Meaning & readings
listen, headstrong, naughty, careful inquiry
On’yomi チョウ、テイ
Kun’yomi き.く、ゆる.す
Nanori きく
Origin
The character 聴 combines the ear radical (耳) on the left, which directly represents the sense of hearing, with a sound-hint component on the right that suggests how to pronounce it. The ear component makes the meaning clear — anything to do with listening or hearing — while the right side tells you roughly how the character sounds in Chinese-derived pronunciation. This pairing of a meaningful component with a pronunciation hint is a common way kanji were built, allowing speakers to understand both what the character means and how to say it.
Components
- 耳
- 悳V
A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.
Common words
- 傾聴 けいちょう listening closely
- 視聴 しちょう looking and listening; (television) viewing
- 聴覚 ちょうかく (sense of) hearing; auditory perception
- 聴講 ちょうこう lecture attendance; auditing
- 聴取 ちょうしゅ hearing (of a statement, opinion, explanation, etc.); asking
- 聴衆 ちょうしゅう audience; attendance
- 盗聴 とうちょう interception (email); wiretap
- 難聴 なんちょう hardness of hearing; bradyacusia
Reference
- Strokes
- 17
- Kangxi radical
- 128
- Formation type
- Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint)
- Grade
- Jōyō (secondary school)
- Frequency rank
- #781 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 1
- Unicode
- U+08074