Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Traffic safety slogan signs in Kin, Okinawa, written in Japanese (center) and Okinawan (left and right).. The Ryukyuan languages (琉球語派, Ryūkyū-goha, also 琉球諸語, Ryūkyū-shogo or 島言葉 in Ryukyuan, Shima kotoba, literally "Island Speech"), also Lewchewan or Luchuan (/ l uː ˈ tʃ uː ə n /), are the indigenous languages of the Ryukyu Islands, the southernmost part of the ...
Within these languages exist dialects of local towns and specific islands, many of which have gone extinct. Although the Shuri dialect of Okinawan was historically a prestige language of the Kingdom of Ryukyu, there is no officially standardized Ryukyuan language.
Okinawan (沖縄口, ウチナーグチ, Uchināguchi, [ʔut͡ɕinaːɡut͡ɕi]), or more precisely Central Okinawan, is a Northern Ryukyuan language spoken primarily in the southern half of the island of Okinawa, as well as in the surrounding islands of Kerama, Kumejima, Tonaki, Aguni and a number of smaller peripheral islands. [3]
The Ryukyu Kingdom (1372–1879) on Okinawa Island used various writing conventions, all of which were markedly different from spoken registers. A unique feature of Ryūkyū's writing conventions is that in the Old Ryūkyū period (?–1609), it developed a predominantly kana writing convention that was based on sōrō-style Written Japanese but exhibited heavy Okinawan influence.
Japonic or Japanese–Ryukyuan (Japanese: 日琉語族, romanized: Nichiryū gozoku), sometimes also Japanic, [1] is a language family comprising Japanese, spoken in the main islands of Japan, and the Ryukyuan languages, spoken in the Ryukyu Islands.
The Southern Ryukyuan languages (南琉球語群, Minami Ryūkyū gogun) form one of two branches of the Ryukyuan languages. They are spoken on the Sakishima Islands in Okinawa Prefecture . The three languages are Miyako (on the Miyako Islands ) and Yaeyama and Yonaguni (on the Yaeyama Islands , of the Macro-Yaeyama subgroup).
[4] [5] As a result of language mixing between Standard Japanese and a Ryukyuan substrate, new varieties of Japanese have arisen in the Ryukyu Islands. In Okinawa, this is known as Uchinaa-Yamatoguchi (Okinawan Japanese). In Amami Ōshima, it's called Ton-futsūgo (Amami Japanese). [10] In 2009, UNESCO included the Ryukyuan languages in its ...
The Northern Ryukyuan languages, also known as the Amami–Okinawan languages, are a group of languages spoken in the Amami Islands, Kagoshima Prefecture and the Okinawa Islands, Okinawa Prefecture of southwestern Japan. It is one of two primary branches of the Ryukyuan languages, which are then part of the Japonic languages. The subdivisions ...