The Chinese Character for woman looks much like the symbol of a man with a womb.
The word is pronounced nu.
There are many derivations that can come from this character. The more obvious ones involve different words that can represent women.
For instance, if you combine the symbol with the word for child haizi you get the word for a daughter or young girl. nuhaizi
The character can be combined with the word for power, quan and result in the word for women's rights.
Combine the word with spirit, shen, and you result in the word for goddess.
But even more interesting than those words are how the character can be combined to form how the culture looked at different concepts.
For instance, if you combine the character of woman and put a roof over her head, you end up with the word an, which could means tranquility. One way to interpret this is, one is not happy unless there is a happy woman at home.
When there's the symbol of the sun above the woman, you have the word for peace. yan. Thus, the idea that peace can only come if man and woman are aligned and together.
The symbol of a woman followed by that of a mouth means "as" and then when you put it over the symbol of a heart, you end up with forgive. shu
When combined with the symbol of a child, you get the word for good. hao. This is the symbol that appears in the common greeting, Ni hao ma?.
