One of the things that is still the most unclear to me about Japanese is pronunciation rules for kanji in compound words. Since I generally don't read Japanese text (instead, I use a translator), that's not much of an issue. However, I want to create some new terminology. Even if I get a list of kanji that I want to use to make the word, I don't know how the word I'd be creating would be pronounced - or how much control I have over the pronunciation if there are multiple on'yomi or kun'yomi possibilities.
For example, why is 呪術 read as "jujutsu"?
When I say that I want to make a word, I mean something like Final Fantasy 6 creating the word Runic as a skill name. In the original Japanese text, the skill was 魔封剣 - which people say is pronounced mafuuken. Why isn't it pronounced mahouken, given that 封 has both fuu and hou as on'yomi? Was that just a stylistic choice by the game designers, and they gave a furigana reading somewhere to standardize it?
Why is 人造人間 pronounced jinzouningen when ツ人 can be jin or nin, and ナ?テ is ken or kan - not gen?
As an example, I want to combine 呪,上,標, and 術 (with an intended meaning of something like "raised sign spell technique"). How would I know what on'yomi and kun'yomi options I have for its pronunciation?
What pronunciation options would I have for making a new word out of a compound word and another compound word?
For example, combining 薬品 and 魔法使 into a compound word (intended to mean something like "drug-based-magic user"), then adding 人造 to make a compound word meaning "drug-based-magic artificial user"). what kanji would i need to keep to communicate those meanings, and would I have different pronunciation options for, say, using 法 in the first compound word versus using it in the second/last compound word?
If I understand correctly, I could add a hiragana character after each kanji to identify the pronunciation I want (from the list of whatever orthographically correct options) - but I'd like to avoid that where possible.
Sorry if my questions aren't quite clear. I'm rather new to thinking about the subject.
Thanks for any answers, commentary, and/or resources!
For example, why is 呪術 read as "jujutsu"?
When I say that I want to make a word, I mean something like Final Fantasy 6 creating the word Runic as a skill name. In the original Japanese text, the skill was 魔封剣 - which people say is pronounced mafuuken. Why isn't it pronounced mahouken, given that 封 has both fuu and hou as on'yomi? Was that just a stylistic choice by the game designers, and they gave a furigana reading somewhere to standardize it?
Why is 人造人間 pronounced jinzouningen when ツ人 can be jin or nin, and ナ?テ is ken or kan - not gen?
As an example, I want to combine 呪,上,標, and 術 (with an intended meaning of something like "raised sign spell technique"). How would I know what on'yomi and kun'yomi options I have for its pronunciation?
What pronunciation options would I have for making a new word out of a compound word and another compound word?
For example, combining 薬品 and 魔法使 into a compound word (intended to mean something like "drug-based-magic user"), then adding 人造 to make a compound word meaning "drug-based-magic artificial user"). what kanji would i need to keep to communicate those meanings, and would I have different pronunciation options for, say, using 法 in the first compound word versus using it in the second/last compound word?
If I understand correctly, I could add a hiragana character after each kanji to identify the pronunciation I want (from the list of whatever orthographically correct options) - but I'd like to avoid that where possible.
Sorry if my questions aren't quite clear. I'm rather new to thinking about the subject.
Thanks for any answers, commentary, and/or resources!