I'm not sure what you mean by separating "meaning" from "roots". To myself they are one in the same (the root word or a meaning of the root "word", there is no

I'm not sure what you mean by separating "meaning" from "roots". To myself they are one in the same (the root word or a meaning of the root "word", there is no difference in my opinion). Could you provide some examples of what you mean? Maybe I'm thinking too literally or you meant "root" (as in radicals) different from "root" (as in root word). 「自転車」, 「図書館」, 「作家」, 「日光」,「棋士」. You even have witty ones like 「親子丼」. Just have to be careful about ones like 「多少」. The reason I would say not to rely on such literal meanings to define words is because some require some stretch of the imagination like「子宮」 and my rule of thumb is if it it requires a stretch of the imagination it's because it doesn't actually mean that. But literal translations can still be useful as mnemonics to learn new words/kanji. Like a pair of training wheels that eventually get removed.