Lesser-Known Languages (LKL): Yonaguni
A language and island that deserve to be known for more than an underwater myth
I spent over 5 years living in Japan without knowing there was a Japanese island only 111 kilometers (70 miles) away from Taiwan: Yonaguni. I only discovered it in 2021 through Kainuguni’s Twitter account and was instantly in awe.
Kainuguni writes Yonaguni with Kanji and kanas like Japanese does but the combination looked nothing like Japanese. For example, 面白んすや isn’t a possible sentence in Japanese. An “n” (ん) cannot follow directly omoshiro (面白).
It turns out the Yonaguni language, also called 与那国物言 or ドゥナンムヌイ (Dunan-munui
), is one of the five—or six, depending on how you count— Ryukyuan languages that are spoken throughout the Ryukyu islands (the most southern islands of Japan).
The Ryukyu islands used to form the strong and commercially very active Ryukyu Kingdom but they were subjugated by Japan in 1879. The islands’ official language therefore became Japanese while the actual languages used on a day-to-day basis stayed Ryukyuan languages.
Unfortunately, Japanese started overtaking local languages during the 20th century and they are now endangered languages. Yonaguni is spoken by about 400 people today, most of whom are elders.
Still, some people are trying to keep the language alive and save it for future generations. Among others, Kainuguni is a non-heritage speaker of the language and contributes to safeguarding the language through his Twitter presence (and his help in writing the language section of this piece!)
A movie about the island called Bachiranun
(ばちらぬん), completely in the Yonaguni language, came out in late 2021, along with a short documentary about life on the island.
Before we get to the language itself, let’s turn to the island’s history and a few cultural aspects.
History
Finding information about the island’s history is close to impossible in English for one single reason: the discovery of something now known as the “Yonaguni monument.” It’s been the center of attention regarding the island for so long that no matter how much I searched in English, nothing remotely detailed or quoted came up.
We’ll get back to this in a moment but, first, let me share what I found in Japanese.1
The first trace of existence on Yonaguni goes back to 4,500 years ago and was found at the Tuguru-Hama ruins (トゥグル浜遺跡) only 20 years ago, in 2002. That same research team also dated the rocks to find the water level was at this level for at least 6,500 years.
No trace of people living on Yonaguni appeared from there on until the 15th century, when the island was mentioned in 1479 in The Veritable Records of King Sejong (世宗莊憲大王實錄, 조선왕조실록소개).
This passage doesn’t seem to be localized on the English version but it’s mentioned when three people from Yaeyama drifted to Korea and were interrogated. They mentioned they were going to Yonaguni2 with official documents, therefore proving there were people living and doing commerce in Yonaguni.
Ōtake Sonaidō Gisa (大竹祖納堂儀佐), from Iriomote island, is said to have brought the entire Yonaguni island under his control around the 14th or 15th century so he may have been the one who instigated commerce with the surrounding islands.
However, the most important, celebrated, and almost idolized chieftain was Sanai Isoba (サンアイイソバ).
Known for her large stature and strength, she is said to have placed her 4 brothers around the island to govern. She worked hard, setting an example for the villagers, and was highly respected.
Legend says she floated enormous stray sandals in the sea to give the impression of giants on the island to deter outsiders. 🤣
Around the mid-15th century, the Satsuma domain took control of most islands of the Ryukyu kingdom and imposed in 1637 a poll tax (also known as head tax), meaning that people had to pay a tax regardless of the crop results. It would be abolished almost 300 years later, in 1903.
Yonaguni island luckily survived the Great Tsunami of Meiwa (明和の大津波) in 1771 without a single death despite the damage and considerable deaths in the surrounding islands. There were 972 people at the time on the island.
After Japan annexed Taiwan in 1895, many people from Yonaguni went to work there.
During World War II, Japan set 13,000 troops in the Yaeyama islands (including Yonaguni) but those were regularly relocated due to malaria outbreaks. In total, 38 people died due to bombings and 366 from malaria on Yonaguni.
By 1947, the population on the island had surged to 12,000 people but some estimates that it may have been 20,000-30,000 if unregistered people were counted. Indeed, there was a lot of smuggling and black market dealings with Taiwan and the US military.
From 1946 to 1958, a type of currency known as B Yen (B円) was put in place and used throughout Okinawa. During its use, the exchange rate was 360 yens to 1 US dollar3 and was said to encourage foreign investment but historians see it rather as a way to keep the dollar strong and yen weak to build more cheaply and keep control of the islands.
In 1972, Okinawa was returned to Japan, and driving on the left side like in the rest of Japan was set in 1978.
Quite an interesting history if you ask me but that’s not all! The island’s culture is just as much worth looking into.
And so is that strange “monument.”
So that’s exactly what we’ll do.
Monument and Culture
As I mentioned earlier, it’s almost impossible to find information about Yonaguni because of something called the “Yonaguni Monument.”
So what’s that?
A maybe man-made ziggurat at the bottom of the sea near Yonaguni.
Maybe.
That’s exactly what’s caused so many articles, documentaries, research, and—well—web pages about the topic.
Nobody knows for sure whether this 150 meters (492 feet) by 40 meters (131 feet) monument that’s 27 meters (89 feet) high is human-made or not.
The Yonaguni Monument was discovered in 1986 by a diver. This means we’ve now had almost 40 years of research and nobody seems to have convincing proof that it is or isn’t human-made. But if it was indeed human-made, it’d be the oldest such structure in the world, thousands of years older than the oldest ziggurat known today (the Sialk ziggurat, about 7,500 years ago).
I find the topic fascinating but let’s not stick to this today like most pieces about Yonaguni do. Instead, I’ll redirect you to this documentary, this piece from National Geographic, or this short BBC video. You already have the conclusion but I can confirm you’ll still be hooked on these documentaries if you choose to go through them.
But enough about this. Let’s talk about things we do know about the island.
Music & Festivals
When it comes to celebrations, the Japanese have a lot of them. And Ryukyuan islands have even more. There are lots of festivals, known as machiri
(マチリ) throughout the year.
The four main instruments found are:
The traditional flute (known as
fi
, フィ). Made out of bamboo, this transverse flute with 6 holes resonates during most festivals.The
nnun
(ンヌン) is a Yonaguni version of the typical taiko drum. It’s also known as the Yonaguni Taiko and can be heard during festivals like the Harvest Festival or for certain plays.The
kanin
(カニン) is a typical gong instrument that serves to keep the rhythm during festivals like the Bon-Odori or for anydunta
(ドゥンタ).The
sanshin
(さんしん, 三線) is the most famous and common instrument on the island. In fact, it’s the most famous instrument representing Okinawa as a whole. This 3-stringed instrument is a true classic.
But wait! There’s a term I didn’t explain: dunta
(ドゥンタ).
Known as yunta on the other Yaeyama islands, these are colorful songs about everyday life such as navigation, housebuilding, the joy of love, and so on. While they will always be played during various festivals, they can also be heard throughout the year without the need for a particular festival.
Festivals like the Harvest Festival are done at the local utaki
(ウタキ, 御嶽), a type of “sacred grove” found throughout Okinawa, that was reserved for women and forbidden to men until recently. A rare English archived page I found explains what experiencing one such festival can be like.
Of course, festivals don’t rely only on music but also dances!
Among those, two stand out:
The
Bon-Odori
(盆踊り), also calledsurubudi
(スルブディ) in their language, is a dance that is part of the Obon festival—a Japanese celebration happening around the country in August to honor the spirits of ancestors. Its variation uses three-foot poles and hats.The
Bou-Odori
(棒踊り, literally “pole dance”) dates back to 1700, and itsTi
(ティ, striking hand) style varies from area to area of the island.
Here’s an example of the Bou-Odori from earlier this year:
If you’re still not curious about Yonaguni, it’s time to turn to yet another surprise: their written word.
Writing Systems
As a remote island, few people on Yonaguni were literate when the Japanese arrived to occupy them and impose the poll tax in 1637. As a result, pictograms known as Kaidā glyphs, kaida-ji
(カイダー字) in Japanese - were used to show what each person had to give until the 1930s when primary education was introduced throughout Japan.
Since these glyphs served to represent what to pay, they were often ideograms representing resources, such as eggs, sheep, fish, rice, etc.
Still, when it comes to the Yonaguni language itself, no writing system per se existed until the 20th century.
The Okinawan Government recently4 set up a unified system relying exclusively on some katakana (including some versions that don’t exist in standard Japanese, such as カ゚, pronounced as [ŋa], as in the English “singer” in some variants).
Some prefer sticking to a mix of Kanji and Hiragana used since the early 20th century but most stick strictly to Hiragana, according to Kainuguni.
It’s interesting to note that a sentence written in a mix of Kanji (with the Yonaguni pronunciation) and Hiragana does not need spaces thanks to the Kanji while a sentence written strictly with Kanas does require spaces to note the beginning and end of words. Here’s an example:
あぬや どぅなんちまぬ まり どぅないぶる。
我や与那国島ぬ生りどぅない居る。
アヌヤ ドゥナンチマヌ マリ ドゥナイブル。
Pronunciation: Anu-ya dunan-chimanu mari dunai-buru.
Translation: I'm from Yonaguni.
To any Japanese speaker, the Kanji-Kana combination is the most convenient as sentences can often be guessed from the Kanji used even without knowing the pronunciation.
On the other end, the hiragana-only system assures anybody they got the correct pronunciation… even if they don’t get the meaning. Well, that’s what learning a language is all about after all, isn’t it? 🙃
The fact that the least widely-used system is the one set by the government is yet another proof languages don’t follow rules set by certain people and instead evolve with the population using the language daily.
We’ve beaten around the bush for long enough now. Let’s turn to the language itself. 🤓
Dunan-Munui Grammar
Well, actually, let me first point out one more curious fact before we talk structure.
One interesting aspect of Yonaguni is its three-vowel system. Indeed, the sounds /e/ and /o/ are almost non-existent in this language apart from a few words like the imperative hire
(ひれ, “go!”). As a result, the only remaining vowels are /a/, /i/, and /u/.
Japanese speakers may also notice that, despite its heavy use in Japanese, the “y” sound becomes “d” in Yonaguni. One such example is the name of the island itself: dunan
(どぅなん, “Yonaguni”), where the /o/ sound also disappears as mentioned above.
The Yonaguni language, known as dunan-munui
(どぅなんむぬい), is a Subject-Object-Verb (SOV) language, like Japanese and other Ryukyuan languages.
Pronouns and Particles
Contrary to Japanese, Dunan-munui
makes a distinction between the inclusive and exclusive “we.” I find this feature quite interesting as it is common among languages further south-west, like Rapa Nui and other Austronesian languages that originated from Taiwan, or, you know, Taiwanese Hokkien.
I’d be surprised if it was a coincidence so I reckon it’s proof of the exchanges with Taiwan throughout history.
This being said, Dunan-munui
relies on particles—like Japanese does—to indicate the word’s relationship with the rest of a sentence:
か゚ (nga) - Subject marker (が in Japanese)
や (ya) - Topic marker (は in Japanese)
ぬ (nu) - Possession marker → “ ’s ” (の in Japanese)
に (ni) - Location/Time marker → “in, at” (に in Japanese)
んき (nki) - Direction marker → “to, towards” (へ、に in Japanese)
Getting the gist of how they are used is quite straightforward if you speak Japanese (or Korean since it’s a similar system), but let me try to explain for those who don’t speak either.
In short, these particles sit stuck to the part of the sentence they concern. They indicate what purpose the part right before them holds in the sentence.
The subject marker indicates, well, the subject of the sentence.
ばんたか゚ かいし くん。(
banta-nga kaishi kun.
)→ We (all) come home. [We(inclusive)-nga home come]
The topic marker indicates what the sentence is about, which could be different from the subject.
あぬや まゆか゚ まち。(
anu-ya mayu-nga machi.
)→ I like cats. [I-ya
mayu-nga
like]The subject is “I” but the topic is “cats.”
The possession marker indicates possession. The possessor goes in front of it while the thing possessed goes after the particle.
うんなぬ ちま (
unna-nu chima
)→ Okinawa Island (literally Okinawa’s Island)
The location marker follows the location where a situation is happening.
だまとぅに だまか゚ あん。(
damatu-ni dama-nga an.
)→ There is a mountain in Japan. [Japan-ni
mountain-nga
to be]
The direction marker indicates a movement to a place.
ばぬや だまとぅんき ひたん。(
banu-ya damatu-nki hitan.
)→ We went to Japan. [We(exclusive)-ya
Japan-nki
went.]
As a side note, my original example for the possession was as follows but Kainuguni kindly let me know the んだ (nda
) particle is an exception and doesn't need the ぬ (nu
).5
んだ
ぬいぬ (nda-
nuinu
)→ Your dog. [Dog-nuyou]
Just like in Japanese, the subject marker and topic marker can overlap quite a bit. I highly recommend this page which mentions more nuances and in which situation to use which.
Verb system
Conjugation felt easy when I first encountered it. It looked similar to Japanese. Since verbs are not impacted by the subject, all I needed to figure out was the form and that was it.
Or so I thought.
You see, verbs are “conjugated” by keeping the verb stem and adding the corresponding ending. For example, the verb “to write” かぐん (kagun書ぐん) becomes: かがぬん (kag-anun
書がぬん) when we express a negation because -anun
is the negation and kag
is the stem.
Except that the past is expressed with -itan
and instead of becoming kagitan
(かぎたん), it turns into katitan
(かてぃたん, 書てぃたん).
That got me to question what the “verb stem” truly was in Yonaguni. Was it just Ka
(in the case of this verb) and the ending -gun, -ganun, or -titan?
Well no. It turns out the verb stem was indeed kag
and the last consonant just happens to change for certain forms.
I asked Kainuguni about this so I could understand better and he got back to me with an explanation that couldn't have been easier to understand for me:
“You see, just like some European languages, Yonaguni verbs have verb types, and whenever you memorize a verb, you will have to memorize its verb type as well.”
As a French person, I’ve gone through learning the 3 verb types we have in French and that each gets modified in a different way for each tense. I also got used to knowing there are tons of exceptions too. Well, Yonaguni does just that.
Kainuguni shared a page6 of the Hosei University Repository which includes this file with all the verb types. Listing them would be too long as it seems there are 6 types and some include sub-types.
There are also at least three exceptions for widely-used verbs:
To be (somewhere) → ぶるん (
burun
)To have (something) → あるん (
arun
)To come → くん (
kun
)
The fact these three verbs are exceptions shouldn’t come as a surprise. This is common in many languages and is a natural evolution of using these verbs much more than any other.
Now, while I won’t share all the verb types, let’s still discuss tenses a bit more.
Tenses
For the present and future tenses, the dictionary form seems to be the most used option:
あか゚ っちーどぅ すむてぃ どぅむん。→ I read a book every day.
a-nga cchiidu sumuti dumun.
[I-nga,
everyday,
book, read]The subject “I” is あか゚ (
a-nga
) from あぬ (anu
) and か゚ (nga
)
かりか゚ あった んだ でぃんわきるん。→ She will call you tomorrow.
kari-nga atta nda dinnwakirun.
[He/She/It-nga
, tomorrow, you, to call]
For the past tense, the ending -itan
(いたん) goes after the verb stem (potentially modified depending on the verb class):
ばぬか゚ んぬに えいが んにたん。→ We saw a movie yesterday.
banu-nga nnu-ni eiga nnitan.
[We(exclusive)-nga
, yesterday-ni
, movie, saw], fromnnun
いやか゚ いたるってぃー だまんき ひたん。→ (My) father went to the mountain last month.
iya-nga itarutti damanki hitan.
[Father-nga
, last month, mountain-nki
, went], fromhirun
Yonaguni has a present continuous form following a similar pattern: -i (い) + bun
(ぶん):
んでぃや はい ぶん。→ You (pl.) are eating.
ndi-ya hai bun.
[You(plural)-ya
, eating], fromfun
Interdictions use the ending -unna (うんな) with what I call the “basic verb stem” — ie. the unmodified verb stem:
ぬむんな!→ Don’t drink!7
numunna!
fromnumun
Possibility can also be expressed with -arirun
(ありるん) after the basic verb stem:
かんたてぃか゚ ばちらりるん。→ They can forget.
kantati-nga bachirarirun.
[They-nga
, forget-can], frombachirun
A good method (shared by Kainuguni) is to proceed as follows to create such a form:
I always think this way: 1) Find a verb > baciruN / kaguN 2) Find its negative form > baciranuN / kaganuN 3) Remove the suffix -nuN and add -riruN > bacirariruN / kagariruN
And as we’ve seen earlier, the negation is -anun
(あぬん). It can also be combined with any of the above forms to make, say, an impossibility or a negative past:
あか゚ いゆ はりぬん。→ I can’t eat fish.
a-nga iyu harinun.
[I-nga
, fish, eat-possibility-negation] fromhun
Hun
→h-un+anun
(negation) →ha-nun+rirun
(impossibility)
かんたてぃや にんだぬたん。→ They didn’t sleep.
kantati-ya nindanutan.
[They-ya
, sleep-negation-past] fromnindun
Nindun
→Nind-un+anun
(negation) →Nindanu-n+tan
(past negation)
Finally, yes-no questions only require a -na
(な) at the end of the sentence.
んだ とぅぶんな?→ Do you fly?
nda tubunna?
[you fly-questionmarker] fromtubun
Open-ended questions can be finished with the particle -ya
(や)
どぅなんちまや んまや?→ Where is Yonaguni Island?8
dunanmachi-ya nma-ya
[Yonaguni Island, where-questionmarker]
If the ending used by the verb finishes with an N, then it merges with the question marker as in kaganun
(かがぬん) → kaganuna
(かがぬな): Don’t you write?
As in Japanese, some suffixes can be added to add emphasis, supposition, etc.
Like it would for most languages, this might seem messy if this is your first time reading this. And yet, it’s quite straightforward and much simpler than most other languages I’ve seen—notably European languages with large conjugation tables.
In the end, this is a matter of getting used to.
Just like I don’t ever wonder which verb is from which “group” in French or Spanish, I reckon Yonaguni speakers modify the verbs as they should without thinking about it.
Speaking a language well is about what feels right after all.
More example sentences
Before I leave you, let’s turn to a few more example sentences that could be useful and/or showcase some of the grammar we’ve seen.
Please note vowels in a row almost always indicate the vowel should be prolonged when pronounced.
んさい わるかやー。がんどぅき わるかや?→ Hello! How are you?
nsai warukayaa. ganduki warukaya?
んさんど! んだや?→ I’m good! How about you?
nsando!ndaya?
んだなーや?→ What’s your name?
ndanaaya?
あぬや Mathias どぅないぶる。→ My name is Mathias. (I am Mathias.)
anuya
Mathiasdunaiburu.
ばがるん。/ ばがらぬん。→ I understand / I don’t understand.
bagarun./bagaranun.
いぐらてぃかや?→ How much is it?
iguradikaya?
ぬんに わるか゚ー。/ ぬんに ぶんか゚ー。→ Sorry (to people above/to people younger or colleagues)
nunni warungaa./nunni bunngaa.
すーや ひさどぅ あんすやー。→ It’s cold today.
suuya hisadu ansuyaa.
すーん あっつぁんか゚ぃえー。→ It’s hot today too.
suun attanngiee.
ふるやや んまや?→ Where is the toilet?
furayaya nmaya?
(あらーぐ) ふがらっさ。→ Thank you (very much)
(araagu) fugarassa.
ぶりきえ!→ Sorry
burikie!
くとぅばんた どぅ まち。→ I like languages.
kutubanta du machi.
あぬや どぅいてぃんがちに だまどぅんき ひたん。→ I went to Japan in November.
anuya duidingachini damadunki hitan.
あぬや たいはんんき ひるん。→ I will go to Taiwan.
anuya taihannki hirun.
Where to learn
Learning the Yonaguni language, like any other lesser-known language, is not an easy feat. There are few resources available online and almost all of them are in Japanese only.
Whether you do speak Japanese or not, you will need to learn at least the Hiragana syllabary if you wish to read any Dunan-munui.
Still, we have Kainuguni who has written online on his blog about a few grammar patterns here. He has also a few tables like these ones available to showcase the conjugation.
On his second Twitter account Yonaguni Daily - 毎日与那国語 - 每日與那國語, he shares a word a day with the translation in English, Japanese, and Mandarin (traditional characters).
If you can read (and understand) Japanese, a lot more opens up.
First, this website provides files like this one filled to the brim with sentences in Yonaguni with their translation in Japanese and recordings for each sentence too!
It also has a small dictionary, the only freely available apart from Kainuguni’s page in English (which is great but covers fewer words).
You can also find a few pages like this one with some Yonaguni but they are far in between.
In any case, I invite you to follow Kainuguni on Twitter and learn a bit more each day.
Final thoughts
Both Yonaguni Island and Dunan-munui
have brought wonders to my eyes. I had already been fascinated the first time I discovered this island two years ago but researching it and diving further into its history and language reminded me once again how wide the world is.
I could ramble on and on about how amazing I find this language.
I could talk about how amazed I was at seeing the differences between Ryukyuan languages in files combining 4 Ryukyuan languages per page, like this one:
I could mention how peculiar it felt to see some vowels of verbs disappear when changing the endings in verbs like “to forget” ばちるん becoming ばちたん in the past.
I could even describe how proud I felt when I discovered I understood the name of the movie made about the island bachiranun
ばちらぬん, the negation of the verb “to forget.”
Or, I could go back to the rabbit hole I fell into when I found the existence of the Yonaguni pyramid.
But I’ve said enough.
Instead, I’ll let you go and turn to the resources I indicated above.
Yonaguni is a place that went from being completely unknown to me to one I truly want to go to someday, to see it and—hopefully—experience the language further.
Until then, as they say on Yonaguni, いちかぃえ!(See you later!) 👋
Only Wikipedia had “information” about Yonaguni’s history but almost no source is quoted for anything before the 20th century. Even the book cited Okinawa: the History of an Island People (2000) only refers to Yonaguni 9 times, including its own bibliography, and never mentions the island being incorporated into the Ryūkyū Kingdom. A good reminder to be careful of what we read when there’s no source.
The records also stated the Koreans asked what country this was, most likely because the guni in Yonaguni is the character for “country” in both Korean and Japanese. Not important to the story but a funny note if you ask me.
Compared to the more “normal” exchange of the “real” yen at the time: 120 yens for 1 US dollar, a rate at which
The last update dates back to May 2022.
That’s the kind of thing difficult to find on one’s own so I truly am grateful to Kainuguni.
that hadn’t come up in all my research so I was psyched to find out more!
Reminds me of the Japanese interdiction nomuna
(飲むな)!
You’ll notice the particle -ya
twice here: once as a topic particle and once as a question particle.