Wuhu Japanese: Difference between revisions

| fam1 = [[w:Japonic languages|Japonic]]

| fam2 = [[w:Japanese language|Japanese]]

}}

The Japanese colonial administration and its associated settlers first brought Japanese to the island following Japan's annexation of the island in ??. Japanese was quickly established as an administrative language, with various famous landmarks, most notably the Broken Clock Tower, being built in this time, as well as various Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples that still stand today. The Japanese also established the first modern education system on the island, leading to Japanese also becoming the primary language of instruction on the island, which expanded Japanese influence on the indigenous languages spoken there.

Other historically Japanese areas may still retain signs in Japanese, though the distinction between signs that originate in the Wuhu variety of Japanese from the occupation and more recent signs in Japanese by Japanese nationals who moved to Wuhu Island after the war has become increasingly unclear. Typically however, these older Wuhu Japanese signs have various distinguishing features, such as horizontal right-to-left reading (common in Japanese before WW2), as well as the use of obsolete letters such as ゐ / ヰ ''wi'' and ゑ / ヱ ''we'' and less common kanji like 嶋 instead of 島 for ''shima'' "island". Additionally, some archaeological discoveries have unearthed signs written in the now mostly obsolete [[w:Kunrei-shiki|Kunrei-shiki]] romanisation system, a system that was official during the Japanese occupation; this would point to the idea that the use of Kunrei-shiki is another distinguishing feature of historical Wuhu Japanese compared to contemporary modern Japanese used on Wuhu Island.

==References==

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