is a genre of songs and poetry originating from the Okinawa Islands, Okinawa Prefecture of southwestern Japan. Most ryà «ka featured the 8-8-8-6 syllable structure.
The word ryà «ka ([ru:ka] in archaic pronunciation) was first attested in the Kon-kà Âken-shà « (1711). The name came into use when Ryà «kyà «'s samurai class in Shuri and Naha embraced Japanese high culture including waka. It is analogous with Japanese custom of contrasting Japanese poetry (waka or yamato-uta) with Chinese poetry (kara-uta). There is abundant evidence that ryà «ka was simply referred to as uta (songs and/or poems) in colloquial use.
In its original form, ryà «ka was songs to be sung with sanshin (shamisen), rather than poems to be read aloud. Thus it is more comparable with Japanese imayà Â, kinsei kouta and dodoitsu than with waka. The composers of ryà «ka were not only those in the upper class, but also included a girl who was sold to the red-light district called Yoshiya Chiru and a woman farmer of passion called Onna Nabe. However, the male members of the samurai class in Shuri and Naha started to read ryà «ka just like waka. They hold utakai, or a gathering for reading a collection of poems on a common theme, for both ryà «ka and waka. It is no wonder that famous ryà «ka poets like Heshikiya Chà Âbin and Motobu Chà Âkyà « were also waka poets.
Researchers disagree on the scope of ryà «ka. In the narrowest definition, it only refers to songs and poems with the 8-8-8-6 syllable structure. This standard form is specifically called . In a slightly broader definition, ryà «ka also covers , which typically has the 7-5-8-6 or 5-5-8-6 syllable patterns. It is a hybrid of waka (first two units) and ryà «ka (second two units). The invention of nakafà « was traditionally attributed to the 18th century poet Heshikiya Chà Âbin, and it was mainly composed by the male members of the samurai class. Another form called is characterized by a series of 8-8 syllable patterns with a 6-syllable unit at the end. There are some 20 chà Âka in the records.
In the broadest definition, ryà «ka includes , and . shares the series of 8-8-...-6 syllable patterns with . However, it is typically longer than and can be seen as an extended narrative poem. was sung by construction workers. Although the same genre exists in Japan, the Okinawan version is characterized by 8-syllable units. was Japanese-style songs that usually consist of a series of the 7-5 syllable pattern. It is said to have originally been performed to entertain Satsuma bureaucrats.
Okinawa shares its 8-8-8-6 syllable structure with its northern neighbor Amami, where the songs in this form are known as shima-uta and are considered a separate genre. Okinawa's southern neighbors, Miyako and Yaeyama, did not embrace ryà «ka. Miyako developed its own lyric songs named tà Âgani and shunkani while Yaeyama has tubarÃÂma and sunkani. Unlike ryà «ka, they show relatively free verse forms.
Ryà «ka is an innovative form that emerged relatively recently. The earliest ryà «ka found in the literature is of the late 17th century. However, there remains a disagreement over exactly how it evolved. Hokama Shuzen considered that the earliest form of songs were incantations that were sometimes chanted rather than were sung. From such incantations, epic songs such as Okinawa's umui and kwÃÂna and Amami's omori and nagare emerged. Epic songs then evolved into lyric songs (feelings of individuals) including Amami's shima-uta and Okinawa's ryà «ka. He claimed that the development of lyrical ryà «ka from epic omoro happened in the 15th to 16th centuries when Okinawan people were supposedly liberated from religious bondage and began to express personal feelings. He also considered that the introduction of sanshin helped the transition from the long, relatively free verse forms to the short, fixed verse form.
Ono Jà «rà  also supported the staged development from epic songs to lyric songs. However, his theory is radically different from Hokama's in that the 8-8-8-6 form was formed under the influence of kinsei kouta of mainland Japan, which has the 7-7-7-5 syllable structure. He dismissed the hypothesis that the first stanza of omoro of the later stage partly showed the 8-8-8-6 pattern, which he reanalyzed as kwÃÂna-like 5-3, 5-3, and 5-5-3. He dated the formation of ryà «ka to the first half of the 17th century, shortly after kinsei kouta became common in Japan.
Ryà «ka reached at its peak from the late 17th century to the early 19th century. While it was originally songs to be sung, the samurai class in Shuri and Naha treated them as poems to be read aloud, under the heavy influence from Japanese high culture. For its origin as songs, early ryà «ka anthologies were classified by melodies rather than by themes as are done for waka. The Ryà «kyà « daikashà « (1878) adopted a hierarchical classification: melodies as the major categories and themes as minor categories. The Kokin Ryà «ka-shà « (1895) switched to the theme-based classification. Today ryà «ka may be classified into 1) celebration poetry 2) seasonal or scenery poetry 3) love poetry 4) teaching poetry 5) travel poetry 6) smallpox poetry. Of these classifications, love poetry is well described in ryà «ka. Peculiar is the smallpox poetry; the purpose of glorification of smallpox demon is improvement from deadly infection of smallpox. There is a collection of smallpox poetry including 105 poems published in 1805.
Ryà «ka as poems gained a wider audience after the formal abolishment of the kingdom. Losing income and status, the former samurai class moved from Shuri and Naha to Northern Okinawa, Miyako, Yaeyama, and other regions, and spread its high culture around Okinawa Prefecture. Newspapers, which first appeared in Okinawa Prefecture in the 1890s, had readers' sections for ryà «ka and waka. Ryà «ka is popular now not only in Ryukyuan living in Okinawa Prefecture, but also in Ryukyuan who have immigrated to Peru and Hawaii.
While Modern South Okinawan is characterized by drastic sound changes that happened in the relatively recent past, the standard reading of ryà «ka reflects conservative literary forms based on the Shuri dialect. Ryà «ka is written with a mixture of kanji and hiragana, as in Written Japanese. Spellings are even more conservative than pronunciations. As a consequence, there are substantial disparities between spelling and pronunciation.
For example, "today" is [táÃÂuÃÂ] in the modern Shuri speech, which corresponds to [kjoÃÂ] in Japanese. However, it is pronounced [kiju] when people read ryà «ka. Its standard spelling is the same as that in pre-spelling-reform Written Japanese: "ãÂÂãµ" (transliterated as kefu).