意識
Meaning in Englishconsciousness, awareness, perception
Animated kanji stroke order
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Word context
What it means
意識 means consciousness or awareness; it denotes the state of being aware of oneself and surroundings, or the cognitive processes underlying attention, perception, and intentional thought.
Main meanings
- The state of wakefulness and responsiveness to stimuli; the distinction between being conscious and unconscious.
- Subjective experience of thoughts, feelings, and sensations; self-awareness and mental states.
- Awareness in a social, ethical, or political sense; moral or collective consciousness.
- In philosophy and cognitive science, the phenomenology of conscious experience or qualia.
How to use it
Used as a noun to denote mental state, awareness, and attention; in medical contexts it appears in phrases like level of consciousness; in philosophical writing it denotes the subjective experience of mind; common verbs with 意識 include 意識する and 意識している to indicate becoming aware or being mindful, with particles like が, を, に marking subjects, objects, or targets of awareness.
Variants and close terms
- 自覚 (jikaku) — self-awareness
- 認識 (ninshiki) — recognition/awareness
- 無意識 (muishiki) — unconsciousness
- 覚醒 (kakusei) — awakening
- 無自覚 (muzikaku) — obliviousness
Composition
- 意: mind, intention
- 識: knowledge, recognition
Etymology
意 with on'yomi i and 識 with on'yomi shiki combine to form ishiki, a Sino-Japanese compound; the pronunciation reflects kanji readings borrowed from Chinese, illustrating how this mind–recognition concept arrived in modern Japanese.
Origin
The term appeared in Japanese with the adoption of Chinese characters and ideas from Buddhist and Confucian thought; it was used in classical literature and philosophy, becoming common in modern psychology and everyday language.
Word class
noun (名詞)