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Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary Let's say you encountered this sentence: 新聞はあなたの脇にあります。 You likely know 新聞 as shinbun (newspaper, new + hearsay), so you could read the whole sentence, except perhaps for one troublesome character smack-dab in the center. Trying to work around it, you would have this: Shinbun wa anata no ___ ni arimasu. The newspaper is in your ... driveway? Birdcage? Thoughts? Looking at the components of 脇 might help. The "flesh" radical, 月, almost always tells us that we're talking about the body. So the newspaper is somewhere in your body?! When Does the 月 Component Not Mean "Flesh"? ... As for 力, that means "power." In fact, it was originally a pictograph of... Show more

皆さん、初めまして。英(はなぶさ)いつきです。私は、幼い頃から日本語に関する勉強が好きで、以前は高校で国語教員をしていました。このブログを通じて、皆さんと一緒にことばの面白さを分かち合えたら嬉しいです。 では早速、今回は「高い」という表現について考えてみましょう。 「背が高い」とは、どういう意味でしょうか？　「高い」は「下から上への距離が大きく離れること」を意味しています。だから、「背が高い」とは定規で地面から測っていくと上の方で目盛りを読む状態を指しています。  では、「鼻が高い」とは、どういう意味でしょう？　頬から鼻の先まで測ってみると長いのでしょうか？　いいえ、日本語では「得意になっている様子」を表わしているのです。皆さんも誰かに褒められたり、自慢できることがあったりすると胸をそらして上の方を見ませんか？　そうした仕草をしているとき、鼻は普段より高い位置になりますね。 では、「目が高い」はどうでしょう？　目が顔から飛び出すくらい上の方にある状態？　想像すると面白いですね。「目が高い」とは、日本では「良いものを見分ける能力に優れていること」を意味しています。  さらに、「声が高い」はどうでしょうか？　ソプラノの声のこと？　いえいえ、「声が大きいこと」を表わします。でも、大きな声で話そうとすると不思議と少し音程が高めになりますね。  日本語を学習している皆さんが高いもの…それは「志（こころざし）」、つまり自分を高めようとする熱意です。  ======================================================== Pleased to meet everyone – I’m Itsuki Hanabusa.... Show more

Love JapanesePod101? You HAVE to Check Out ChineseClass101.com! 50% Off Subscriptions for LIFE to the First 101 Signups! Innovative Language Learning LLC, the company that brought you JapanesePod101.com, is proud to announce the newest member of our language family, ChineseClass101.com! Have you been hankering to add another language in addition to Japanese to your linguistic repertoire? Have you ever wanted to learn Chinese for business, travel or personal fulfillment? If so, now is the perfect time to learn Chinese! ChineseClass101.com has all the same features as JapanesePod101.com to help you master both oral and written aspects of the language! The best part:  If you are one of the first 101 people to subscribe to... Show more

The Kanji for this week are as follows: (Remember, each compound must use the Kanji in the brackets .) Kanji Scrabble #05 : 　年、立、長、大、語、社、入、国、会、見 Kanji Scrabble, a JapanesePod101.com original game. (Learn How to Play Here) To start, all you need is a Twitter account and to follow our Twitter account @japanesepod101 (What's Twitter you ask? Read our guide here.) Answers: Kanji Kana English 入学 にゅうがく (n,vs) entry to school or university/matriculation/(P)/ 国学 こくがく (n) study of (ancient) Japanese literature and culture/(P)/ 国立大学 こくりつだいがく (n) national university/ 国語学 こくごがく (n) Japanese philology (linguistics)/ 大学 だいがく (n) (1) post-secondary education institution, incl. university, college,... Show more

Welcome to Forum Spotlight! Here we'll be introducing interesting and useful posts made by members at our very own JapanesePod101.com Forum. Our first forum spotlight post explaining particles for beginners of Japanese comes from Bueller_007さん. This was posted in response to a listener who said that they were having trouble keeping all of the particles straight. は (wa) marks a topic, emphasing what follows it as being specific to that topic. There is no real equivalent in English, but people often say that "AはB" = "As for A, B". The "topic" is often the grammatical subject, but can be anything (including the grammatical object, and sometimes the verb), and it may also follow some other particles. Grammar Bank が (ga) marks... Show more

Hi everyone! Did you know that JapanesePod101 is on Facebook? On Facebook, you can find a JapanesePod101.com Group, FanPage, and Application! If you're not quite sure what Facebook is,  it's a Social Networking Service that allows you to keep up with your friends and learn more about the people you’ve met. You can also share your photos, videos or other information with each other. What can you get from joining us on Facebook? - Updates on what's happening at JapanesePod101.com - The latest information on our daily lessons - FREE STUFF! That's right, starting now, Sunday 6:30 p.m. Tokyo time, we'll be giving away 5 Free App Codes to the first 5 people that grab them from our Fan Page on Facebook. This app code will give... Show more

Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary If you asked me to refer in Japanese to four species of Antarctic penguins, I might try to squeeze ペンギン (pengin: penguin), 4種類 (yon shurui: four kinds), and いる (iru: to exist) into a sentence. In the penguin sign I've mentioned (yes, we're still talking about it!), ペンギン and 4種類 certainly appear. But instead of いる, we find this: 生息する (seisoku suru: to inhabit, live)     life + to live Here's the relevant text again: 南極に生息する4種類のペンギン Nankyoku ni seisoku suru yon shurui no pengin four Antarctic penguin species 南極 (nankyoku: South Pole)     south + pole 種類 (shurui: kind, type)     kind +... Show more

Thanks for following us on Twitter! We hope you have been enjoying the wasei-eigo mini lessons we've been updating everyday. We plan to change the theme for the vocabulary every 2 weeks or so, which means that the wasei-eigo lessons are coming to an end and it's time for a new theme. Our next theme will be counter words! Over the next couple of weeks we will introduce you to a new counter everyday on Twitter. We'll be alternating between elementary counters for beginning students and more difficult counters for advanced students. So what are counters and how do they work? Counters, or 助数詞 (josūshi), are words that are paired with numbers and are used to count things and events. They are similar to English phrases such as "a... Show more

The Kanji for this week are as follows: (Remember, each compound must use the Kanji in the brackets .) Kanji Scrabble #04 : 　右、上、大、車、気、左、足、長、入、小 Kanji Scrabble, a JapanesePod101.com original game. (Learn How to Play Here) To start, all you need is a Twitter account and to follow our Twitter account @japanesepod101 (What's Twitter you ask? Read our guide here.) Answers: Kanji Kana English 上手 うわて、じょうず、かみて (adj-na,n) (1) upper part/(adj-na,n) (2) skillful (only in comparisons)/dexterity (only in comparisons)/(n) (3) over-arm grip on opponent's belt (sumo) 入手 にゅうしゅ (n,vs) obtaining/coming to hand 右手 みぎて (n) right hand 大手 おおて (n,adj-no) (1) front castle gate/(2) both arms open/outstretched arms/(3)... Show more

Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary Two weeks ago, I introduced the following sentence: ペンギンと背比べ！南極に生息する4種類のペンギンの脇に立ち、あなたの身長と比較してみて下さい。 Pengin to seikurabe! Nankyoku ni seisoku suru 4 shurui no penginno waki ni tachi, anata no shinchō to hikaku shite mite kudasai. Stand beside the four Antarctic penguin species and see how tall they are compared to you! Breakdown of the Kanji ... At first glance, it might seem as if this text is about penguins, and of course they play a vital role. But the more I look at it, the more I see that it's full of body parts! See how many components or whole kanji you can spot that relate in some way to bodies or their functions. I'll post the original sign again to... Show more