The Traditional Chinese words that confuse you 1 : Homophones, Homographs, Homonyms, and others

 


不詳/不祥

不 means no.
This 詳's 部首 is 言. In 部首13, we know that 言 is related to speech, speaking and words, if there is no speech, no speaking and no words, it means you don't know anything, so this 不詳 means unknown or uncertain.
In 部首15, we talked about礻is related to worship, this 祥 means blessing, so when you add 不 in front of it, it becomes to be cursed or not blessed by God.

授/受

There is a phrase that uses both of these words together, which is 私相授受.
私 means private. 相 means each other
授 means give and 受 means accept
So the phrase means: Giving and accepting in private.
How can these two words be distinguished?
If I give you an apple, I have to hold it with my hand and give it to you. You can choose to accept it or not, which means you can choose not to extend your hand. So this 授 give, uses 手 as its 部首, and the other word that does not have a hand is accept.

舐/拭

These two 舐/拭 both have the meaning of sliding over the surface of something.
The point is to use what?
This 舐's 部首 is 舌tongue, which means to move the tongue over the surface of something, so it means to lick.
This one, its 部首 is hand, which means to use the hand to slide over the surface of something, so it means to wipe.

詐/炸

This 詐's 部首 is 言, which means someone deceives you by speech, speaking or words. So, it's 詐騙 fraud
However, if you change the 部首 to 火, it means to explode a place.

站/佔

This 站 is making the legs straight, So you can see: The left side has legs and is standing on the ground. So it means to stand.
occupy means to take something for one's use, usually without permission, or to take control or possession of a place by force. So this 佔 uses 人 as its 部首, because only humans can do these actions.

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