The Kanji Code is a linguistical-adjacent (painstakingly science-backed; so it is of course ignored widely) guidebook for learning the Kanji in a systematic way. In other words, THEY'VE DONE IT! Japanese isn't just a random jumble of pictographs anymore! The book itself is pretty advanced level stuff, but if you want to learn actual Japanese and not whatever the weirdly mediocre textbooks are peddling this funding round, this is the good stuff. The author is Natalie Hamilton, previously a JET and presently a linguistics scholar and publisher. This is her dissertation, so I'd say its proper decent. Its for whatever levels, but probably best starting off around 'intermediate' (whatever that means4u). Its basically the dictionary you thought your teacher recommended for Kanji, when they gave you Heisig and you realise RTK literally is just meanings, and nothing else. This is all the other bumpf.
There are 214 Radicals (Kangxi) / 2136 Joyo Kanji / 3-4000 Onyomi / and 4000+ Kunyomi. All 3 scripts (Kanji/Katakana/Hiragana) are connected by Kanji/Hanzi origins. These are bound to the Wu/Go-on/500-600 CE, Han/Ken-on/600-700 & Present Chinese Onyomi/Tou-on/1200+ time periods, and is the majority of Kanji's origins. In the book and for our purposes, these are then normally in linguistics bound up into
Shoukei - pictographs - eg 木 (tree)
Shiji - Ideograph - e.g 上 (up)
Keii - Compound Ideograph - 休 (rest/relax)
& Keiseimoji - Form sound/semasio-phonetic - e.g. 清 (clean/clear)
Kanji. In the book, Onyomi are covered, and Kunyomi are left to rote learning which is quite easy given most are Shoukei and Shiji like tree and up. After that you get into the parts of the Kanji you are required to learn,
Radicals (meaning components) tells you the meaning category.
Phonetics (sound components) tells you the pronunciation.
Return to the idea of Keiseimoji. 80% of Kanji are Keiseimoji. 59.76% of these Kanji in turn had either the same or overlapping orthography or meaning (Hong, 2005). By understanding however that you can systematically learn to read these Kanji (their sound, then thus their form, or meaning association). Thus, Kanji will become recognisable components each of which have known purpose and function. Keiseimoji are semasio-phonetic characters with a radical that denotes the sound. Radicals indicate the category ... so those that contain the water radical (氵/水) could be read as water associated. These are in 13 subject matters/associations (for 5-600+ radicals and components).
1 Nature
2 Human Body
3 People
4 Enclosures
5 Verbs & Languages
6 Natural Materials
7 Math and Measurement
8 Food
9 Animals
10 Warfare
11 Man-made-tools
12 Senses
13 Supernatural
The majority of these types of Kanji are used to write nouns/verbs/vocabulary/set phrases/proverbs/sayings. As for radicals, their Semantic components are mostly on the left and phonetic components are mostly on the right, is the classical Keiseimoji formula.
1 Radical on left, phonetic on the right
2 Radical on top, phonetic on the bottom
3 Phonetic on top, radical on bottom
4 Radical elsewhere , phonetic on left/in an enclosure
You then gain the Fragmenting Approach in Chapter 3 of 'drawing out phonetic components, fragments of kanji that give the Onyomi.'
In Chapter 4 the Artistic Approach is taken by 'grouping Kanji by visual features and using these groups as a way to learn the Onyomi readings.
Once you learn that 清= SEI, you will essentially be reading the Kanji characters phonetically ... 清= SEI is a particualrly consistent case. The author calls it a power phonetic which is カ in the book.
永 （泳）= EI and is a phonetic component/ in the sound category
氵（泳）= water and is a form-association component
All invented component names are marked by the 想 (idea) symbol and at times the radical and the phonetics can combine to create the meaning e.g.
Kanji On Meaning Phonetic sound
仲 middle CHUU
忠 central CHUU
These phonetics aren't a specific Onyomi, but Kanji Characters that contain them often have a readings that rhyme/sound effects/onomatopoeia. In Chapter 4, groups of Kanji characters that are connected by a visual feature between their visual look & ON sounds, strong enough to call it a pattern. Gojuon column order reflects how many readings use it, so more K's, less W's. The eventual goal however is not technocratical, but to learn the Japanese names of phonetic components. We call them components as radicals means something else to most people already, so its components if you decided to try this (SCIENTIFICALLY BACKED AND WELL RESEARCHED) methodology.
link to book here: https://thekanjicode.com/
https://thekanjicode.com/the-kanji-code-study-guide/
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