How to Write 嘛 (ma/má) — Meaning “(Particle) Indicating obviousness / (Dialect) What”

Imagine opening your mouth (口) to say 'Ma!' while holding a piece of hemp (麻). The hemp plant sounds like 'ma' and the mouth shows you are speaking, helping you recall that 嘛 is a spoken particle for obviousness.

The left 口 should be small and placed high, not in the middle. The right 麻 has a wide top stroke (广) and a balanced bottom 木; a common mistake is making the 口 too large or the 麻 too narrow, which disrupts the character's proportion.

㕡 (hè) is extremely rare and has the component 霍 on the right, while 啻 (chì) means 'only' or 'but' and is not used in daily conversation. In contrast, 嘛 is a common particle in modern Chinese, used to state the obvious or in dialectal phrases like 干嘛.

嘛 is used as a modal particle to show something is obvious, as in 就是嘛 ('exactly, that's right'). It also appears in the question word 干嘛 (gàn má, 'what are you doing?'), which is very common in informal spoken Chinese. Remember it adds a casual, confirming tone.

Common words containing 嘛 include: 干嘛 (gàn má) — what are you doing? / why?; 就是嘛 (jiù shì ma) — exactly; that's right (used for emphasis).