漢字Kanji · in Action & Movement
劣: inferiority, be inferior to
Also: be worse
JLPT N16 strokesSecondary schoolYour ink: 白 Not met
力 carries the meaning · 少 is drawn in
6 strokes
Small seal · Qin Today
Small seal: Wikimedia Commons, public domain. Today’s form: KanjiVG, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Two readings, and the words that use each
レツretsu · on'yomi · in compounds
- 劣勢れっせいinferiority (e.g. numerical)
- 劣悪れつあくpoor (quality, conditions, etc.); bad
- 劣化れっかdeterioration (in quality, performance…
- 卑劣ひれつmean; contemptible; despicable
- 劣等感れっとうかんinferiority complex; sense of inferiority
おとるotoru · kun'yomi · on its own
- 劣るおとるto be inferior to; to be less good at
Words: JMdict, EDRDG, CC BY-SA 4.0.
成り立ち
Where it comes from
Memory story · made up to help you remember
“Flex your arm and feel the power! That's 力, representing the raw muscle and effort required to change the world.”
繋がり
Connections
Ink shades, lightest to darkest: 白 Not met, 淡 Met, 中 Learning, 濃 Familiar, 印 Mastered
少
Also built on few (少)
Easy to confuse
The difference, side by side劣 inferiority · 力
vs妙 exquisite · 女In ChineseSame character in simplified and traditional · liè
Same form: 劣 is written the same way in mainland China (simplified) and in Taiwan and Hong Kong (traditional).
- Simplified
- 劣 mainland China, Singapore
- Traditional
- 劣 Taiwan, Hong Kong
Pinyin liè most common reading
Forms and pinyin: Unicode Unihan database (Unicode License v3). Pinyin lists the most common reading, not every reading.
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