拉屎
lā​shǐ

defecate

拉 lā, la pull

Phonosemantic compound. 扌 represents the meaning and 立 represents the sound.

Components

扌
扌 Meaning component
shou, shǒu hand

扌 is a component form of 手.

立
立 Sound component
lì stand
Change in sound

Character Evolution

Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Regular Modern

Component uses

Sound (1)

啦

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartlop[r]ˤəp break

說文解字

《說文》：“拉，摧也。从手，立聲。”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)

屎 shǐ excrement

Depicts a person (尸) defecating feces.

Components

尸
尸 Iconic component
shī sitting person
◎
◎ Iconic component
characterless component

Depicts feces. Unrelated to 米.


Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-SagartsyijX[qʰ]ijʔ excrement
xjij[qʰ]ij (dialect: *qʰ- > *x-, no palatalization)moan

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica