女子

The Chinese word 女子 (nǚzǐ) for "woman" or "female" is composed of two characters: 女 (nǚ) and 子 (zǐ). The character 女 originally depicted a woman kneeling with her hands crossed in front of her, representing the traditional role of women in Chinese society. It is also used as a prefix to indicate female-related words, such as 女性 (nǚxìng, "female") and 女孩 (nǚhái, "girl").The character 子 (zǐ) originally depicted a child, and is often used as a suffix to indicate a person or thing, such as 学生 (xuésheng, "student") and 房子 (fángzi, "house"). In the context of 女子, 子 is used to indicate that the word refers to a female person.Together, the characters 女 and 子 form the word 女子 (nǚzǐ), which specifically refers to a woman or a female person. It is commonly used in both formal and informal settings, and is the standard term for "woman" in Mandarin Chinese.