Ep. 45: Patrick Heinrich on Ryukyuan Language Documentation and Revitalization

Field Notes is back for its fifth and final season! Season five's inagural episode is with Patrick Heinrich from the Ca' Foscari University of Venice. Patrick received his Masters degree in Linguistics and Japanese Studies in 1998 from Heinrich-Heine University Düsseldorf. He completed his PhD in Japanese Studies in 2002 at Duisburg University. He is a sociolinguist who has worked extensively in the Ryukyuan archipelago, and has written many publications on language ideology, language shift, language reclamation, language planning and policy, and language and well-being. Along with Shinsho Miyara and Michinori Shimoji, he is the co-editor of the Handbook of the Ryukyuan Languages (2015). He is also co-editor of Language Crisis in the Ryukyus (2014), along with Mark Anderson. 

Things mentioned in this episode:

• Ryukyuan language family
• Uchinaaguchi (Okinawan) language
• Miyako language
• Dunan (Yonaguni) language
• Yaeyama language
• Amami languages
• Educated Not to Speak Our Language: Language Attitudes and Newspeakerness in the Yaeyaman Language(Hammine, 2020)
• Language Shift in the Ryukyu Islands (Anderson, 2019)
• Byron Fija on Ryukyuan Languages in Uchinaaguchi
• Ladino language
• Yonaguni film
• Yonaguni Fotografia Europea photo project (Anush Hamzehian and Vittorio Mortarotti- more info found here and catalogue found here)
• Rice Island, Satellite Island, Border Island: Yonaguni Across Time (Heinrich, 2021)
• Patrick on ResearchGate
• Madoka Hammine on ResearchGate

If you are interested in Ryukyuan linguistics, check out previous Field Notes episodes with Prof. Michinori Shimoji and Madoka Hammine:

• Ep 28: Irabu Ryukyuan Language Documentation with