VocabularyJLPT N5 · core

口

くち

hepburn kuchi

mouth

Part of speech · noun

Pattern visualization

口mouth

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Numbers3 strokes · 2.0s

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Examples

口を大きく開けてください。
Please open your mouth wide.
口が悪いです。
He has a foul mouth.

Collocations

口を開ける (open mouth)口が悪い (foul-mouthed)入口 (iriguchi, entrance — "enter mouth")出口 (deguchi, exit — "exit mouth")人口 (jinkou, population)

Mnemonic

くち — 口, Yamato. The kanji 口 is a single square — the simplest possible head-on drawing of a human mouth. That one character branches in two directions ── the mouth itself: 口を開ける (open the mouth), 口が悪い (foul-mouthed = Korean 'ibi heomhada'). 'opening / passage': 入口 iriguchi (entrance = 'mouth you enter'), 出口 deguchi (exit = 'mouth you leave'), 窓口 madoguchi (a counter / window). At a station, every '~口' is this same kanji — 八重洲口, 北口, 南口 (Yaesu / north / south exit). In the onyomi こう kou, the word turns into a social and statistical term ── 人口 jinkou (population = 'count of people's mouths' = how many mouths there are to feed). The old agricultural intuition is still frozen there. The Korean reading gu is sister to the onyomi こう.

Quick check

How do you read "population" 人口 in Japanese?