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 (/luːˈtʃuːən/), are the indigenous languages of the Ryukyu Islands, the southernmost part of the Japanese archipelago.

The Ryukyuan languages have topic and focus markers, which may take different forms depending on the sentential context.

[11] Starting in the 1890s, the Japanese government began to suppress the Ryukyuan languages as part of their policy of forced assimilation in the islands.

[12] Circa 2007, in Okinawa, people under the age of 40 have little proficiency in the native Okinawan language.

It’s locally known as トン普通語 (Ton Futsūgo, literally meaning "potato [i.e. rustic] common language").

A similar commemoration is held in the Amami region on February 18 beginning in 2007, proclaimed as Hōgen no Hi (方言の日, "Dialect Day") by Ōshima Subprefecture in Kagoshima Prefecture.

Each island has its own name for the event: Yoronjima's fu (2) tu (10) ba (8) is the goroawase source of the February 18 date, much like with Okinawa Prefecture's use of kutuba.

[21] However, Ryukyuan may have already begun to diverge from Proto-Japonic before this migration, while its speakers still dwelt in the main islands of Japan.

[22] This situation lasted until the Kyushu-based Satsuma Domain conquered the Ryukyu Islands in the 17th century.

[22] In 1846-1849 first Protestant missionary in Ryukyu Bernard Jean Bettelheim studied local languages, partially translated the Bible into them and published first grammar of Shuri Ryukyuan.

[24] Students caught speaking the Ryukyuan languages were made to wear a dialect card (方言札 hōgen fuda), a method of public humiliation.

[25] In 1940, there was a political debate amongst Japanese leaders about whether or not to continue the oppression of the Ryukyuan languages, although the argument for assimilation prevailed.

[26] In the World War II era, speaking the Ryukyuan languages was officially illegal, although in practice the older generation was still monolingual.

[27] This policy of linguicide lasted into the post-war occupation of the Ryukyu Islands by the United States.

[25] As the American occupation forces generally promoted the reforming of a separate Ryukyuan culture, many Okinawan officials continued to strive for Japanification as a form of defiance.

The Ryukyuan languages are spoken on the Ryukyu Islands, which comprise the southernmost part of the Japanese archipelago.

However, this was a sharp contrast from Japan at the time, where classical Chinese writing was mostly used for official texts, only using hiragana for informal ones.

Omoro Sōshi (1531–1623), a noted Ryukyuan song collection, was mainly written in hiragana.

Sounds not distinguished in the Japanese writing system, such as glottal stops, are not properly written.

Sometimes local kun'yomi are given to kanji, such as agari (あがり "east") for 東, iri (いり "west") for 西, thus 西表 is Iriomote.

Okinawa Prefectural government set up the investigative commission for orthography of shimakutuba (しまくとぅば正書法検討委員会, Shimakutuba seishohō kentō iinkai) in 2018, and the commission proposed an unified spelling rule based on katakana for languages of Kunigami, Okinawa, Miyako, Yaeyama and Yonaguni on May 30 in 2022.

[30] Ryukyuan languages often share many phonological features with Japanese, including a voicing opposition for obstruents, CV(C) syllable structure, moraic rhythm, and pitch accent.

For instance, Ōgami does not have phonemic voicing in obstruents, allows CCVC syllables, and has unusual syllabic consonants such as /kff/ [kf̩ː] "make".

For instance, the Irabu dialect of the Miyako language only allows glottalization with /t/ and /c/: /ttjaa/ [ˀtʲaː] "then", /ccir/ [ˀtɕiɭ] "pipe".

[34][note 2] However, the syllable may still sometimes be relevant—for instance, the Ōgami topic marker takes a different form after open syllables with short vowels:[35] Ryukyuan languages typically have a pitch accent system where some mora in a word bears the pitch accent.

[38] One strategy they use is compounding with a free-standing noun:[38] imi-small+ ffachild→ imi-ffasmall childimi- + ffa → imi-ffasmall {} child {} {small child}kjura-beautiful+ ʔkinkimono→ kjura-ginbeautiful kimonokjura- + ʔkin → kjura-ginbeautiful {} kimono {} {beautiful kimono}Compounding is found in both Northern and Southern Ryukyuan, but is mostly absent from Hateruma (Yaeyama).

[37] Hateruma Yaeyama stands out in that it is a zero-marking language, where word order rather than case marking is important:[41] pïtu=Øperson=COREbudur-ja-ta-ndance-PRF-PAST-REALpïtu=Ø budur-ja-ta-nperson=CORE dance-PRF-PAST-REAL"People danced.