CJKV Information Processing, 2nd Edition

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Chapter 1: CJKV Information Processing Overview

Sample CJKV charactersTable 1-5.

Script Sample characters

Hanzi (simplied)

󰔎󰔏󰔐󰔑󰔒󰔓󰔔󰔕󰔖󰔗

Hanzi (traditional)

一乙丁七乃九了二人儿驫鱺鸝灩灪爩麤齾齉龘

Kanji

󰝋󰐯󰐰󰐱󰐲󰐳󰐴󰐵󰐶󰝝󰝞

Hanja

󰙯󰙰󰙱󰙲󰙳󰙴󰙵󰙶󰙷󰙸

But, how frequently are each of these scripts used? Given an average sampling of Japanese

writing, one normally nds 30% kanji, 60% hiragana, and 10% katakana. Actual percent-

ages depend on the nature of the text. For example, you may nd a higher percentage of

kanji in technical literature, and a higher percentage of katakana in elds such as fashion

and cosmetics, which make extensive use of loan words written in katakana. Most Korean

texts consist of nothing but hangul syllables, and most Chinese texts are composed of only

hanzi.

*

Latin characters are used the least, except in Vietnam, where they represent the

primary script.

So, how many characters do you need to learn in order to read and write CJKV languages

eectively? Here are some very basic guidelines:

You must learn hiragana and katakana if you plan to deal with Japanese—this consti-•

tutes approximately 200 characters.

Learning hangul is absolutely necessary for Korean, but you can get away with not •

learning hanja.

You need to have general knowledge of about 1,000 kanji to read over 90% of the kanji •

in typical Japanese texts—more are required for reading Chinese texts b