Handbook of the Ryukyuan Languages - History, Structure, and Use. Handbooks of Japanese Language and Linguistics, Vol 11.

The UNESCO atlas on endangered languages recognizes the Ryukyuan languages as constituting languages in their own right. This represents a dramatic shift in the ontology of Japan’s linguistic make-up. Ryukyuan linguistics needs to be established as an independent field of study with its own research agenda and objects. This handbook delineates that the UNESCO classification is now well established and adequate. Linguists working on the Ryukyuan languages are well advised to refute the ontological status of the Ryukyuan languages as dialects. The Ryukyuan languages constitute a branch of the Japonic language family, which consists of five unroofed Abstand (language by distance) languages.The __Handbook of Ryukyuan Languages__ provides for the most appropriate and up-to-date answers pertaining to Ryukyuan language structures and use, and the ways in which these languages relate to Ryukyuan society and history. It comprises 33 chapters, written by the leading experts of Ryukyuan languages. Each chapter delineates the boundaries and the research history of the field it addresses, comprises the most important and representative information. Preface Introduction to the Handbooks of Japanese Language and Linguistics Table of contents Acknowledgements Contributors List of tables List of figures List of abbreviations Introduction: Ryukyuan languages and Ryukyuan linguistics I. Overview 1. The Linguistic archeology of the Ryukyu Islands 2. Proto-Ryukyuan 3. A Sketch History of Pre-Chamberlainian Western Studies of Ryukyuan 4. B. J. Bettelheim 1849: The first grammar of Ryukyuan II. Linguistic features 5. Ryukyuan languages: A grammar overview 6. A generative approach to focusing in Okinawan 7. Lexicon 8. Phonological aspects of Ryukyuan languages 9. Intonation in Okinawan 10. The tense-aspect-mood systems of the Ryukyuan languages 11. Tense, Aspect, and Mood in Miyara Yaeyaman 12. Okinawan kakari musubi in historical and comparative perspectives III. Grammars of individual languages 13. Amami grammar 14. Okinoerabu grammar 15. Shuri Okinawan grammar 16. Tarama Miyako grammar 17. Hateruma Yaeyama grammar 18. Dunan grammar (Yonaguni Ryukyuan) IV. Sociolinguistics 19. Substrate-influenced Japanese and code-switching 20. Local language varieties and the media 21. Uchinaaguchi in the linguistic landscape of Heiwa Dori and Makishi Market 22. Uchinaaguchi as an online symbolic resource within and across the Okinawan diaspora 23. Orthography development V. Sociology of language 24. Japanese language spread 25. Language shift 26. Language and identity in Okinawa and Amami: Past, present and future 27. Linguistic and cultural revitalization 28. Chinese kanwa textbooks: Language education, power and cultural expansion 29. Ryukyuan languages in Ryukyuan music VI. Bibliography 30. A selected bibliography of Ryukyuan dialectology Index

The UNESCO atlas on endangered languages recognizes the Ryukyuan languages as constituting languages in their own right. This represents a dramatic shift in the ontology of Japan’s linguistic make-up. Ryukyuan linguistics needs to be established as an independent field of study with its own research agenda and objects. This handbook delineates that the UNESCO classification is now well established and adequate. Linguists working on the Ryukyuan languages are well advised to refute the ontological status of the Ryukyuan languages as dialects. The Ryukyuan languages constitute a branch of the Japonic language family, which consists of five unroofed Abstand (language by distance) languages.The Handbook of Ryukyuan Languages provides for the most appropriate and up-to-date answers pertaining to Ryukyuan language structures and use, and the ways in which these languages relate to Ryukyuan society and history. It comprises 33 chapters, written by the leading experts of Ryukyuan languages. Each chapter delineates the boundaries and the research history of the field it addresses, comprises the most important and representative information.

This handbook offers the most appropriate and up-to-date answers pertaining to Ryukyuan language structures and use, and the ways in which these languages relate to Ryukyuan society and history. Each of the more than 30 chaptersdelineates the research history of its area, comprises the most important and representative information on the state of research, spells out future research desiderata, and includes a comprehensive bibliography. The handbook will serve as standard reference work for many years to come