kanji

1. (uncountable) The system of writing Japanese using Chinese characters.
2. (countable, uncountable) Any individual Chinese character as used in the Japanese language.

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ˈkænd͡ʒi/

Etymology

Cognate with Korean: 한자

Cognate with Mandarin Chinese: 漢字

Cognate with Vietnamese: Hán tự

Cognate with Cantonese: 漢字

In summary

Borrowed from Japanese 漢字(かんじ) (kanji, “Chinese characters”), from Middle Chinese 漢 (MC xanH, “Han dynasty, China”) + Middle Chinese 字 (MC dziH, “[written] character”) (Compare Korean 한자 (hanja), Mandarin 漢字 /汉字 (hànzì), Vietnamese Hán tự, Hokkien 漢字 /汉字 (hàn-jī / hàn-lī), Cantonese 漢字 /汉字 (hon³ zi⁶)). Doublet of hanja and Hanzi.

Synonyms

Chinese characters

Chinese character

man’s handwriting

Kanji

Translations

Kanji

kanji

kanji

kanji

kanji

carácter japonés

kanji

sinojapanisches Schriftzeichen

حَرْف يَابَانِيّ

caractères sino-japonais

kanji

kanji

japanisches Zeichen

كَانْجِي

طَابِع يَابَانِيّ