Can one chinese character represent many different words?

Question

Take a look at this character

https://www.mdbg.net/chinese/dictionary?page=worddict&wdrst=0&wdqtm=0&wdqcham=1&wdqt=%E5%87%A0

几

It has 3 meanings and has a different tone

If it's true that one character can represent other words, please show me other samples.

Answer 1

Yes.

处 also has two different readings:

chǔ

and

chù

with many different meanings.

chǔ for instance means:

to reside / to live / to dwell / to be in / to be situated at / to stay / to get along with / to be in a position of / to deal with / to discipline / to punish

while chù means:

place / location / spot / point / office / department / bureau / respect / classifier for locations or items of damage: spot, point

This is not uncommon, especially with simplified characters as sometimes multiple traditional characters get simplified into the same singular character, you just need to know when what means what.

Answer 2

Can one chinese character represent many different words?

Most Chinese characters only pertain to something, akin to prefixes or suffixes in English, and ordinarily not used alone. When someone asks what does this character mean? the answer typically varies with what word it's contained in.

For example 平 (flat) would not ordinarily be used by itself (although occasionally it is); it'd usually belong to a word such as 平衡 (balance), 和平 (peace), 平安 (safety), 公平 (fair), 平凡 (ordinary), etc.

With that in mind, single-character words are relatively few, but they can have multiple distinct meanings. Here are some examples which arise in early Chinese studies:

• 米 (mǐ) means both "a meter" (一百米 = 100 meters) and "rice" (两斤米 = 1kg rice)
• 生 (shēng) means both "to give birth" (我生宝宝了 = I gave birth) and "raw" (那个肉是生的 = that meat is raw).
• 站 (zhàn) means both "to stand" (我站在这儿 = I stand here) and "station" (这是哪个站? = what station is this?)
• 等 (děng) means both "to wait" (我等你 = I wait for you) and "etc." (房子、汽车等 = house, car, etc.)
• 角 (jiǎo) means both "corner" (三角形有三个角 = triangles have three corners) and "0.1 yuan" (一元等于十角 = one yuan equals 10 jiao)
• 读 (dú) means both "to study" (读科学 = study science) and "to read" (读书 = read a book)
• 贵 (guì) means both "expensive" (太贵了 = too expensive) and "precious" (很贵的宝宝 = precious baby)

Sometimes they also have different pronunciations:

• 还 means both "still" [pronounced hái] (你还爱我吗? = do you still love me?) and "to return" [pronounced huán] (我还了车 = I returned the car)
• 只 means "only" [pronounced zhǐ] (我只是一个人) and is a measure word for certain animals [pronounced zhī] (一只鸟 = a bird)

Some of the above examples have additional meanings.