What happens when a speaker could not read a kanji character when reading a text out loud?


I am currently in the process of slowly learning kanji. I have found out that
there are 2136 characters of general use "joyo" kanji, but it is said that the
total number of kanji characters could be very well over 50,000, though
obviously it is very rarely used, if at all.

A question then came into mind. What happens when someone already fluent in
joyo kanji (imagine a native japanese high school student in his/her final
year) were to read a printed text out loud that happens to contain a single
kanji they did not know before? Did they simply skip it? Or is it actually
possible to make an educated guess of the pronunciation of the character?

I would imagine it would be common courtesy to at least provide furigana when
printing kanji outside of the joyo list, but I do wonder what happens when it
is printed without.

Obviously being a relative beginner in japanese, I could not provide an
example, so it would be nice if the answer also contains an example.




> Did they simply skip it? Or is it actually possible to make an educated
> guess of the pronunciation of the character?

In the majority of cases, they can make a guess (although it may be
incorrect). Most kanji, especially difficult ones, are [phono-
semantic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_character_classification#Phono-
semantic_compound_characters), and one can guess the on-reading of a phono-
semantic kanji by looking at its radicals. Typically the radical at the right
is the phonetic component.

For example, you may be able to read 犠牲 and 憧憬 correctly if you know how to
read 義, 生, 童 and 景, which are much easier. 噴, 墳 and 憤 share the same on-
reading (ふん), so if you know the reading of one of them, you may be able to
read 古墳, 憤死 and 噴火, too. Actually these examples are not particularly
difficult to educated adults, but the same strategy basically works for much
rarer non-joyo kanji, too.

This obviously does not work for difficult kun-readings and
[jukujikun](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/24513/5010) such as 向日葵
(ひまわり), but most difficult words native speakers are likely to encounter in
everyday life are on-on compounds.

See also: [Do native speakers consciously use phonetic elements in
形声文字?](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/6727/5010)




> Did they simply skip it? Or is it actually possible to make an educated
> guess of the pronunciation of the character?

In the majority of cases, they can make a guess (although it may be
incorrect). Most kanji, especially difficult ones, are [phono-
semantic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_character_classification#Phono-
semantic_compound_characters), and one can guess the on-reading of a phono-
semantic kanji by looking at its radicals. Typically the radical at the right
is the phonetic component.

For example, you may be able to read 犠牲 and 憧憬 correctly if you know how to
read 義, 生, 童 and 景, which are much easier. 噴, 墳 and 憤 share the same on-
reading (ふん), so if you know the reading of one of them, you may be able to
read 古墳, 憤死 and 噴火, too. Actually these examples are not particularly
difficult to educated adults, but the same strategy basically works for much
rarer non-joyo kanji, too.

This obviously does not work for difficult kun-readings and
[jukujikun](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/24513/5010) such as 向日葵
(ひまわり), but most difficult words native speakers are likely to encounter in
everyday life are on-on compounds.

See also: [Do native speakers consciously use phonetic elements in
形声文字?](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/6727/5010)

