Korean Reader for Chinese Characters will help students of Korean master basic Chinese characters that are frequently encountered in everyday situations. More than five hundred characters are targeted in exercises that aid in the efficient study of the forms, meanings, and sounds of individual characters and their compounds. Although the primary goal of the Reader is recognition of basic Chinese characters, students are encouraged to learn to write them properly by inclusion of a section on stroke order. The Reader is also designed to reinforce skills in reading and writing in Korean while studying Chinese characters. Forty lessons are preceded by an introductory chapter on the principles of Chinese character formation and reading and writing characters and followed by appendices on stroke order, English translations of the main reading text of each lesson, and an index of characters. The lessons are organized into seven parts: new characters, reading text, glossary, notes, new words in characters, more words in characters, and exercises. After every fifth lesson, there is a section reviewing all the characters introduced in the preceding five lessons.

Because Chinese characters are commonly known as pictograms, most Chinese learners wonder if they can possibly learn thousands of characters. Some give up altogether and choose to learn only Pinyin, the romanized form of Chinese characters and so their use of the language becomes very limited. However, considering that the people who devised the Chinese language and most of the people who write and speak it every day are not geniuses, we have found a shortcut, an easier way, that would help people appreciate and learn the Chinese characters. This book has been written to share that secret with you! Countries that still use Chinese characters in their vocabulary are China (including Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore), Korea and Japan. China, for obvious reasons, uses it most often. The simplified characters are used in China and Singapore, whereas Taiwan and Hong Kong use the original complicated characters. Japan uses a mix of both. Korea has her own alphabet Hangul, but up to 60% of the vocabulary has borrowed meaning from Chinese characters. Therefore, if you don't know them, it is very hard for you to understand their true meanings. For these reasons, many researches on Chinese characters have been carried out mostly in China, Korea and Japan. We have taken into account the opinions of scholars from these three countries and shortlisted 3,500 characters, which outnumbers the 2,633 characters in the HSK Level 1-6 characters list. This book contains 1,160 characters that explain about the most frequently-used 856 characters including 623 characters in the HSK Level 1-3 list. Chinese characters are based on inscriptions found on bones and tortoise carapaces used in the 14th and 12th century B.C. centuries. In the 6th and 7th centuries, they were said to have been passed on to nations in the Korean peninsula at that time, and then passed on to Japan. All languages change with time and Chinese was no exception. The usage of Chinese characters in Korea and Japan retain the original form and meaning of when they were passed on, so it was very helpful to have the input of scholars from the three countries. This book is an attempt to compile the opinions of scholars from these three countries, and the authors' personal interpretations of the inscriptions on bronze, bones and tortoise carapaces to explain the origin of the characters. The authors' aim is to help our readers understand the characters, not to become scholars in their own right. But that does not mean this book is a pet project. It is intended to help readers further understand the meanings of all Chinese characters.

The book describes how the three East Asian writing systems-Chinese, Korean, and Japanese- originated, developed, and are used today. Uniquely, this book: (1) examines the three East Asian scripts (and English) together in relation to each other, and (2) discusses how these scripts are, and historically have been, used in literacy and how they are learned, written, read, and processed by the eyes, the brain, and the mind. In this second edition, the authors have included recent research findings on the uses of the scripts, added several new sections, and rewritten several other sections. They have also added a new Part IV to deal with issues that similarly involve all the four languages/scripts of their interest. The book is intended both for the general public and for interested scholars. Technical terms (listed in a glossary) are used only when absolutely necessary.

Chinese, Japanese, South (and North) Koreans in East Asia have a long, intertwined and distinguished cultural history and have achieved, or are in the process of achieving, spectacular economic success. Together, these three peoples make up one quarter of the world population.They use a variety of unique and fascinating writing systems: logographic Chinese characters of ancient origin, as well as phonetic systems of syllabaries and alphabets. The book describes, often in comparison with English, how the Chinese, Korean and Japanese writing systems originated and developed; how each relates to its spoken language; how it is learned or taught; how it can be computerized; and how it relates to the past and present literacy, education, and culture of its users.Intimately familiar with the three East Asian cultures, Insup Taylor with the assistance of Martin Taylor, has written an accessible and highly readable book. Writing and Literacy in Chinese, Korean and Japanese is intended for academic readers (students in East Asian Studies, linguistics, education, psychology) as well as for the general public (parents, business, government). Readers of the book will learn about the interrelated cultural histories of China, Korea and Japan, but mainly about the various writing systems, some exotic, some familar, some simple, some complex, but all fascinating.

In Sinography, Zev Handel provides a comprehensive comparative analysis of the ways in which the Chinese-character script evolved as it was adapted to write other languages of Asia, including Korean, Vietnamese, Japanese, Zhuang, Khitan, and Jurchen.

Modern Korean breaks new ground in the field of Korean studies by providing students at last with an intermediate-level language text. The volume emphasizes the development of reading proficiency, but the exercises reinforce skills learned through conversation practice. They use a communicative approach emphasizing student-student and student-teacher interactions in real-life scenarios. Twenty-four lessons are divided into two groups of twelve lessons each. A single lesson consists of a main text, written in expository or descriptive prose that often incorporates a conversational style; a dialogue; a discussion of new word usage and structural patterns; substitution and grammar drills; exercises; and a vocabulary list. The second half of the book introduces Chinese characters found in each lesson. Modern Korean may be used for classroom instruction or self-study. Main text topics cover a wide range of subjects including Korean history, geography, holidays, literature, customs, and people, allowing students to develop a better understanding of Korean society and culture while improving their language skills.