Bihua - Part 2 - Components of Character (Search Words based on Radical)

Open up bihua website. Click here!

It will take you its homepage that looks roughly like the following. Today, we are going to look at 部首查字 bu shou cha zi, word search based on Radical. I have given a short simple explanation on radical. Please refer to the explained a little about Radical in the May 31st Post. Please revisit it to rephrase your memory.

Click on the circled and it will show you the following. There are about 268 radicals. It is categorized based on the number of stroke.

The question is how to use this?

1. Use this feature to enrich your vocabularies

You can click on the one that you interested the most (maybe something that you encounter often), such as the following:

Under the 2 strokes radical, please find the first one above, and click on it. It will take you the following page:

The circled part above is the name for it. Unfortunately, they don't give you the pin yin. At this point, you can use Pleco just to find out on how to pronounce it.

is known as 单人旁 dan ren pang. 单 dan means 'single' 人 ren 'human' 旁 pang comes from pang bian that means side (this is often found on the left side of the character). The shape of this radical is actually a modified 人 ren. Thus, if you notice, the first character that consists of 2 strokes (right underneath the circled part) is called "ren". We always write it in this form when we use it as a word by itself.

On this page, you can see all the words that carry this radical. It is usually used on the left hand side of the character.

From here, you learn each words by click on the blue hyperlinks that will give you either the meaning (CH - EN or CH - CH), the order of strokes or the words formation. If you need to refresh what I am talking about, please see the previous post.

2. Use this feature to search for words

If you ever need to use PRINTED Chinese Dictionary, the thing am about to mention below will come handy for you too

If you encounter new word, let say "花", and you want to know more about this word, the meaning, the strokes or the possible word formations, here is how to utilize the site to satisfy your need.

a. Find the radical.

I have mentioned that Chinese character has a few components, as what you can see on Pleco when you search for a word. Thus a Chinese character can consist of only the radical (the most basic word, such as; 一，人） or it can be formed by a radical + other parts which are non-radical.

So, if you look at 花 you will probably break it down to:

 + +

In which it is all possible for the 3 components above to act as "radical". So how? Try one by one! :)

If you decide that the radical for 花 is , then click on it and see if you can find it.

So you have to count the number of strokes for 花， which is 7 strokes. Scroll down to strokes 7 see if the character that you are looking for is there. In this case, it is NOT! So you know that you have got it wrong! The radical is not dan ren pang.

You will definitely find out that the correct radical is   草字头cao zi tou。

Don't worry if you are concern about the radical that is split in the middle (looks like 2 crosses instead of 1 joint fence). They are the same. They both come from the original character of cao (meaning: grass) that looks like this: "艸". 

So that is the 2 usage of "word search based on radical" 部首查字。

Please take your time to digest ALL the posts (about both Pleco and Bihua.com) and do the following exercise:

1. Using Pleco, please find the components for the 4 characters below:

鱼，猫，妈，上 (what is the radical and what other parts that you can find in those characters， how many strokes each and what is the total strokes for the character).

Then, Write down the meaning for each one of them and pronounce them.

For example: "神 "

Answer: I will use the simplified handwriting mode on my phone to find this word on Pleco (because  I do not know the pinyin). Then, once I found it, I know that this (神) is pronounced as shen that means "god/mind/..."

The components that form the characters are as followed.

The radical is shi or widely known as 示字旁 shi zi pang.  The other part of that form the character is shen (meaning: to state to a superior).

The radical has 4 strokes, while the other parts have 5 strokes. Total strokes for the character is 9 strokes.

2. Using Bihua.com, please find the components for the 4 characters below:

让 (rang)，收 (shou)，六 (liu)，胖 (pang)

(what is the radical and what other parts that you can find in those characters and how many strokes each and what is the total strokes for the character).

Then, Write down the meaning or each one of them and pronounce them.

Do the same like the sample above. In this case, please use Bihua.com

If I am looking for the same word on bihua 神. Here is what you can do.

1. Using the handwriting mode just like the above. I will get the following. Try your own!

The homepage

From the website URL we know that this site is intended for checking of bi shun (Chinese strokes). So by default your input, will return you with the page above. You can click on the blue bold character and it will take you the following page.

From here you can open up the 字典 （zi dian）= dictionary to show you the meaning of the word. See the screen result below.

2. Identify the radical yourself by guessing, just like what we do to the character 花 above. Try it yourself.

As a reminder, do not overwhelm yourself with all the information that you are trying to absorb now. The post may look long, but put into practice it is actually very brief. So, step by step!

What I am showing to you is the usage of the tools that might come useful for you now or in the future. So if you find that certain things are not relevant to the level you are in yet,  do not use it. But when you reach certain point and need it, you know where to look.

One more post on bihua.com's feature, then I might probably introduce you to hanyu pinyin. :)

加油 Jia you!      => Look up the meaning  and make yourself one phrase richer than you were!

Linda Tan