Hanja 漢字 / 한자

hanja · from Korean

What is hanja?

Hanja are Chinese characters used in Korean, today mainly for Sino-Korean words in names, newspaper headlines, academia and disambiguation.

Korean was written in Chinese characters before Hangul and for centuries after. South Korea teaches 1,800 basic hanja for education, and many people write their names in hanja, but everyday writing is almost entirely Hangul. North Korea abolished hanja in general use. Knowing hanja helps decode Sino-Korean vocabulary.

Examples

學校 학교 hakgyo (school); 大韓民國 대한민국 Daehan Minguk (Republic of Korea); 金 김 Gim/Kim (surname)

Kungfucius says: Korean dropped Chinese characters from daily writing but kept them in the vocabulary, like a tattoo under a sleeve.