How many Kanjis do you know?

[namiko]

woh, that sounds difficult. americans, such as myself would probably take longer to accomplish all of that work, but i'll try;)

[Chan]

yea, definately its crazy work for non native speakers...but with time and hard work i'm sure you'll be able to do it...same applies to me learning japanese...i'm doing it on my own...its only 3 months and now i can read and write japanese...and a bit of grammar...so how long have you been learning japanese?

[namiko]

sure! i have gotten pretty far. i still have much to learn! i know only 1 chinese word, "nihao":D

[Chan]

yea...nihao is a typical greeting...written as 你好！

[Matsumoto_hideto]

400 for me and its getting pretty tough

[namiko]

i know basic kanji like 'flower', tree, simple objects:|

[Chan]

those are actually the easiest cuz you get to associate them with pictures...花。。木。。。水。。。etc..etc...

the next step is actually to know that the basic kanji characters can also be radicals...(i.e most important part of kanji...the identity)....then as you know, a radical with merge with another radical to form new kanji characters...and this makes the learning process much easier cuz you're not learning the character itself but you're learning how to build up kanji which is more to the understanding...

start with learning the 1st steps...the strokes...and remember to write them in order...vary important if you want to go far in kanji

[namiko]

yeah, like writing the word "telephone" right? you have to combine 2 kanji to form that word...eeto...'eletricty' and...

[Chan]

yea...it has the same kanji characters for chinese and japanese...電話..."denwa" in japanese..."dian hua" in chinese....made by combining "electricity" and "speech'...so it literally means "electric speech"...

[namiko]

goota go, talk later. ja mata!;)

[strange368]

Yeah, I only know about 200 characters and several of them aren't on the Joyou list. Regarding the meaning of words, I wish the Japanese would get a new hint from the Chinese, because I get tired of trying to sound out kana for words like コンプター. It's crazy since the Chinese use the characters for electric and brain.

[KRed]

About 500 but that needs doubling before i can take the level 2 test.

[Reggie]

I decided to start completely memorizing the Kanji with both the On and Kun readings, stroke order, meaning, etc. about 2 or 3 weeks ago, so I only know somewhere between 50 and 60. Recently, I've taken a break to work on my grammar some more though, so hopefully, I'll be able to get back to Kanji.

[Spaztick]

About 200, but I want to learn another 100 before the end of the month (Read Japanese today rocks!)

[Kei]

Do native japanese speakers know so many kanji? (5000+)
Is there a normal person average or normal comunication average? Like someone who didn't go to college or studied much in Japan how many kanji would that person know on average? Sorry if my spelling is bad, I'm not a native english speaker