Tips for reading Japanese Kanji?

Hi all,

I understand a little amount about kanji characters and their properties, such as multiple "readings".

Is there a general rule about kanji readings? How do you know whether to pronounce the on-reading instead of kun-reading?

For example, 東京 uses both on-reading, but in other place names "東" is usually kun-reading.

Also, when is kanji read with nanori-reading?

Thanks in advance for any help.

------- How do you know whether to pronounce the on-reading instead of kun-reading?----------

I know Japanese kanji is all combined in various ways with kun and on readings.
'Higashiyama' as an example, both use kun reading. Tokyo is 'on' reading as you stated.
There is no specific way I don't think other then to say you have to learn each words, not just by each Chinese character, as David explained in other thread. Some words are modifiers as in adjectives and adverbs.

'kun' is Japanese pronounciation of Chinese characters.
'on' is reading phonetically

----Also, when is kanji read with nanori-reading?------

Is used when introducing your name. (I think)

How do you know which reading to use? You spend years memorising them, and then you often still get it wrong ;-)

With place names and people's names, even Japanese people often don't know how to read the name correctly if they don't know the person or haven't been to the place before.

------How do you know which reading to use?------

You can familialize the readings on Chinese characters by studying kanji dictionary. That would be your best bet.