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Interpreting kanji frequency list

eeky

先輩
8 Jun 2010
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The kanji frequency list (see attachment) contains a number of duplicate entries (for example, 蓮, 靴, 雰, 瞳, etc.). These all seem to have cross-references in the "Notes" column, but I can't properly understand the notes or the reason why these characters are duplicated.

Also, the list ends in a bizarre way. The "Rank" column, which has previously progressed from 1 through 3500, suddenly jumps to 3561, then 3729, then 3753, and so on. Again there is a note in the "Notes" column which may contain some explanation, but again I cannot properly understand it.

Can anyone explain what is going on with these two things?
 

Attachments

  • sanko_3.pdf
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Kanji variations (異体字) are distinguished in the research. For instance, No.1808 is the ordinary 蓮, whereas No.2029 is 蓮 with 2点しんにゅう.
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The kanji listed in the page 71 are the ones that are not ranked in the top 3500, but are considered relatively common and needed to be discussed in the council whether the kanji list should contain them or not.
 
Aha, I see. It's strange though ... on my screen the characters appear identical, and my computer also thinks that they are "internally" the same character (i.e. same character code). Do you actually see different characters on your screen, or did you manually create your graphic to illustrate what the note is explaining?
 
The latter. They use completely the same kanji for both ranks in the list. (The asterisk next to the kanji would mean "this kanji is a substitute" and then the note explains the actual difference between the two kanji probably because usual font set doesn't contain all variations of kanji.)
 
That's simply because the list was a data for the council that determined the new Joyo kanji. I don't know about the newer version, but it's most likely not in the HP of the Agency for Cultural Affairs, since there's no plan/need to discuss it now.
 
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