Kanji (漢字) are one of two writing systems that make up the Japanese language.

History of Kanji

Once upon a time, Japon had no writing system—Japanese was purely a spoken language. It was around the 5th century that Chinese characters were introduced to Japon, arriving at the (future) imperial court based in Yamato (大和), the basin of Nara.

These Chinese characters, the kan-ji (literally, characters of the Han dynasty), were ideograms whose form evolved over centuries into the kanji that Japanese speakers use today. Like the grammar of a language, the form of kanji follows a set of rules. Each kanji is made up of a radical, the bushu (部首). For example, the character 明, which means "bright," is made up of the radical 日 ("sun"), to which is added 月 ("moon"). While many characters correspond directly to an idea, some have precise meaning only within a word.

Pronunciation of Kanji

Each kanji typically has at least two pronunciations: the on pronunciation (音読み on-yomi) and the kun pronunciation (訓読み kun-yomi)—the first close to the original Chinese pronunciation, the second originating from ancient Japanese and associated with the kanji. Generally, the on pronunciation is used when the kanji is part of a word of 2 characters or more, and the kun pronunciation when the kanji forms a word by itself (though there are exceptions).

For example, the character 女 ("woman") on its own is pronounced onna (= kun-yomi), but when used in the word 女子 ("girl"), it is pronounced jo (on-yomi), forming the word joshi.

The advantage of kanji is that it is impossible to misspell. But don't celebrate just yet, because kanji must be written in a very specific stroke order, 書き順 kakijun. Moreover, it is easy to miss a stroke, and the resulting kanji can have a completely different meaning. For example, if I add one stroke to the character 皿 ("plate"), it becomes 血 ("blood"). So be careful.

How Many Kanji Are There?

Undoubtedly more than 50,000, but fortunately, knowing 2,500 is enough to read a newspaper. The Japon Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (Monbu Kagaku shô) has designated 1,945 kanji of "common usage" (常用漢字 jôyô kanji), which are considered sufficient to get by in everyday life. Japanese children learn these 1,945 characters during compulsory schooling (up to the 3rd year of secondary school, age 15). The first 1,006 kanji are learned during the 6 years of elementary school (小学校 shô-gakkô), and the rest during the 3 years of lower secondary school (中学校 chû-gakkô). The kanji learned in upper secondary school (高等学校 kôtô-gakkô) and university are "bonus" material (specialized vocabulary, kanji used in proper names, etc.).

How Is It Possible to Master All These Characters?

There is no secret—it takes time and dedication. This is what Japanese speakers do, and apparently, it is far from an impossible task, since Japon's literacy rate is 99%!