HSK 6 · Media

书法 shūfǎ “calligraphy” in Chinese

Traditional 書法

What 书法 means

  1. calligraphy
  2. handwriting
  3. penmanship

How to say 书法

  • Pitch chart of the first tone: stays high and level, 5 to 5 on the five-level scale书shū1st tone, high and level
  • Pitch chart of the third tone: dips low then rises, 2 to 1 to 4 on the five-level scale法fǎ3rd tone, dipping

书法 in a sentence

  1. 你擅长书法吗?

    Nǐ shàncháng shūfǎ ma?

    Are you good at calligraphy?

    Sentence #9989886 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

  2. 我对书法略知一二。

    Wǒ duì shūfǎ lüèzhīyī'èr.

    I know a little about calligraphy.

    Sentence #11238627 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

How 书法 is built

Each colour is one part of the character. Parts repeat across thousands of characters, so learning them makes new words easier. See all 214 in our radicals chart.

The character 书 (shū) drawn as one shape
书shūbook

书 is a single shape of 4 strokes. Learn it whole, then watch its stroke order below.

Memory aidSimplified from 書: a hand holding a brush 聿 over words: to write, a book.

The character 法 (fǎ) with each of its parts in a different colour
法fǎlaw
  • 氵water form of 水 · shuǐ
  • 去to go away · qù

Memory aidTraditionally explained as water 氵, which always lies level and so is fair, with 去 (qù) “to remove”, driving the guilty away: law, method.

How to write 书法

书 4 strokes · 法 8 strokes

Watch the order, then press Try writing it and draw each stroke in the grid. Each stroke is checked as you go.

书法 (shūfǎ) stroke order chart: each stroke of the characters in the order you write them
Stroke order chart for 书法 (shūfǎ). Red marks the next stroke, so you can copy it onto paper one step at a time.

Words related to 书法

Words with 书

Words with 法

More words: Media & Arts

FAQs

书法 (shūfǎ) means “calligraphy” or “handwriting”. It is an HSK 6 word.
Say it shūfǎ: shū with a 1st tone, then fǎ with a 3rd tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
In Traditional characters, used in Taiwan and Hong Kong, 书法 is written 書法. The pronunciation is the same.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type shufa with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 书法 from the suggestions. Typing shufa into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
书法 is an HSK 6 word in the HSK 2.0 word lists.

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Sources: meaning and pinyin checked by a native Mandarin teacher against the official HSK lists. Extra meanings from CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0). Example sentences from Tatoeba (CC BY 2.0 FR). Character parts and stroke order from Make Me a Hanzi.