委 (wěi) - Meaning, Stroke Order & Audio

委

wěi[wei3]Tone 3

to entrust, committee, dejected, surname Wei

HSK 5

Multiple Readings (多音字):

Guru Deep Dive

English · to entrust, committee, dejected, surname Wei

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Topology:Top-bottom

Strokes:8

Writing Balance Rule: The top component (禾) should be slightly compressed and balanced centrally over the bottom component (女), ensuring the vertical stroke runs neatly down the center line.

1. Meaning

to entrust, to commit (a task or responsibility to someone)

committee or committee memberto cast aside or discardwinding or roundaboutdejected or listless

Verb / NounNeutral#actions#administration#emotions#surnames

Sample Usage

委员会
wěiyuánhuì
committee
委托
wěituō
to entrust / to commission

2. Sound

/[weɪ̯²¹⁴]/Tone: 214

委

wěiwei3

ˇ(214)

=wěi

Initial Consonant

Type: Labio-Velar Glide (Zero Initial)

Sounds like: w sound like in 'water'

Unaspirated

Airflow Tactile Test: Round lips tightly before gliding into vowel.

Tongue & Mouth Position: Lips rounded and protruded slightly, back of tongue raised toward soft palate.

Final Rhyme

Vowel Group: -e vowel group

Sounds like: ei rhymes with 'way' or 'hey'

Mouth Shape Guide: Pronounce as standalone vowel 'ay'.

Common Learner Trap: Keep vowel quality steady across all 4 tone contours.

Tone

T3 (214)

2 → 1 → 4 (214)

3rd Tone (Low-Dipping)

Tone Pitch & Cadence: Tone 3 is the low dipping tone (214). It starts mid, dips down to the bottom of your vocal range, and rises back up.

Sandhi: When followed by another Tone 3 syllable, wěi changes to a Tone 2 (35) rising pitch.

👂

Listening trap: Do not confuse with wēi (Tone 1, high level) or wèi (Tone 4, sharp falling). Tone 3 dips down before rising.

👋

Physical Tone Gesture: Trace a checkmark in the air: dip down from your normal speaking pitch to a low valley, then sweep upward.

3. Writing

Topology: Top-bottom · Strokes: 8 strokes

Writing Balance Rule: The top component (禾) should be slightly compressed and balanced centrally over the bottom component (女), ensuring the vertical stroke runs neatly down the center line.

4. Components

Radical 女 · Female Radical (woman, female)

Semantic Clue (形旁): 女 (Relates to submission, compliance, or submissive posture in historical contexts.)

Phonetic Clue (声旁): 禾 (original sound: hé / wěi phonetic evolution)

The character combines 禾 (cereal plant / grain) on top and 女 (woman) on the bottom. Historically, grain represents abundance or stacking up, while the lower part depicts a person yielding or bending.

禾 Top component, providing the phonetic and visual shape of stacked stalks
女 Bottom component, providing the female / kneeling posture semantic element

Phonetic Family (形声字家族)

9· Phonetic Root: 委 (wěi)

5. History

Liushu category: Phono-semantic (形声)

Origin: Originally depicted a person bending or crouching down obediently (combining grain and a kneeling person), which evolved into the meanings of submitting, entrusting tasks, and giving up.

Semantic Evolution: From bending/submitting to entrusting responsibilities (handing something over to someone lower or compliant), and further extending to committees (entrusted groups) and dejection.

In ancient times, it could mean to cast aside because someone who yields or bends is pushed aside.

6. Sinosphere

🇻🇳

Sino-Vietnamese

uỷ

Corresponds to the Vietnamese hỏi tone (dipping).

🇯🇵

Kanji (Japanese)

On: イ (i) / Kun: し.る (shi.ru), ゆ委ねる (yudaneru)

🇰🇷

Hanja (Korean)

위

Sound Shift Bridge: The historical initial w- maps across Sino-Xenic traditions to initial w- or y-/i- sounds.

7. Memory

Vivid Mnemonic Story

A woman (女) holding harvested grain stalks (禾) is willing to ENTRUST her entire harvest to the village COMMITTEE.

Phonetic Family (形声字家族)

逶

wēiwinding, tortuousAdded the movement radical (辶) to indicate a winding path.

矮

ǎishort, lowAdded the arrow radical (矢) on the left instead of grain.

Lookalikes & Traps (形近字)

季(jì)

季 has 子 (child) at the bottom, meaning season; 委 has 女 (woman) at the bottom, meaning entrust/committee.

秀(xiù)

秀 has 乃 at the bottom, meaning excellent/elegant; 委 has 女 at the bottom.

8. Mastery

Active Recall Challenge

我们公司成立了一个新[___]来处理这个问题。

Clue: wěi yuán huì

Common Learner Pitfall

Confusing the bottom component 女 with 子 (child) found in characters like 季.

Memory Prompts

Recognition: When you see 委, what are its two most common functional meanings in HSK vocabulary?

Production: How do you write the character for 'to entrust' or 'committee' (wěi) combining grain and woman?

委wěito entrust, committee, dejected, surname Wei

Speed:

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