본 논문에서는 부수를 통해 한자를 이해하기위해서 “口”를 부수로 가지고 있는 “口, 噤, 含, 味, 呼, 吸, 吹, 吃, 名, 命”의 10가지 글자의 본의와 인신의 및 파생의를 비교하고 알아보았다. 또한 그 중 몇몇 단어에 대한 사회언어학적 분석을 통하여 그들이 어떤 문화적 함의를 가지고 있으며 중국 사회의 변화에 어떻게 영향을 받았는지 분석하였다. “口部字”는 대체로 “먹거나 말하는 부위, 동작”의 의미를 지니고 있으며 중국인들은 고금을 막론하고 먹는 것을 중시하는 민족이기 때문에 “口部字”에는 중국인들의 역사와 사회문화 및 정서까지도 풍부하게 반영되어 있어 사회언어학적 연구 대상으로 활용할 수 있었다. 분석한 단어들은 전체 상용 한자의 일부분으로 본다면 모두 개별적인 의미를 지니고 있었지만, 口部에 속한 단어의 일환으로써는 모두 “口部字” 본의의 뜻을 크게 벗어나지 않고 일정한 테두리 안에서 의미가 확대되거나 축소되었다. 대부분의 한자들은 『說文解字』 상의 본의를 현대에 와서도 그대로 사용하고 있었고 자형과 자의에 근거하여 새로이 의미를 추가되었다. 보통은 구체적인 사물의 뜻에서 추상적인 개념을 나타내는 방향으로 발전하였다. 하지만 일부 한자들은 현대에 와서 사회의 발전과 외래 문물의 유입으로 인해 “口香糖”, “脫口秀”, “吃秀”같은 신조어, 외래어의 모습으로 변화되었다.
This article focused on comparing the original, extended and derivative meanings of ten characters“口 kou, 噤 jin, 含 han, 味 wei, 呼 hu, 吸 xi, 吹 chui, 吃 chi, 名 ming, 命 ming”, which have common radicals, “口 kou” in order to figure out Chinese characters by way of radicals. It also tried to analyze their cultural undertones and impacts of Chinese social changes on them through the sociolinguistic analysis of some of the words. “口部字 kou buzi”generally means “specific body parts or actions related with eating or saying.” Chinese people of all ages lay stress on eating, so it was possible to use“口部字 kou buzi”as the objects of sociolinguistic research, which profusely reflects Chinese history, society, culture and even their emotions in it. Each word analyzed in this article originally had their individual meanings as the parts of all the Chinese characters in common use, but their meanings were extended or reduced without deviating from the original boundary as the parts of“口部字 kou buzi”. Most Chinese characters in these modern times have the inherent meanings in『說文解字 Shuo wen jie zi』and new meanings were added, based on the forms and meanings of each character. They usually developed towards referring to abstract concepts from concrete objects. However, some of the characters have been changed into neologism and loanword such as “口香糖 kouxiangtang”, “脫口秀 tuokouxiu”, “吃秀 chixiu” influenced by social development and introduction of foreign cultures. In addition, this study was able to draw cultural undertones through sociolinguistic analysis, based on semantic changes of the words mentioned above. For example, we could make out how the Western way of thinking, Western ideas and culture have extensively changed Chinese society by studying words made up of “口 kou”. Words composed of“味 wei”showed us the developmental process of 五味 wuwei and 中醫 zhongyi, which can be called as the result of Chinese traditional culture, and “呼 hu”and “吸 xi”let us see the aspects of realization of Taoism culture, a Chinese traditional thought. Especially in the case of“吃 chi”, we could find the Chinese elements reflected by relatively abundant culture compared with other words, because Chinese people were more concerned with eating in their long history and tradition. Lastly, Chinese naming tradition shown in “名 ming”reveals the phases of the times, by letting us compare the values of each period in history. Therefore each Chinese character can be a new standard which shows us the way to another different China in the past and the present, as long as we regard each character as the essence holding cultural symbols and social meanings, not simple marks of textual records.