{"id":17404,"date":"2023-10-23T22:34:09","date_gmt":"2023-10-23T20:34:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/?p=17404"},"modified":"2024-05-04T23:28:06","modified_gmt":"2024-05-04T21:28:06","slug":"shapeshifting-chinese-characters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/","title":{"rendered":"Shapeshifting Chinese characters"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-17406\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shapeshifting-square-300x300.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shapeshifting-square-300x300.png 300w, https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shapeshifting-square-150x150.png 150w, https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shapeshifting-square-768x768.png 768w, https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shapeshifting-square.png 1000w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/>Most Chinese character components are well-behaved; they look the same in different compounds and aren\u2019t hard to recognise. Some components are sneaky, though; they change appearance depending on context.<\/p>\n<p>One of the major challenges when learning to read and write Chinese <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/6-challenges-students-face-when-learning-to-read-chinese-and-how-to-overcome-them\/\">is that the link between the spoken and written language is not obvious<\/a> and sometimes non-existent. By realising that characters that look different are actually the same, you make the learning process a little bit easier, so let\u2019s have a closer look at these shapeshifting characters!<\/p>\n<p><em>Tune in to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/podcast\/\">the Hacking Chinese Podcast<\/a> to listen to the related episode:<\/em><br \/>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/podcasters.spotify.com\/pod\/show\/hackingchinese\/embed\/episodes\/168---Shapeshifting-Chinese-characters-e2av1ql\" width=\"400px\" height=\"102px\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n<em>Available on <a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/hacking-chinese-podcast\/id1536284827\">Apple Podcasts<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/podcasts?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy8zODhlYjllOC9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw==\">Google Podcasts<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/overcast.fm\/itunes1536284827\/hacking-chinese-podcast\">Overcast<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/show\/5iCRv1jg3j3yJZGJlYVYaO\">Spotify<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/L_lgi6weJcM\">YouTube<\/a> and many other platforms!<\/em><\/p>\n<h3>An example: \u4eba changes shape to \u4ebb when on the left in compounds<\/h3>\n<p>Let\u2019s begin with an example most readers will be familiar with. The character \u4eba (r\u00e9n), \u201cperson\u201d, is written as \u4eba when used as a stand-alone character, but when it appears on the left side of compounds, it\u2019s written \u4ebb. In Chinese, this component is called \u5355\u4eba\u65c1 (d\u0101nr\u00e9np\u00e1ng). Here are some common compound characters with this component:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u4f60 (n\u01d0), \u201cyou\u201d<\/li>\n<li>\u4ed6 (t\u0101), \u201che; him\u201d<\/li>\n<li>\u4f11 (xi\u016b), \u201crest\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It\u2019s still the same character, though. It contributes the meaning of \u4eba, &#8220;person&#8221;, to these characters and is best thought of as a different form of \u4eba rather than as a new character. This is not obvious if it&#8217;s the first time you see these characters, however.\u00a0 There are characters that are much more similar than \u4eba and \u4ebb that do in fact mean different things! If you want to know more about this, <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.skritter.com\/2014\/12\/when-small-changes-make-a-big-difference-part-1?ref=hackingchinese\">I&#8217;ve written a series of articles about it over at Skritter<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Another sign that they are indeed the same character is that when in characters where it\u2019s the phonetic component (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/phonetic-components-part-1-the-key-to-80-of-all-chinese-characters\/\">i.e. where its function is to indicate sound<\/a>), the pronunciation is still <em>r\u00e9n<\/em>. For example, in the character \u4ec1 (r\u00e9n), \u201cbenevolence\u201d, \u4ebb is the phonetic component, which is not hard to guess since the whole character is also pronounced <i>r\u00e9n<\/i>.<\/p>\n<h3>Colloquial names for shapeshifted Chinese character components<\/h3>\n<p>Still, when talking about \u4ebb, Chinese people don\u2019t just say <i>r\u00e9n <\/i>because that would make it impossible to distinguish it from \u4eba. Instead, all common character components have colloquial names, and so \u4ebb is called \u5355\u4eba\u65c1 (d\u0101nr\u00e9np\u00e1ng), &#8220;single-person-side&#8221;. For a more comprehensive list of colloquial names, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/kickstart-your-character-learning-with-the-100-most-common-radicals\/#table\">check this table<\/a> from my article about the 100 most common Chinese radicals:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"OC4qsVR9uo\"><p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/kickstart-your-character-learning-with-the-100-most-common-radicals\/\">Kickstart your Chinese character learning with the 100 most common radicals<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-embedded-content\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" style=\"position: absolute; clip: rect(1px, 1px, 1px, 1px);\" title=\"&#8220;Kickstart your Chinese character learning with the 100 most common radicals&#8221; &#8212; Hacking Chinese\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/kickstart-your-character-learning-with-the-100-most-common-radicals\/embed\/#?secret=JJiXo6jFLC#?secret=OC4qsVR9uo\" data-secret=\"OC4qsVR9uo\" width=\"500\" height=\"282\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Note that the colloquial name is not always a reliable indication of the origin or meaning of the component in question. For example, the component \u5f73 looks very similar to \u4ebb and is even called \u53cc\u4eba\u65c1 (shu\u0101ngr\u00e9np\u00e1ng), &#8220;double-person-side&#8221;,\u00a0 in Chinese, but it&#8217;s completely unrelated to \u4eba. Instead, it&#8217;s the left side of \u884c (x\u00edng), originally showing a road intersection, often included to point out movement or action.<\/p>\n<h3>You\u2019ll learn these easy cases just by looking at them\u2026<\/h3>\n<p>Most characters simply get a bit squeezed when they are written in compounds. For example, \u53e3 (k\u01d2u), \u201cmouth\u201d, becomes smaller in a compound like \u559d (h\u0113), \u201cto drink\u201d, and \u5b50 (z\u01d0), \u201cchild; son\u201d, needs to be more narrow to fit in the character \u597d (h\u01ceo), \u201cgood\u201d), but since these are essentially identical, there\u2019s no reason to discuss them further here.<\/p>\n<p>Many characters do change shape when appearing in compounds, however. We already looked at \u4ebbas an example, which is just a slightly morphed version of \u4eba. Once you&#8217;ve noticed that, you&#8217;re unlikely to forget that they belong together. Here are some other cases that are equally easy to learn:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u624b (hand): \u624c(left) as in \u6253, \u9fb5 (top) as in \u770b*<\/li>\n<li>\u725b (cow): \u725c (left\/right) as in \u7269 or \u4ef6, \u2ea7 (top) as in \u544a<\/li>\n<li>\u793a (altar): \u793b as in \u89c6<\/li>\n<li>\u7af9 (bamboo): \u2eae as in \u7b77<\/li>\n<li>\u7f8a (sheep): \u2eb6 as in \u7740, \u2eb7 as in \u7f8e*<\/li>\n<li>\u8863 (clothes): \u2ec2 as in \u88e4<\/li>\n<li>\u8db3 (foot): \u2eca as in \u8e22<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><i>*See \u201cEverything is not as it seems\u201d below for details.<\/i><\/p>\n<h3>\u2026but some cases require extra attention<\/h3>\n<p>Naturally, it\u2019s somewhat subjective which shifts in shape should be considered tricky, but here are some that are not obvious if you haven\u2019t seen them before. Some of these are easier to see in traditional characters, though:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u5200 (knife): \u5202 as in \u522b<\/li>\n<li>\u5fc3 (heart): \u5fc4 (left) as in \u5fd9, \u2e97 (bottom) as in \u6155<\/li>\n<li>\u6c34 (water): \u6c35 as in \u6ca1<\/li>\n<li>\u706b (fire): \u706c as in \u70ed or \u718a*<\/li>\n<li>\u72ac (dog): \u72ad as in \u72d7<\/li>\n<li>\u7389 (jade): \u738b as in \u73a9<\/li>\n<li>\u8a00 (speech): \u8ba0(simp.) or \u8a01 (trad.) as in \u8bf4\/\u8aaa<\/li>\n<li>\u8089 (meat): \u6708 (simp.) or \u2ebc (trad.) as in \u80d6**<\/li>\n<li>\u91d1 (metal): \u9485 (simp.) or \u91d2 (trad.) as in \u94b1\/\u9322<\/li>\n<li>\u98df (food): \u9963(simp.) or \u98e0 (trad.) as in \u996d\/\u98ef<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><i>* See \u201cEverything is not as it seems\u201d below for details.<br \/>\n** If you wonder why this character doesn&#8217;t have a traditional counterpart, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/chinese-character-variants-and-fonts-for-language-learners\/\">check this article<\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>The last four examples are good examples of why traditional characters might be easier to recognise, even if they take longer to write. For a complete discussion of this topic, see <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/are-simplified-characters-really-simpler-to-learn\/\">Are simplified characters really simpler to learn?<\/a><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"Ca5e6Ns7i4\"><p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/are-simplified-characters-really-simpler-to-learn\/\">Are simplified characters really simpler to learn?<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-embedded-content\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" style=\"position: absolute; clip: rect(1px, 1px, 1px, 1px);\" title=\"&#8220;Are simplified characters really simpler to learn?&#8221; &#8212; Hacking Chinese\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/are-simplified-characters-really-simpler-to-learn\/embed\/#?secret=xmTukwpmFD#?secret=Ca5e6Ns7i4\" data-secret=\"Ca5e6Ns7i4\" width=\"500\" height=\"282\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3>Shapeshifting Chinese characters with subtle differences<\/h3>\n<p>The differences between the stand-alone and component forms of some characters are extremely subtle, and you might not have noticed some of them even if you have studied Chinese for a decade or longer. Let\u2019s do a mini-quiz!<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>What\u2019s the last stroke in \u8f66, &#8220;vehicle&#8221;?<\/li>\n<li>What about when it appears in \u8f7b, &#8220;light&#8221;?<\/li>\n<li>What\u2019s the last stroke in \u725b, &#8220;cow&#8221;?<\/li>\n<li>What about when it appears in \u7279, &#8220;special&#8221;?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>The answer is that the stroke order changes when these characters get squeezed into the left component position in compounds:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>In \u8f66, the last stroke is \u31d1<\/li>\n<li>In \u8f7b, and other compounds, the last stroke of \u8f66 is actually \u31c0<\/li>\n<li>In \u725b, the last stroke is \u31d1<\/li>\n<li>In \u7279 and other compounds, the last stroke of \u725b is actually \u31c0<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>These examples are from <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.skritter.com\/2021\/03\/the-ultimate-guide-to-chinese-character-stroke-order?ref=hackingchinese\">a blog post over at Skritter<\/a>, which also includes the following helpful animations where you can compare the stroke order:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/blog.skritter.com\/2021\/03\/the-ultimate-guide-to-chinese-character-stroke-order?ref=hackingchinese\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.skritter.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/%E8%BD%A6-character.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"250\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.skritter.com\/2021\/03\/the-ultimate-guide-to-chinese-character-stroke-order?ref=hackingchinese\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.skritter.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/%E8%BD%A6-component-form.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"250\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/blog.skritter.com\/2021\/03\/the-ultimate-guide-to-chinese-character-stroke-order?ref=hackingchinese\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.skritter.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/%E7%89%9B.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"250\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.skritter.com\/2021\/03\/the-ultimate-guide-to-chinese-character-stroke-order?ref=hackingchinese\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.skritter.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/%E7%89%9C.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"250\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>I can hear some of you wondering why on earth the Chinese writing system is so needlessly complicated, but if you think about it, this difference in stroke order makes perfect sense if you consider that to write the next component, you have to move almost straight up, and that\u2019s just easier to do from a \u31c0 than a \u31d1!<\/p>\n<h3>How to deal with shapeshifting characters as an independent student of Chinese<\/h3>\n<p>As I have shown in this article, there are two categories of shapeshifting characters. First, we have the easy cases where simply seeing them together once and paying attention is probably enough. For these characters, you don&#8217;t need to do much, so let&#8217;s move on.<\/p>\n<p>Second, we have tricky cases that might take a long time to learn if you don\u2019t give them some care and attention. If you&#8217;re not careful, you might think that these are indeed new characters you didn&#8217;t know, so looking them up or seeing them in the list above can be very helpful. That is indeed one of the reasons I wrote this article!<\/p>\n<p>Still, I don\u2019t think it\u2019s a good idea to study shapeshifting characters explicitly in detail, especially not out of context. You don&#8217;t need to add the examples in this article to your deck of flashcards, for example. Reading this article should be enough to make you aware of what\u2019s going on; the rest will come with more reading and writing. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/how-to-best-use-flashcards-to-learn-chinese\/\">Flashcards are great for learning some things, but you shouldn&#8217;t adopt the habit of relying on them to learn everything.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>When you learn more about characters and do look things up <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/review-the-outlier-linguistics-dictionary-of-chinese-characters-with-discount-code\/\">in a good dictionary<\/a>, you&#8217;ll notice that some things that look different are the same, and that some things that look the same are different, something we&#8217;ll turn to next.<\/p>\n<h3>Everything is not as it seems:<\/h3>\n<p>Not every component that looks like a certain character is actually that character. If you\u2019re just after a quick way to memorise a character, you might not need to delve deep into how it evolved, but if you want to understand Chinese characters, you need to know about something called \u201cempty components\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Empty components are components that express neither meaning nor sound. In other words, it&#8217;s not a meaning component (such as \u624c in \u6253) or a sound component (such as \u4ebb in \u4ec1).<\/p>\n<p>You can\u2019t know this just by looking at the character, but the \u9fb5 in \u770b (k\u00e0n), \u201cto see\u201d, is not actually \u624b, \u201chand\u201d, even though folk etymology says it\u2019s a hand shading an eye. It is in fact an empty component and used to look very different. This might not help you memorise the character, however, so if you think the hand-shading-an-eye mnemonic works, then stick with it!<\/p>\n<p>Another example: the \u706c in \u718a (xi\u00f3ng), \u201cbear\u201d, is not actually \u706b \u201cfire\u201d as indicated above, but is instead a corrupted version of \u5927. Again, this is great to know if you want to really understand Chinese characters in themselves, but it&#8217;s definitely not needed if your goal is just to be able to recognise the character. It is possible to delve too deep sometimes, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/5-levels-of-understanding-chinese-characters-superficial-forms-to-deep-structure\/\">which I discussed in more detail here<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"SuoKdRwArd\"><p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/5-levels-of-understanding-chinese-characters-superficial-forms-to-deep-structure\/\">5 levels of understanding Chinese characters: Superficial forms to deep structure<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-embedded-content\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" style=\"position: absolute; clip: rect(1px, 1px, 1px, 1px);\" title=\"&#8220;5 levels of understanding Chinese characters: Superficial forms to deep structure&#8221; &#8212; Hacking Chinese\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/5-levels-of-understanding-chinese-characters-superficial-forms-to-deep-structure\/embed\/#?secret=WJ9lYExf3w#?secret=SuoKdRwArd\" data-secret=\"SuoKdRwArd\" width=\"500\" height=\"282\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>So, not everything is as it seems. This is by definition hard to know, and most native speakers don\u2019t know that \u5f73 is unrelated to \u4ebb, that \u9fb5 in \u770b is not actually a hand, and that \u718a has nothing to do with fire!<\/p>\n<h3>Learning more about Chinese characters and character components<\/h3>\n<p>So how do you know what something actually means? How do you know when \u706c is not \u706b, when \u9fb5 is not \u624b, and that \u5f73 is unrelated to \u4ebb? You ask the experts, of course! <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/review-the-outlier-linguistics-dictionary-of-chinese-characters-with-discount-code\/\">Outlier Linguistics offers a dictionary that makes all this information easily accessible on your phone<\/a>. I highly recommend this resource and you can check out my full review here:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"odCFL39nwT\"><p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/review-the-outlier-linguistics-dictionary-of-chinese-characters-with-discount-code\/\">Review: The Outlier  Dictionary of Chinese Characters<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-embedded-content\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" style=\"position: absolute; clip: rect(1px, 1px, 1px, 1px);\" title=\"&#8220;Review: The Outlier  Dictionary of Chinese Characters&#8221; &#8212; Hacking Chinese\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/review-the-outlier-linguistics-dictionary-of-chinese-characters-with-discount-code\/embed\/#?secret=yM0e0jw6zk#?secret=odCFL39nwT\" data-secret=\"odCFL39nwT\" width=\"500\" height=\"282\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>If you want my best advice about learning Chinese characters, check out my guide here: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/my-best-advice-on-how-to-learn-chinese-characters\/\">My best advice on how to learn Chinese characters<\/a><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"OWQih7Wgcu\"><p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/my-best-advice-on-how-to-learn-chinese-characters\/\">My best advice on how to learn Chinese characters<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-embedded-content\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" style=\"position: absolute; clip: rect(1px, 1px, 1px, 1px);\" title=\"&#8220;My best advice on how to learn Chinese characters&#8221; &#8212; Hacking Chinese\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/my-best-advice-on-how-to-learn-chinese-characters\/embed\/#?secret=JK7MpdsBh8#?secret=OWQih7Wgcu\" data-secret=\"OWQih7Wgcu\" width=\"500\" height=\"282\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Most Chinese character components are well-behaved; they look the same in different compounds and aren\u2019t hard to recognise. Some components are sneaky, though; they change appearance depending on context! Let\u2019s have a closer look at these shapeshifting characters.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17406,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,6,10,18,22],"tags":[97,112,1065,1100,462,1291,549],"class_list":["post-17404","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beginner","category-distinctively-chinese","category-intermediate","category-recommended-resources","category-vocabulary","tag-character-components","tag-chinese-characters","tag-outlier-linguistics","tag-podcast-episode","tag-radicals","tag-shapeshifting-characters","tag-stroke-order"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Shapeshifting Chinese characters<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Most Chinese character components are well-behaved; they look the same in different compounds and aren\u2019t hard to recognise. Some components are sneaky, though; they change appearance depending on context! Let\u2019s have a closer look at these shapeshifting characters.\u00a0\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Shapeshifting Chinese characters\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Most Chinese character components are well-behaved; they look the same in different compounds and aren\u2019t hard to recognise. Some components are sneaky, though; they change appearance depending on context! Let\u2019s have a closer look at these shapeshifting characters.\u00a0\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Hacking Chinese\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/HackingChinese\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-10-23T20:34:09+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2024-05-04T21:28:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shapeshifting-square.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1000\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1000\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Olle Linge\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@HackingChinese\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@HackingChinese\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Olle Linge\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"9 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Olle Linge\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/fd696a7384c7de665cc9d67c15205b15\"},\"headline\":\"Shapeshifting Chinese characters\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-10-23T20:34:09+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-05-04T21:28:06+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":1635,\"commentCount\":2,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2023\\\/10\\\/shapeshifting-square.png\",\"keywords\":[\"Character components\",\"Chinese characters\",\"Outlier Linguistics\",\"Podcast episode\",\"Radicals\",\"Shapeshifting characters\",\"Stroke order\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Beginner\",\"Distinctively Chinese\",\"Intermediate\",\"Recommended resources\",\"Vocabulary\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/\",\"name\":\"Shapeshifting Chinese characters\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2023\\\/10\\\/shapeshifting-square.png\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-10-23T20:34:09+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-05-04T21:28:06+00:00\",\"description\":\"Most Chinese character components are well-behaved; they look the same in different compounds and aren\u2019t hard to recognise. Some components are sneaky, though; they change appearance depending on context! Let\u2019s have a closer look at these shapeshifting characters.\u00a0\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2023\\\/10\\\/shapeshifting-square.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2023\\\/10\\\/shapeshifting-square.png\",\"width\":1000,\"height\":1000},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\\\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Shapeshifting Chinese characters\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/\",\"name\":\"Hacking Chinese\",\"description\":\"A better way of learning Mandarin\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Hacking Chinese\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/logo\\\/image\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2010\\\/09\\\/square-stamp-1000.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2010\\\/09\\\/square-stamp-1000.png\",\"width\":1000,\"height\":1000,\"caption\":\"Hacking Chinese\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/logo\\\/image\\\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.facebook.com\\\/HackingChinese\",\"https:\\\/\\\/x.com\\\/HackingChinese\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/fd696a7384c7de665cc9d67c15205b15\",\"name\":\"Olle Linge\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/7d60e40795941ec743c532d9ba9a94d261cd89f55ab4a7a0a8271040e7046559?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/7d60e40795941ec743c532d9ba9a94d261cd89f55ab4a7a0a8271040e7046559?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/7d60e40795941ec743c532d9ba9a94d261cd89f55ab4a7a0a8271040e7046559?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Olle Linge\"},\"description\":\"Hi! My name is Olle Linge (\u51cc\u96f2\u9f8d) and I'm the creator and editor of Hacking Chinese. Read more about the website and me on the About page.\",\"sameAs\":[\"http:\\\/\\\/www.hackingchinese.com\"]}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Shapeshifting Chinese characters","description":"Most Chinese character components are well-behaved; they look the same in different compounds and aren\u2019t hard to recognise. Some components are sneaky, though; they change appearance depending on context! Let\u2019s have a closer look at these shapeshifting characters.\u00a0","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/","og_locale":"en_GB","og_type":"article","og_title":"Shapeshifting Chinese characters","og_description":"Most Chinese character components are well-behaved; they look the same in different compounds and aren\u2019t hard to recognise. Some components are sneaky, though; they change appearance depending on context! Let\u2019s have a closer look at these shapeshifting characters.\u00a0","og_url":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/","og_site_name":"Hacking Chinese","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/HackingChinese","article_published_time":"2023-10-23T20:34:09+00:00","article_modified_time":"2024-05-04T21:28:06+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1000,"height":1000,"url":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shapeshifting-square.png","type":"image\/png"}],"author":"Olle Linge","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@HackingChinese","twitter_site":"@HackingChinese","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Olle Linge","Estimated reading time":"9 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/"},"author":{"name":"Olle Linge","@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/#\/schema\/person\/fd696a7384c7de665cc9d67c15205b15"},"headline":"Shapeshifting Chinese characters","datePublished":"2023-10-23T20:34:09+00:00","dateModified":"2024-05-04T21:28:06+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/"},"wordCount":1635,"commentCount":2,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shapeshifting-square.png","keywords":["Character components","Chinese characters","Outlier Linguistics","Podcast episode","Radicals","Shapeshifting characters","Stroke order"],"articleSection":["Beginner","Distinctively Chinese","Intermediate","Recommended resources","Vocabulary"],"inLanguage":"en-GB","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/","url":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/","name":"Shapeshifting Chinese characters","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shapeshifting-square.png","datePublished":"2023-10-23T20:34:09+00:00","dateModified":"2024-05-04T21:28:06+00:00","description":"Most Chinese character components are well-behaved; they look the same in different compounds and aren\u2019t hard to recognise. Some components are sneaky, though; they change appearance depending on context! Let\u2019s have a closer look at these shapeshifting characters.\u00a0","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-GB","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-GB","@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shapeshifting-square.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shapeshifting-square.png","width":1000,"height":1000},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/shapeshifting-chinese-characters\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Shapeshifting Chinese characters"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/","name":"Hacking Chinese","description":"A better way of learning Mandarin","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-GB"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/#organization","name":"Hacking Chinese","url":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-GB","@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/09\/square-stamp-1000.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/09\/square-stamp-1000.png","width":1000,"height":1000,"caption":"Hacking Chinese"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/HackingChinese","https:\/\/x.com\/HackingChinese"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/#\/schema\/person\/fd696a7384c7de665cc9d67c15205b15","name":"Olle Linge","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-GB","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7d60e40795941ec743c532d9ba9a94d261cd89f55ab4a7a0a8271040e7046559?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7d60e40795941ec743c532d9ba9a94d261cd89f55ab4a7a0a8271040e7046559?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7d60e40795941ec743c532d9ba9a94d261cd89f55ab4a7a0a8271040e7046559?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Olle Linge"},"description":"Hi! My name is Olle Linge (\u51cc\u96f2\u9f8d) and I'm the creator and editor of Hacking Chinese. Read more about the website and me on the About page.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com"]}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17404","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17404"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17404\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18517,"href":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17404\/revisions\/18517"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17404"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17404"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hackingchinese.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17404"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}