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Lesson Transcript

Hi everyone.
Welcome to the Japanese Kanji video series.
In this lesson, you'll learn the "gate" radical.
Take a look at these kanji characters. Can you guess what they mean?
By the end of this lesson, you'll be able to grasp the meaning behind these kanji characters.
門、
First off, can you spot the radical that's common in all of these kanji characters?
(pause for 4 seconds)
It's this part here. It looks like a gate or window with two sliding doors.
This particular radical is called...
門、間、問、聞
もんがまえ
The "gate" radical is used in some of the most common kanji characters. Let's take a look at it in more detail.
Meaning
The concept behind this radical is "gate", "division" or "department".
From left to right, the first kanji means "gate", the second means "period", the third character means "question", and the fourth character means "to listen".
門、間、問、聞
The first example shows that this radical exists as a kanji character on its own.
The second kanji has the gate radical in the enclosing position, and this other character in the center. It's the "day" radical that we learned in lesson 9.
Together, the concept of the "gate" radical together with "day" gives us "a division of day", which we can associate with a "period" of time.
The third kanji has the same radical paired with another character that we"ve learned. It's the "mouth" radical that we learned in lesson 6.
The "department of mouth", means "to question" or "to ask".
The final kanji has the same radical paired with another character, which is the kanji character for "ear".
The "department of ear", means "to listen".
OK. Let's move on!
Common positions
The "gate" radical will *always* appear in the enclosing position, whether it's by itself or if it's used in other kanji characters, and because of this, it's easily recognizable.
As seen in the original examples for "gate", "period", "question", and "to listen", it will always be in this position.
pause 3 seconds
Okay. Now let's learn how to write this radical.
Stroke Order
The "gate" radical is written in eight strokes.
The first stroke is a straight, vertical downstroke on the left side.
The second stroke looks like a right corner. It connects to the first stroke, and goes from left to right, bends, and continues downwards slightly.
The third and fourth stroke are two horizontal strokes that close out the box.
The fifth stroke is short vertical stroke which starts near the center and goes downwards slightly.
The sixth stroke connects to the previous stroke. It goes from left to right, bends, and continues all the way downwards reaching the floor where it flicks upwards slightly towards the center.
The last two strokes are horizontal strokes that close out the box.
And that's it! You're done!
Common Readings
When the "gate" radical appears on its own, the kanji character can be read as...
モン for the "on" reading
and かど for the "kun" reading
When the "gate" radical is *part* of another kanji...
カン、あいだ、ま
for the kanji meaning "period".
モン、と
for the kanji meaning "ask" or "question". And...
ブン、き
for the kanji meaning "listen".
Lesson Review
In this lesson, you learned about the "gate" radical.
The concept behind the character is "gate", "division", or "department".
You also learned the kanji characters for "gate", "period", "ask or question", and "listen", in which this radical appears.
This radical will always be in the enclosing position.
And it's written in eight strokes - demonstrated here:
Well done! You just learned your tenth and final radical in this series! With this set of 10 radicals alone, you can deduce the meaning of 30% of ALL practical, everyday kanji in Japanese!
Was this video series helpful? Let us know if you"d like to see more of this series by replying in the comments!
And if you want to learn more Japanese, or more of Risa and I, go to JapanesePod101.com! We have a host of different videos on various topics for you to choose from. We'll link them at the end of the video!
Good luck as you continue learning Japanese!
Until next time!
Bye!
Bye~!

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