DICTIONARY · CC-CEDICT
社
Mandarin · pinyin shè
Meanings
- (bound form) society; organization; agency
- (old) god of the land
Characters in this entry
- 社
- shè · god of the soil and altars to him; group of families; company, society
Explore the spelling
Mandarin tones
4 · she4
Compare attested words with these syllables ↗Dictionary tones. Connected speech can change their realization.
Connected dictionary
1character link31same-tone records
Counts describe dictionary records, not word frequency or semantic similarity. Source identities stay separate.Read this spelling in Classical texts
Follow a written form into the eight pinned witnesses: Analects, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi, Sunzi and the Mao Shijing. A match is a place to investigate; it does not prove that a modern dictionary sense fits the passage.
Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 9 senses · 2 Cantonese readings
Rime Cantonese 粵拼
se5 · se6
Cantonese word readings for 社. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.
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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section
Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.
character
- (historical) god of the soil
- (historical) altar for offering sacrifices to the god of the soil
- (historical) festival for offering sacrifices to the god of the soil
- (historical) to offer sacrifices to the god of the soil
- (historical) an ancient grass-root administrative unit
- organized body; society; association
- agency (used for certain agencies that provide services)
- a surname, She
- (in Vietnam) commune (third level division along with wards and commune-level towns)
Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history
Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source & license · Data pack