Meaning & readings

feelings, emotion, passion, sympathy, circumstances, facts

On’yomi ジョウ、セイ
Kun’yomi なさ.け

Origin

This character combines the heart radical on the left, which signals that the word deals with emotions or feelings, with the character for "blue" or "green" on the right, which provides a sound hint for pronunciation. The heart radical alone () appears in many emotion-related characters, so here it anchors the meaning to the realm of feelings and circumstances. The right component doesn't mean "blue" in this context — it's just there to tell you roughly how to pronounce the word. Together, the visual pairing of "heart plus sound hint" creates a character that captures the idea of feelings and emotional responses.

AI-generated (claude-haiku-4-5), not yet reviewed. Formation type (automated guess): Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint).

11 strokes

Components

  • radical left
  • sound hint right

A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.

Common words

  • 愛情 あいじょう love; affection
  • 感情 かんじょう emotion; feeling
  • 苦情 くじょう complaint; troubles
  • 激情 げきじょう violent emotion; passion
  • 詩情 しじょう poetic sentiment
  • 事情 じじょう circumstances; conditions
  • 純情 じゅんじょう pure heart; naivete
  • 情け なさけ pity; sympathy

Reference

Strokes
11
Kangxi radical
61
Grade
Grade 5 (Kyōiku)
Frequency rank
#235 (newspapers)
Former JLPT
level 2
Unicode
U+060C5