The Tokunoshima language ( ''Shimaguchi'' or ''Shimayumiita''), also Toku-No-Shima, is a

dialect cluster A dialect continuum or dialect chain is a series of language varieties spoken across some geographical area such that neighboring varieties are mutually intelligible, but the differences accumulate over distance so that widely separated vari ...

spoken on

Tokunoshima , also known in English as is an island in the Amami archipelago of the southern Satsunan Islands of Kagoshima Prefecture, Japan. The island, in area, has a population of approximately 27,000. The island is divided into three administrative ...

Kagoshima Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located on the island of Kyushu and the Ryukyu Islands. Kagoshima Prefecture has a population of 1,599,779 (1 January 2020) and has a geographic area of 9,187 km2 (3,547 sq mi). Kagoshima Prefecture borders Kumamoto P ...

of southwestern

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...

. It is part of the Amami–Okinawan languages, which are part of the

Japonic languages Japonic or Japanese–Ryukyuan, sometimes also Japanic, is a language family comprising Japanese, spoken in the main islands of Japan, and the Ryukyuan languages, spoken in the Ryukyu Islands. The family is universally accepted by linguists, and ...

Dialects

Okamura (2007) posits two divisions of Tokunoshima: Kametsu–Amagi in the north and Isen in the south. Kametsu is the traditional politico-cultural center of the island. It has been a center of distributions of new lexical traits, some of which were not confined in Tokunoshima Town but spread to Amagi Town in the northeast and, less frequently, to Isen. The dialects of Isen are considered more conservative by the speakers.

Folk terminology

According to Okamura Takahiro (b. 1936 in Asama, Amagi Town), the speakers of Tokunoshima call their tongues ''sïmagucï'', which consists of two morphemes. The first part ''sïma'' (Standard Japanese ''shima'') refers to an island both in Standard Japanese and Tokunoshima but it also means (one's own) local community in Tokunoshima and other Amami dialects. The second part ''kucï'' (Standard Japanese ''kuchi'') means a mouth, and by extension, speech. Hence, ''sïmagucï'' refers to the speech of one's own community and of the island as a whole. Note that ''sïmagucï'' is more strongly associated with the former because the speakers of Tokunoshima are fully aware that each ''shima'' has a distinct language.

Phonology

The following is the phonology of the Kametsu dialect, which is based on Hirayama et al. (1986).

Consonants

As with most Ryukyuan languages to the north of Central Okinawan, stops are described as "plain" C’ and "glottalized" C‘. Phonetically, the two series are lightly aspirated and tenuis , respectively.Samuel E. Martin (1970) "Shodon: A Dialect of the Northern Ryukyus", in the ''Journal of the American Oriental Society'', vol. 90, no. 1 (Jan–Mar), pp. 97–139. Notes *The

zero onset In orthography, a zero consonant, silent initial, or null-onset letter is a consonant letter that does not correspond to a consonant sound, but is required when a word or syllable starts with a vowel (i.e. has a null onset). Some abjads, abugidas, ...

/'/ may be added. It is contrasted with glottal and . * is before and , and before and . * is new and infrequent. *, and are realized as , and , respectively. * is before and , and elsewhere. *, , and are phonemically analyzed as , , and , respectively. *, , and are phonemically analyzed as , , and , respectively. *, and are phonemically analyzed as , and , respectively.

Vowels

Tokunoshima has , , , , , and , long and short.

Correspondences to Standard Japanese

Only major sound correspondences are listed. *Standard Japanese mostly corresponds to . *Standard Japanese is merged into . *Tokunoshima , and are of secondary origin and mostly correspond to Standard Japanese diphthongs. *Standard Japanese and corresponds to Tokunoshima and , respectively. *Standard Japanese and , and , and and are merged into , , and , respectively. *The fusion of two consecutive morae resulted in glottalized consonants in Tokunoshima.

References

Sources

*''Tokunoshima hōgen jiten'' (2014) by Okamura Takahiro, Sawaki Motoei, Nakajima Yumi, Fukushima Chitsuko and Kikuchi Satoru. Based on Okamura's Asama dialect.

External links

Literature on the Tokunoshima dialect by Fukushima Chitsuko
(in Japanese) {{DEFAULTSORT:Tokunoshima Language Kagoshima Prefecture Ryukyuan languages