Kiku is a Japanese word for listen. It is comprised of smaller characters that together, as my guest Haru Yamada puts it, “generate the secret alchemy of listening: an ear on the left and fourteen hearts on the right, conjuring a person listening with the energy of fourteen hearts.”
Think for a moment what it means to listen with the energy of fourteen hearts.
Imagine what that makes possible!
“Listening is expansive — and like curiosity — an open-ended thing. So it’s being able to grapple with and cope with uncertainty and ambiguity…and just sit with it.” ~ Haru Yamada
Haru Yamada, PhD. is a self-described global nomad and sociolinguist who loves thinking and writing about how people talk and listen across cultures. Her book, 聴くKIKU The Japanese Art of Good Listening was released in the UK in March 2025, and in the US in October 2025. You can find her Sounds Good writing on Substack at @haruyamada.
Theme music by Sean Balick. ”Wahre” by Cloud Harbor via Blue Dot Sessions.