浅い
あさい · asai · JLPT N4 · i-adj
shallow
🦶💧 asai sounds like a sigh: so shallow it only wets your feet
浅 pairs the water radical 氵 with 戋, a component meaning small or scant: scant water = shallow. The same word covers shallow rivers, light sleep, pale colours and superficial knowledge. Its opposite is 深い (fukai), deep.
浅 — water radical 氵 + 戔 (small/thin)
浅 is a semantic-phonetic compound. The water radical 氵 gives the meaning (relating to water), while 戔 (originally depicting small or slight things) supplies the sound and reinforces the sense of 'little'. Together they mean 'shallow water', later extended to 'shallow' or 'superficial' in general.