Ryukyuan

The Ryukyuan languages are the indigenous languages of the Ryukyu Islands, the southernmost part of the Japanese archipelago, and together with Japanese and Hachijo they make up the Japonic language family. They are not mutually intelligible with standard Japanese, or reliably with one another, despite having historically been classified as Japanese dialects for political reasons, and they split into a Northern group (Amami, Kunigami, Okinawan) and a Southern group (Miyakoan, Yaeyama, Yonaguni). UNESCO lists four Ryukyuan languages as definitely endangered and two as severely endangered, and fluent speakers are now largely restricted to the older generation, with projections suggesting the languages could disappear by 2050.