扇 (shàn): fan (handheld or mechanical)

Meanings

1 fan (handheld or mechanical)
2 leaf (of a door, window, or screen); sliding/hinged panel
3 classifier for doors, windows, and similar leaved objects

Characters

扇

shàn

fan; leaf of a door

Examples

她拿起一把扇子。

Tā náqǐ yī bǎ shànzi.

She picked up a fan to cool herself.

这间屋子有两扇门。

Zhè jiān wūzi yǒu liǎng shàn mén.

There are two doors in this room.

把电扇打开，太热了。

Bǎ diànshàn dǎkāi, tài rè le.

Turn on the electric fan — it's so hot.

Tips

usage

Anchor noun is 扇子 (handheld fan). Modern household fans extend the word into compounds: 电扇 (electric fan), 风扇 (electric fan), 吊扇 (ceiling fan), 落地扇 (pedestal fan), 塔扇 (tower fan). Shape sense: 扇形 (fan-shape, sector). As a classifier it counts leaved objects: 一扇门 (one door), 两扇窗 (two windows).

register

Tone flip 扇 (first tone) turns the noun into a verb: 'to fan (the air)' or, colloquially, 'to slap (someone's face)'. Most action senses go to shān; most thing-or-shape senses stay on shàn. The compound 扇贝 (scallop) keeps shàn because the shellfish is named for its fan-shaped shell.

Components

radical

户 hù

door; household

Outer-upper door radical — the indexing component (Kangxi #63). Pictures a single-leaf door (one half of 門). The original meaning of 扇 was 'a door-leaf,' hence the door radical. From there extended to anything that opens and closes like a door panel: a fan, a shutter, paired leaves.

semantic

羽 yǔ

feathers; wings

Inner-lower feather radical — depicts paired feathers. Combined with the door above, the image is a feathered hand-fan opening like a door-leaf, the canonical fan made of bird feathers. Drives the modern reading shàn ('fan') and the verbal sense of fanning the air. Same family as 翅 (wing), 翼 (wing).