Miyako

Language

Also known as Miyako language · Irabu language · Iravcï language · Miyakoan

Subclass of: Southern Ryukyuan
Indigenous to: Miyako Islands
, Okinawa Prefecture

Overview

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia · Read full article · Text CC BY-SA 4.0

The Miyakoan language is a diverse dialect cluster spoken in the Miyako Islands, located southwest of Okinawa. The combined population of the islands is about 52,000. Miyakoan is a Southern Ryukyuan language, most closely related to Yaeyama. As of 2025, the number of competent native speakers is not definitively known. As a consequence of the Japanese government's Japanese language policy, which has traditionally referred to the language as 宮古方言 , or simply a dialect of standard Japanese, it is not taught or used in schools. As a result, most people born after 1970 tend to not use the language except in songs and rituals, and the younger generation almost exclusively uses Japanese as their first language. UNESCO classified Miyakoan as a "definitely endangered" language in its Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger in February, 2009. The Endangered Languages Project currently classifies the language as "severely endangered."

Overview

All data

23 statements · 30% with external sources · numbers in brackets are citations

UNESCO language status: 3 definitely endangered
1
Sources
1.Stated in Red Book of Endangered Languagesunesco.org/languages-atlas/en/atlasmap/language-id-1973.htmlRetrieved 2018-06-24
View statement on Wikidata ↗
Ethnologue language status: 8a Moribund
1
Sources
1.Stated in Ethnologueethnologue.com/language/mviRetrieved 2019-05-10
View statement on Wikidata ↗
Country: Japan
1
Sources
1.“ScriptSource - Japan”scriptsource.org/country/JPRetrieved 2023-08-19
View statement on Wikidata ↗
Follows: Proto-Miyako

On other databases

12 identifiers linking Miyako across the web's reference databases

Data quality

statements

30%

externally sourced

Source last edited August 31, 2026. AIDB refreshes this page daily.

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AIDB. (2026). Miyako (Q36218). Retrieved from https://aidb.si/e/miyako-Q36218