The Eye Radical 目: Overview, Mnemonics, and Vocabulary

Another week, another episode of the radical series!

Today, we’ll introduce to you a radical related to our body parts in Chinese. Let’s solve this riddle to find out what the radical is.

“What body part is pronounced as one letter but written with three, only two different letters are used?”

“Did you figure it out yet? Is it the head? No! Is it the forehead? Not even close! But you’re almost there, going down just a bit. Ah, it’s the eyes, isn’t it? One point for you guys! It’s “eye.”

In this article, we’ll learn about the eye radical, what it is, and how to memorize it with fun mnemonics.

Table of Contents

What is the eye radical?

In Chinese, the eye radical is pronounced as “mù” and written as 目. This radical is composed of 5 strokes and listed as radical 109 according to the Kangxi radical chart (a system of radicals of Chinese characters). 目 mù is one of the most widely used radicals, with 674 characters (out of 49,030) found under this radical in the Kangxi Dictionary.

Eye radical 目 mù is a pictogram character that conveys a message or an idea using representational or pictorial drawings. Similar to other radicals such as 一 yī (one), 口 kǒu (mouth), or 厂 hǎn(cliff), the eye radical 目 mù also shows how the character and the object they describe are closely related.

Let’s take a look at how this radical transformed through times:

What is the stroke order of the radical 目?

The eye radical 目 has five strokes, written in the following order:

Source: Visual Mandarin

How can you memorize the eye radical?

Though it’s not difficult to commit the eye radical 目 to memory, there’s a learning technique that lets learners memorize this word with fun rather than learn it by heart – the mnemonics technique.

At Pandanese, we employ mnemonics flashcards to help Chinese learners like you get the most out of your learning. Your Chinese learning journey couldn’t get any easier! Or could it? Have a look at how mnemonics works in this example.

Eye radical vocabulary list for you!

Want to explore more about the eye radical and other related terms? Enrich your knowledge with this vocabulary.

Character	Pinyin	English meaning
看	kàn	watch, look
睡	shuì	sleep
冒	mào	emit
眼睛	yǎn jing	eyes
眉毛	méimao	eyebrow
一眼	yīyǎn	a glance
节目	jiémù	performance, show
目的	mùdì	purpose
目前	mùqián	at the present time
目光	mùguāng	gaze
注目	zhùmù	attention

Pandanese makes your Chinese learning a breeze!

Learning Chinese should not be hard but easy and full of joy! Ditch the textbook and rote learning method for mnemonics which is proven a technique that helps learners digest new pieces of information more easily and more efficiently.

Pandanese is a web-based application exclusively designed to help Chinese-language learners memorize Chinese characters easier and more effectively. Pandanese uses scientifically proven memory-aid methods like mnemonics and Spaced Repetition System (SRS) to optimize your learning ability, helping you learn more than 6,000 hanzi and vocabulary within just a year.

If you’re interested in the Chinese language, especially Chinese radicals, we encourage you to check out our Pandanese blog and read as much as you like before starting your learning!

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