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 family is universally accepted by linguists, and significant progress has been made in reconstructing the proto-language, Proto-Japonic.[2] The reconstruction implies a split between all dialects of Japanese and all Ryukyuan varieties, probably before the 7th century. The Hachijō language, spoken on the Izu Islands, is also included, but its position within the family is unclear.
Most scholars believe that Japonic was brought to the Japanese archipelago from the Korean peninsula with the Yayoi culture during the 1st millennium BC. There is some fragmentary evidence suggesting that Japonic languages may still have been spoken in central and southern parts of the Korean peninsula (see Peninsular Japonic) in the early centuries AD.
Possible genetic relationships with many other language families have been proposed, most systematically with Koreanic, but none have been conclusively demonstrated.
^Robbeets, Martine (2017-01-01). "Austronesian influence and Transeurasian ancestry in Japanese: A case of farming/language dispersal". Language Dynamics and Change. 7 (2): 210–251. doi:10.1163/22105832-00702005. ISSN 2210-5832.
language families have been proposed, most systematically with Koreanic, but none have been conclusively demonstrated. The extant Japoniclanguages belong...
classification of the Japoniclanguages and their external relations is unclear. Linguists traditionally consider the Japoniclanguages to belong to an independent...
proposed language family that would include the Turkic, Mongolic and Tungusic language families and possibly also the Japonic and Koreanic languages.: 73 ...
that Japoniclanguages were spoken in central and southern parts of the peninsula. There have been many attempts to link Koreanic with other language families...
Austroasiatic, Austronesian, Japonic, Dravidian, Indo-European, Afroasiatic, Turkic, Sino-Tibetan, Kra–Dai and Koreanic. Many languages of Asia, such as Chinese...
language, they make up the Japoniclanguage family. Although Japanese is spoken in the Ryukyu Islands, the Ryukyu and Japanese languages are not mutually intelligible...
with Japanese, these languages are part of the Japoniclanguage family, but they are separate languages,[citation needed] and are not mutually intelligible...
other scholars have emphasized similarities with Japoniclanguages. Lee and Ramsey suggest that the language was intermediate between the two families. Other...
The geographically proximate languages of Japanese (part of the Japoniclanguages) and Korean (part of the Koreanic languages) share considerable similarity...
includes all other Turkic languages. Turkic languages show many similarities with the Mongolic, Tungusic, Koreanic, and Japoniclanguages. These similarities...
Japanese constitutes a branch of the Japanese subgroup of the Japoniclanguages (Insular Japonic), with the other varieties of Old Japanese, which all descend...
Yayoi culture are regarded as the spreaders of agriculture and the Japoniclanguages throughout the whole archipelago, and were characterized by both local...
it is the national language, and within the Japanese diaspora worldwide. The Japonic family also includes the Ryukyuan languages and the variously classified...
hypothesized by Benedict who added the Japoniclanguages to the proposal as well. A link with the Austroasiatic languages in an 'Austric' phylum is based mostly...
is one of two primary branches of the Ryukyuan languages, which are then part of the Japoniclanguages. The subdivisions of Northern Ryukyuan are a matter...
Ryukyuan language split from Proto-Japonic when its speakers migrated to the Ryukyu Islands. The Ryukyuan languages split from Proto-Japonic in the last...
clause). An example of such a language is Navajo. These languages are said to have nonreduced relative clauses. These languages have a structure equivalent...
comprising Japoniclanguages, Korean, Tungusic languages and Turkic languages, but this view has been severely criticized. Contemporary Mongolic languages are...
Austronesian languages Distribution of Koreanic languages Distribution of Japoniclanguages Distribution of Ainu languages Distribution of Nivkh languages Distribution...
equivalent in any modern Japanese dialect or any other Japoniclanguage. Instead, all modern Japoniclanguages and dialects express the prohibitive with a suffixal...
notable among the Japonic languages in that it allows non-nasal syllable-final consonants, something not found in most Japoniclanguages. The most divergent...
consonants and vowels. As is typical of Japoniclanguages, Old Japanese was primarily an agglutinative language with a subject–object–verb word order,...
related to the extinct Khitan language. It was believed that Mongolian was related to Turkic, Tungusic, Korean and Japoniclanguages but this view is now seen...
Kikai dialects are members of the Amami–Okinawan languages, which are part of the Japoniclanguages. The classification of Kikai is disputed. Some even...
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