Taxonomy of meanings for 男:　　

Additional information about 男

說文解字:

Criteria
• BOY
  

  1. Tóng zǐ 童子 is the standard neutral word for a boy below the age of 15, but the strong connotation is that of ignorance and immaturity.

  2. Shù zǐ 豎子 refers to a boy as opposed to an infant, but very often often with strong pejorative force.

  3. Tóng 童 by itself is an archaic word referring to a boy, but the term enters freely into non-archaic binomes.

  4. Rú zǐ 孺子 can refer to a child of any sex, and certainly often refers to young girls, but like rú 孺 alone the word does sometimes refer specifically to boys regarded as catamites.

  5. Nán 男 refers generally to males, and only by extension to boys. Note incidentally that apparently even in Tang times a nán ér 男兒 tends to be a young man rather than a boy.

  6. Zǐ 子 refers generally to children, but it is often hard to distinguish the meaning from that of boy, when the reference obviously is to males. See CHILD.

  7. Ruò zǐ 弱子 refers to a (probably male) child as an object of maternal love, and there is pervasive doubt whether this term refers to a boy or a girl, although given traditional preoccupations with boys, one suspects the typical reference is taken to little boys needful of motherly care. See CHILD.

• MALE
  

  1. The current general term is nán 男 (opp. nǚ 女 "female) or, more administratively and technically nán zǐ 男子 (opp. nǚ zǐ 女子 "female").

  2. Mǔ 牡 refers to the male of birds and beasts in purely biological terms.

  3. Xióng 雄 denotes maleness, but often connotes virility, strength and domination as well.

  4. Zhàng fū 丈夫 (opp. fù rén 婦人 "woman") is a current, probably colloquial, word for an adult male.

  5. Fū 夫 is a dignified term for an adult male.

• WOMAN
  

  1. The current general word for a woman is nu# 女 (ant. nán 男 "male"), and the word can also refer to unmarried women.

  2. Fù 婦 (ant. fū 夫 "married man") refers to a woman who is either married or definitely of marriagable age.

  3. Aυ 媼 and yù 嫗 (ant. wēng 翁 and sōu 叟 "old man") refer to old women.

  4. Bì 婢 (ant. pú 僕 "male of low status") refers to a woman of low social status.

  5. Nu# zǐ 女子 (ant. nán zǐ 男子 "male") can refer to a female child (as well as being an administrative way of referring to - preferably counted - females).

• FEMALE
  

  1. The current general word for a female of any species is cí 雌 (ant. xióng 雄 "male").

  2. Nu# 女 (ant. nán 男 "male") refers specifically to human females.

  3. Pìn 牝 (ant. mǔ 牡 "male") refers to specifically to females of animals.

  4. Zì 牸 refers to females of buffalo, but sometimes also of tiger, rhinoceros, or horse.

  5. Mǔ 母 (ant. gōng 公 "male") refers to adult females of some species, including spirits. NB incidentally: Mǔ jī 母雞 is current, while mǔ niǎo 母鳥 does not seem to be found.

  6. Kūn 坤 (ant. qián 乾 "metaphysically: male") is a metaphysical way of characterising things as belonging to the female realm. (NB incidentally and irrelevantly as a modern Chinese reflex kūn biǎo 坤錶 "women's watch".)

• DIVIDE
  

  1. The most current general word for physically diving things into separate parts is fēn 分 (ant. yī 一 "treat as one undivided whole, to unite") and this word may refer to destroying the unity of what is being divided.

  2. Bié 別 (ant. tóng 同 "treat as the same, treat the same way") is to separate physically what can be separated out without interfering with integrity of the things separated. ( 別男女 "separate men from women")

  3. Xī 析 is to split and divide what is naturally unsplit and undivided.

  4. Lí 離 (ant. hé 合 "combine into one") is to keep apart what naturally is apart.

Word relations
• Ant: (MALE)女/FEMALE Nu# 女 (ant. nán 男 "male") refers specifically to human females. 3 Attributions