JLPT N5 Kanji – 分 – fun, bun, wakaru, wakeru

This is 5-Minute Kanji, and today, we will go over a slicing kanji: the kanji for divide or minute.

Mnemonic:
An old man with a WALKer slices his CAKE with a KNIFE. He radios to his friend with a WALKie-talkie “What a BOON a whole cake!”

Onyomi:

ブン、フン、フ*
bun, fun, fu

Kunyomi:

わかる、わける、わけ*, わけつ*
wakaru, wakeru, wake

* Not commonly used in modern Japanese

The ふん onyomi reading is primarily used to refer to minutes, like in ごふん (5 minutes), although it will change to ぷん after some numbers like いっぷん (1 minute). Meanwhile, ぶん is used more for abstract compounds to mean part or something like じぶん (myself) or きぶん (feeling).

The kunyomi わかる means to understand something and is intransitive, meaning it doesn’t take an object. The subject is what is being understood, like in the following sentence:

日本語にほんごが　わかります。(I undersand Japanese.)

The kunyomi わける, on the other hand, means to split and does take an object, like in the following sentence:

ケーキを　三人さんにんで　分わけました。([We] split the cake among 3 people.)

Note that when using わかる, the kanji is usually not used. It is often written in kana only. However, with わける, the kanji is often used.

Mnemonic Factory

This kanji is made of two other kanji (or radicals). The top one is 八, the kanji for 8. Originally, this kanji meant half or divide, but was used as the kanji for 8 because of its sound. You can easily imagine something, like a stick, being broken in half.

The other kanji or radical on the bottom is 刀, blade as in かたな. It actually resembles a large, thick knife.

These two kanji or radicals can be used with great effect to create numerous visual mnemonics that mean split or divide. It’s a little more difficult to come up with a mnemonic for understanding, but maybe you can think of it as if you divide things into parts you can understand it better.

For the main mnemonic that I came up with, I visualized someone cutting a Mt. Fuji-style cake in half with a knife. Another highly visual mnemonic is someone chopping a book to better understand it. The top part is the book exploding outward as the knife slices down.

For onyomi, it is a little tough to think of words with a similiar sound to ふん and ぶん. You have FOONy as funny pronounced strangely. Or a strange sigh someone might make. For ぶん, you have the word BOON which matches it perfectly, or a strangely pronounced BUUN for a hot dog or cheeseburger bun. Maybe you can imagine someone with a Swedish (or Minnesota/Canadian) accent commenting on your hot dog bun that is sliced into 8 parts – “That’s FOONy BOONy ya got there!”

For kunyomi, you are also a little limited. You could use WALKer or WALKE-talkie, or if you are fond of Fonzy the Bear – WAKAWAKA. You can imagine him dividing your WALKE-talkie in half during a bad joke and commenting WAKAWAKA.

Example Words

How about a few example words where this kanji is used?

Onyomi

These words are almost always written entirely in kanji (sometimes with okurigana) and preserve a Sino‐Japanese feel:

• 自分（じぶん） “myself, I, me”
• 半分（はんぶん） “half”
• 多分（たぶん） “perhaps, probably, generous”
• 十分（じゅうぶん） “enough, sufficient” (Not N5)
• 一分（いっぷん） “one minute”

Compounds that make use of the ぶん reading often refer to parts or portions of something. Whereas, when the ふん or ぷん is used, it more often refers to minutes.

Kunyomi

The kun’yomi わかる and わける have different meanings and are used differentlyわける:

• 分かる（わかる） “to understand, used with が particle to mark what is being understood” Note: This is often written in kana only.
• 分ける（わける） “to split or divide”
• 分かり合う（わかりあう） “to understand each other” (Not N5)
• 見分ける（みわかる） “to distinguish, to tell apart” (Not N5)

わかる means to understand and is used with the が particle to mark what is being understood. Meanwhile, わける means to divide and takes an object marked with the を particle.

Commonly confused with

Story Review

Can you remember the story from the beginning? Let’s give it a try and yell out the words that are missing.

An old man with a ____er slices his ____ with a _____. He radios to his friend with a ____-talkie “What a ____ a whole cake!”

Perfect? Let’s give it another try.

An old man with a ____er slices his ____ with a _____. He radios to his friend with a ____-talkie “What a ____ a whole cake!”

Word Review

Can you read these? I’ll give you the kanji and please yell out the reading for each word

自分

分かる

分ける

半分

多分

十分

That’s it for the kanji for time. Please let me know in the comments below if you have any questions. If you’d like to learn more kanji, hit the subscribe button and hit the bell mark to get a notification every time I send out a new video. Also, be sure to check out my other 5 Minute Kanji videos.