劝

勸

quàn

verb HSK 5 #3,260

Meanings

1 to advise
2 to urge
3 to persuade

Characters

劝

quàn

to advise; to urge; to persuade

Examples

HSK 1

朋友们都劝我去看医生。

Péngyoumen dōu quàn wǒqù kàn yīshēng.

My friends all urged me to see a doctor.

HSK 4

她怎么劝都没有用。

Tā zěnme quàn dōu méiyǒu yòng.

No matter how she tried to persuade, it was useless.

HSK 5

我劝他不要抽烟了。

Wǒ quàn tā búyào chōuyān le.

I advised him to stop smoking.

Tips

grammar

劝 + person + (不要) + verb: 劝他别去 (advise him not to go), 劝她多休息 (urge her to rest more).

culture

劝酒 (quàn jiǔ, to urge someone to drink) is a major part of Chinese banquet culture. Refusing can be awkward, but saying 我开车 (I'm driving) is the magic escape.

Components

radical

力 lì

strength; force

Right indexing strength radical - marks 劝 as an action requiring effort: pushing, exerting, applying pressure to convince someone. The radical anchors the effort-and-encouragement family alongside 努 (strive), 助 (help), 劳 (labour), 勉 (encourage). Persuading takes work.

phonetic

又 yòu

right hand (here phonetic substitute)

Left 又 - a simplified replacement for the traditional phonetic 雚 (guàn, 17 strokes). Supplies a near-sound for quàn through cursive shorthand convention. The traditional 勸 keeps the 17-stroke 雚 phonetic on the left; the simplified 劝 substitutes the 2-stroke 又 for ease of writing, sacrificing the literal sound link for stroke economy.

Stroke Order

劝 quàn

劝