access the description and mnemonic of every kanji without even creating an account: https://www.wanikani.com/kanji/. The downside is that their mnemonics heavily rely on their own way of breaking down kanji to radicals, and they apparently don’t use standard radicals. So you may need to study their radicals first if you feel like their mnemonic don’t make any sense.

#8

I like Etymological Dictionary of Han Chinese Characters by Howell (as a searchable pdf).
It focuses on Japanese, and highlights numerous differences from Chinese.
I also find it at the same time both more readable and more detailed than 漢字知識 linked above.

But even though personally I like etymologies and don’t want any weird mnemonics in my long-term memory, I have to admit that vivid and offensive mnemonics are more effective.