Japan, U.N. share blind spot on 'migrants'

by Debito Arudou

The Japan Times

On March 23, I gave a speech to Jorge Bustamante, United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Migrants, for NGO FRANCA regarding racial discrimination in Japan. Text follows:

I wish to speak about the treatment of those of "foreign" origin and appearance in Japan, such as white and non-Asian people. Simply put, we are not officially registered — or even counted sometimes — as genuine residents. We are not treated as taxpayers, not protected as consumers, not seen as ethnicities even in the national census. According to government polls and surveys, we do not even deserve the same human rights as Japanese. The view of "foreigner" as "only temporary in Japan" is a blind spot even the United Nations seems to share, but I will get to that later.

First, an overview: The number of non-Japanese (NJ) on visas of three months or longer has increased since 1990 from about 1 million to over two. Permanent residents (PR) number over 1 million, meaning about half of all registered NJ can stay here forever. Given how hard PR is to get — about five years if married to a Japanese, 10 years if not — a million NJ permanent residents are clearly not a temporary part of Japanese society.

Moreover, this does not count the estimated half-million or so naturalized Japanese citizens (I am one of them). Nor does this count children of international marriages, about 40,000 annually. Mathematically, if each couple has two children, eventually that will mean 80,000 more ethnically diverse Japanese children; over a decade, 800,000 — almost a million again. Not all of these children of diverse backgrounds will "look Japanese."

What's more, we don't know Japan's true diversity because the Census Bureau only surveys for nationality. This means when I fill out the census, I write down "Japanese" for my nationality, but I cannot indicate my ethnicity as a "white Japanese," or a "Japanese of American extraction" (amerikakei nihonjin). I believe this is by design — because the politics of identity in Japan are all about "monoculturality and monoethnicity." Given modern Japan's emerging immigration and assimilation, this is a fiction. The official conflation of Japanese nationality and ethnicity is incorrect, yet our government refuses to collect data that would correct that.

The point is we cannot tell who is "Japanese" just by looking at them. This means that whenever distinctions are made between "foreigner" and "Japanese," be it police racial profiling or "Japanese only" signs, some Japanese citizens will also be affected. Thus we need a law against racial discrimination in Japan — not only because it will help noncitizens assimilate into Japan, but also because it will protect Japanese against xenophobia, bigotry and exclusionism, against the discrimination that is "deep and profound" and "practiced undisturbed in Japan," according to U.N. Rapporteur Doudou Diene in 2005 and 2006.

There are some differences in viewpoint between my esteemed colleagues here today and the people I am trying to speak for. Japan's minorities as definable under the U.N. Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD), including Ainu, Ryukyuans, zainichi special-permanent- resident ethnic Koreans and Chinese, and burakumin, will speak to you as people who have been here for a long time — much longer than people like me, of course. Their claims are based upon time-honored and genuine grievances that have never been properly redressed. For ease of understanding, I will call them the "oldcomers."

I will try to speak on behalf of the "newcomers," i.e., people who came here relatively recently to make a life in Japan. Of course both oldcomers and newcomers contribute to Japanese society, in terms of taxes, service and culture, for example. But it is we newcomers who really need a Japanese law against racial discrimination, because we, the people who are seen because of our skin color as "foreigners," are often singled out for our own variant of discriminatory treatment. Examples in brief:

1. Housing, accommodation

One barrier many newcomers face is finding an apartment. According to the Mainichi Shimbun (Jan. 8), on average in Tokyo it takes 15 visits to realtors for an NJ to find an apartment. Common experience — this is all we have because there is no government study of the problem — dictates that agents generally phrase the issue to landlords as, "The renter is a foreigner, is that OK?" This overt discrimination happens with impunity in Japan. One Osaka realtor even advertises apartments as "gaijin allowed," a sales point at odds with the status quo. People who face discriminatory landlords can only take them to court. This means years, money for lawyers and court fees, and an uncertain outcome — when all you need is a place to live, now.

Another barrier is hotels. Lodgings are expressly forbidden by Hotel Management Law Article 5 to refuse customers unless rooms are full, there is a clear threat of contagious disease, or an issue of "public morals." However, government surveys indicate that 27 percent of all Japanese hotels do not want foreign guests, period. Not to be outdone, Fukushima Prefecture Tourist Information advertised the fact that 318 of their member hotels refuse NJ. Thus even when a law technically forbids exclusionism, the government will not enforce it. On the contrary, official bodies will even promote excluders.

2. Racial profiling by police

Another rude awakening happens when NJ walk down the street. All NJ (but not citizens) must carry ID cards at all times or face possible criminal charges and incarceration. So Japanese police will target and stop people who "look foreign" in public, sometimes forcefully and rudely, and demand personal identification. This very alienating process of "carding" can happen when walking while white, cycling while foreign-looking, using public transportation while multiethnic, or waiting for arrivals at airports while colored. One person has apparently been "carded," sometimes through physical force, more than 50 times in one year, and 125 times over 10 years.

Police justify this as a hunt for foreign criminals and visa over-stayers, or cite special security measures or campaigns. However, these "campaigns" are products of government policies depicting NJ as "terrorists, criminals and carriers of infectious diseases." None of these things, of course, is contingent upon nationality. Moreover, since 2007, all noncitizens are fingerprinted every time they re-enter Japan. This includes newcomer PRs, going further than the US-VISIT program, which does not refingerprint Green Card holders. However, the worst example of bad social science is the National Research Institute of Police Science, which spends taxpayer money on researching "foreign DNA" for racial profiling at crime scenes.

In sum, Japan's police see NJ as "foreign agents" in both senses of the word. They are systematically taking measures to deal with NJ as a social problem, not as fellow residents or immigrants.

3. Exclusion as 'residents'

Japan's registration system, meaning the current koseki family registry and juminhyo residency certificate systems, refuse to list NJ as "spouse" or "family member" because they are not citizens. Officially, NJ residing here are not registered as "residents" (jumin), even though they pay residency taxes (juminzei) like anyone else. Worse, some local governments (such as Tokyo's Nerima Ward) do not even count NJ in their population tallies. This is the ultimate in invisibility, and it is government-sanctioned.

4. 'Japanese only' exclusion

With no law against racial discrimination, "No foreigners allowed" signs have appeared nationwide, at places such as stores, restaurants, hotels, public bathhouses, bars, discos, an eyeglass outlet, a ballet school, an Internet cafe, a billiards hall, a women's boutique — even in publicity for a newspaper subscription service. Regardless, the government has said repeatedly to the U.N. that Japan does not need a racial discrimination law because of our effective judicial system. That is untrue.

For example, in the Otaru onsen case (1999-2005), where two NJ and one naturalized Japanese (myself) were excluded from a public bathhouse, judges refused to rule these exclusions were illegal due to racial discrimination. They called it "unrational discrimination." Moreover, the judiciary refused to enforce relevant international treaty as law, or punish the negligent Otaru City government for ineffective measures against racial discrimination. The Supreme Court refused to hear the case.

Furthermore, in 2006, an openly racist shopkeeper refused an African-American customer entry, yet the Osaka District Court ruled in favor of the owner! Japan needs a criminal law, with enforceable punishments, because the present judicial system will not fix this.

5. Unfettered hate speech

There is also the matter of the cyberbullying of minorities and prejudiced statements made by our politicians over the years. Other NGOs will talk more about the anti-Korean and anti-Chinese hate speech during the current debate about granting local suffrage rights to permanent residents.

I would instead like to briefly mention some media, such as the magazine "Underground Files of Crimes by Gaijin" (Gaijin Hanzai Ura Fairu (2007)) and "PR Suffrage will make Japan Disappear" (Gaikokujin Sanseiken de Nihon ga Nakunaru Hi (2010)). Both these books stretch their case to talk about an innate criminality or deviousness in the foreign element, and "Underground Files" even cites things that are not crimes, such as dating Japanese women. It also includes epithets like "nigger," racist caricatures and ponderings on whether Korean pudenda smell like kimchi. This is hate speech. And it is not illegal in Japan. You could even find it on sale in convenience stores.
Conclusion

In light of all the above, the Japanese government's stance towards the U.N. Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination is easily summarized: The Ainu, Ryukyuans and burakumin are citizens, therefore they don't fall under the CERD because they are protected by the Japanese Constitution. However, the zainichis and newcomers are not citizens, therefore they don't get protection from the CERD either. Thus, our government effectively argues, the CERD does not cover anyone in Japan.

Well, what about me? Or our children? Are there really no ethnic minorities with Japanese citizenship in Japan?

In conclusion, I would like to thank the U.N. for investigating our cases. On March 16, the CERD Committee issued some very welcome recommendations in its review. However, may I point out that the U.N. still made a glaring oversight.

During the committee's questioning of Japan last Feb. 24 and 25, very little mention was made of the CERD's "unenforcement" in Japan's judiciary and criminal code. Furthermore, almost no mention was made of "Japanese only" signs, the most indefensible violations of the CERD.

Both Japan and the U.N. have a blind spot in how they perceive Japan's minorities. Newcomers are never couched as residents of or immigrants to Japan, but rather as "foreign migrants." The unconscious assumption seems to be that 1) foreign migrants have a temporary status in Japan, and 2) Japan has few ethnically diverse Japanese citizens.

Time for an update. Look at me. I am a Japanese. The government put me through a very rigorous and arbitrary test for naturalization, and I passed it. People like me are part of Japan's future. When the U.N. makes their recommendations, please have them reflect how Japan must face up to its multicultural society. Please recognize us newcomers as a permanent part of the debate.

The Japanese government will not. It says little positive about us, and allows very nasty things to be said by our politicians, policymakers and police. It's about time we all recognized the good that newcomers are doing for our home, Japan. Please help us.

Debito Arudou coauthored the "Handbook for Newcomers, Migrants and Immigrants." Twitter arudoudebito. More on this meeting and photos at www.debito.org/?p=6256. Just Be Cause appears on the first Community Page of the month.

What does iomante mean for modern-day Ainu?

by Deborah Davidson

project uepeker

Iomante (or Iyomante), the controversial "Bear-Sending Ceremony," which is so sensitively depicted in our most recent storybook translation (The Ainu and the Bear~the gift of the cycle of life; RIC Publications; 2010), is bound to upset some readers. We realize this, and sympathize. A newborn bear cub is torn from its mother (at the cost of the mother's life) and raised with tender care by a village, only to be killed in a ceremony that releases its spirit from the human world so it may return to the spirit world from which it came. The book does not advocate the practice. It simply explains how the custom fits into the traditional Ainu worldview, and attempts to show that within that worldview, the practice makes some sense, and is not meant to be a cruel one.

In 1955, Iomante was outlawed in Japan as barbaric, but the prohibition was rescinded in 2007. Does this mean the practice will be revived among the Ainu? Not likely. The ceremony has already been documented in detail on film for the historical records. The need for bear meat and bear skins in daily life is a thing of the past. Furthermore, the bear population of Hokkaido is declining at an alarming rate with the spread of urban areas.

So what does the right to practice Iomante mean to today's Ainu? I have been looking for hints of the answer to this question for some time now, and was intrigued by a recent news article about a sending ceremony conducted for the shimafukurou (Blakiston's fish owl). The shimafukurou is traditionally regarded by the Ainu as the guardian of the village. In some areas of Hokkaido it is the highest-ranked Ainu god, while in other areas the bear ranks higher. The sending ceremony for the owl is similar to that for the bear.

According to the news article, the dead body of a fledgling shimafukurou was found on a rural highway in the Hidaka area of Hokkaido on December 25, 2009. From the ID bracelet attached to its leg, it was identified as a juvenile that had been released into the wild just six months earlier by the Ministry of the Environment. The MOE is involved in breeding this endangered bird to circumvent its extinction. Even fledgling shimafukurou have wing spans that can exceed one meter (three feet), while the fully mature owls can be more than two-meters (six feet) from wingtip to wingtip.

The man who discovered the dead owl, the president of a construction company and member of the Hidaka branch of the Hokkaido Ainu Association, was reported as saying, "I knew at once it was no ordinary bird. There were the half-eaten remains of a duckling nearby. The owl must have brought its meal to the road to eat, and then gotten hit by a car." That same day, before returning the bird to the MOE, the Hidaka branch of the Ainu Association conducted a "sending ceremony" (Hopunire) to send the bird's spirit safely back to the spirit world. The subtle differences in meaning between Hopunire and Iomante seems to depend on the geographic origin of the speaker, but for the purposes of this blog post, the difference is insignificant.

I have also read that Iomante has been conducted in recent years for bears that die in captivity, such as those reared at the Kuma-bokujou bear park in Noboribetsu, one of the areas in Hokkaido where people of Ainu descent are concentrated. In these, and perhaps other ways, it appears that the tradition of Iomante is being preserved and carried on by modern-day Ainu.

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アイヌ協会支部が神の送りの儀式【新ひだか】

国の天然記念物で絶滅危惧種のシマフクロウが２５日朝、静内田原の道道静内中札内線の路上で死骸で見つかった。足環が装着されており、この番号から、環境省が富良野から放った幼鳥と確認された。

　発見したのは道アイヌ協会新ひだか支部長を務める大川勝さん(６５)＝大川建設社長＝。同日午前７時までに田原から御園方面に向かう道路沿いで、車にひかれたシマフクロウを見つけた。

　大川さんは「普通の鳥ではないと思った。エサにしたらしいコガモの死骸があり、道路に降りて食べているうちに車にひかれたのでは」と話している。

　この死骸に足環がついていたため、環境省北海道地方環境事務所に問い合わせたところ、同省が保護繁殖を目的に今年６月に富良野から放鳥した幼鳥と判明。同日午後、事務所担当者が死骸を引き取った。

　シマフクロウは絶滅の危機にあり、国内では道東を中心に北海道に１３０羽程度の生息と推計されている。死骸で見つかったシマフクロウは幼鳥とはいえ、羽を広げると１メートル以上の大きさになる。

　アイヌにとってシマフクロウは集落（コタン）の守り神。環境省からの引き取りを前に、新ひだか支部は同日午後、静内真歌の町アイヌ民俗資料館で支部として初めての「カムイホプニレ（フクロウの神の送りの儀式）」を行い、霊を慰めた。

A Cultural Revival

by Lucy Birmingham

The Wall Street Journal

The spirit of Japan's Ainu artists

Koji Yuki was 20 years old when he turned against his father and buried his Ainu identity. That was the year Shoji Yuki died; a radical activist, he had long fought to win legal rights for the Ainu, Japan's underclass, and have them recognized as an indigenous people. More than a century of government-backed racial and social discrimination and forced assimilation had stripped the once-proud hunter-gatherers and tradesmen of their identity and livelihood.

The Ainu cause had torn apart the Yuki family. "My father divorced my mother when I was young and devoted himself to the Ainu liberation movement," says Mr. Yuki. "I couldn't understand the way he lived his life."

Years later, Mr. Yuki changed his mind about his father's efforts, and today the son is himself a powerful voice for the Ainu. But he speaks through culture rather than politics, as one of the leaders of a remarkable revival of Ainu arts, dance and music -- with a cool, contemporary edge.

The origins of the Ainu are still debated. The most popular theory is that they are descendants of the Jomon people who lived throughout Japan 13,000 years ago. They are considered a race different from the "mainland" Japanese, who are called "Wajin" in the Ainu language.

The Ainu eventually settled in Japan's north, and for centuries their villages dotted Sakhalin Island and the Kuril Islands. (These were seized by the Soviet Union at the end of World War II, though Japan has disputed the claim for four of the Kuril Islands.) The Ainu culture fell victim to Japanese expansion in the 1800s, and most Ainu now live in Hokkaido, the second-largest of Japan's four main islands. In 2006 the Hokkaido government put the number of people of Ainu ancestry there at about 24,000; the national census doesn't include such a count, but after generations of intermarriage the total is far larger. Many hide their Ainu identity, still fearful of discrimination.

Handsome with a powerful gait, Mr. Yuki, 45, reveals a shyness as he explains his work as a hanga (wood block print) artist. "Hanga is not part of the Ainu traditional arts, but woodcarving is," he says. "So I asked my favorite Japanese hanga artists to teach me. I might be the only Ainu doing this professionally." His prints are mainly of animals native to his Hokkaido homeland, such as the deer, fox, bear, owl and magnificent red-crowned crane. The island, known for its severe snowy winters (it's a popular ski destination), is the site of breathtaking mountain ranges, volcanoes, lush forests and crystal lakes, and unique flora and fauna. It's easy to understand the Ainu reverence for nature and the animistic belief in spirits.

"My prints are based on traditional Ainu legends, mainly animal spirits," says Mr. Yuki at a one-man exhibition in Tokyo. "The bear is especially important." Among the Ainu, the bear is considered the most sacred of animals; one of the works in the exhibition is "Hepere Cinita," or Dream of the Baby Bear. (All the works in the exhibition carry titles in the Ainu language.) His "Sarorun Kamuy," or Crane God, he says, "represents the Ainu's desire to return to their roots, like the great cranes that migrate back to Hokkaido every winter."

He created the work in 2008, after the Ainu won official indigenous status from the Japanese government. That followed the U.N. General Assembly's passage in 2007 of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and came just before a 2008 Group of Eight wealthy nations summit in Hokkaido.

Mr. Yuki the hanga artist and carver is also a musician, founder and leader of the Ainu Arts Project, a decade-old community-based music group. "We're a native rock band based on traditional Ainu music," says Mr. Yuki, explaining that he was inspired by the aboriginal Australian band Yothu Yindi and Native American bands. The 25 members, from kids to seniors, perform 50 to 60 times a year. They sing mainly in the Ainu language and dress in the splendid Ainu attusi robe. Along with the guitar, drums and bass, they play the Ainu tonkori (like a zither) and mukkuri (similar to a jew's harp).

"We've chosen a rock sound because we don't want people to associate the Ainu with just old tradition," Mr. Yuki explained. "With hanga, music and singing I can convey the traditional Ainu culture and spirit with new expressions, just like Oki and Mina Sakai."

Mina Sakai is a 27-year-old musician who founded the Ainu Rebels hip-hop group; Oki is Oki Kanno, the dynamic, 50-something leader of the Oki Dub Ainu Band, and probably the Ainu's biggest star. Half-Ainu and half-Japanese (as is Ms. Sakai), Mr. Kanno has taken the band on tours of the U.S., Australia, South America, Europe and Africa, and collaborated with numerous indigenous artists, including the well-known Native American flutist R. Carlos Nakai and the Australian aboriginal band Waak Waak Jungi. The band's sound is a hot, rhythmic fusion of reggae (hence the "dub," a reggae genre), African music and electronica highlighted with traditional mukkuri and amplified tonkori.

"I'm called the 'Tonkori Man,'" Mr. Kanno says after a recent Tokyo gig where the packed house, including fans from Brazil, jumped and jived throughout the three-hour nonstop performance.

It was a tonkori that Mr. Kanno received as a gift in 1992 that persuaded him to pursue music. He had just returned to Japan after five years working in film production in New York City. Fluent in English (and its expletives), Mr. Kanno says he has no formal musical training. "But I've got my ancestors backing me, which makes my music strong," he adds. "My ancestors were really great. They created powerful rhythms and melodies, inspired by the different cultures they came in contact with through trading."

Unfretted, with three to five strings and a long, thin, wooden body, the tonkori is the Ainu people's only stringed instrument. With its limited pitch, it calls on the player to create rhythmic variations rather than melodies. Mr. Kanno spent 15 years getting his amplified version finely tuned; now he has a powerful, original sound that isn't drowned out by the bass and drums. Mr. Kanno is clear about his goal: "What I want to do is create a really cool Ainu groove, a new type of music."

A major impetus for the cultural revival was the Law for the Promotion of Ainu Culture, enacted in 1997 (a major turnaround from laws of the mid-1800s that cemented bans on the language and customs.) It led to the establishment of government-backed institutions such as the Ainu Culture Center in Tokyo, which opened that year.

Universities also are opening once-closed doors with courses in Ainu studies. Waseda University in Tokyo recently sponsored an indigenous-dance workshop with Native American Rosalie Daystar Jones and Ainu Rebels founder Ms. Sakai as guest teachers. (Ainu dance was added last year to Unesco's list of the intangible cultural heritage of humanity.)

Ms. Sakai, with a smile that lights up a room, has become an inspiration for young Ainu. Her own inspiration was a visit with Haida Indians in Canada during a high-school class trip. She loved their new songs -- cool, positive and energetic. After years of facing discrimination in her Hokkaido hometown, she suddenly took pride in her Ainu heritage.

Ms. Sakai and her brother, Atsushi, started the Ainu Rebels in 2006 as a way to dig into their Ainu roots. The group wore attusi robes and Ainu headwear and incorporated Ainu ritual dances like the crane dance for women and the sword dance for men. Lyrics were sung in the Ainu language -- with a fresh hip-hop take. Among older Ainu, reactions to the Rebels was mixed. "Because it was so new, some conservative elders didn't really like the idea, but others were happy about it," says Atsushi Sakai. The Tokyo-based group grew to eight members, all of Ainu descent, and was spotlighted as a case of empowered Ainu youth reviving and recreating Ainu tradition.

Ms. Sakai balanced her music with activism. In July 2008, just ahead of the G8 summit, she helped organize an event in Hokkaido that attracted indigenous peoples from around the world. The festival mixed traditional culture with calls for Ainu rights, including a formal apology from government leaders for past wrongs.

Caught between old and new worlds, Ms. Sakai is struggling to find her place as an artist. "It's important that I spread Ainu culture and create pride among the Ainu, so there is no more prejudice or discrimination against us," she explains. "But this means I am not totally free as an artist."

The Ainu Rebels disbanded last autumn because Ms. Sakai decided to pursue a career as a professional singer. (The Rebels were an amateur group.) In collaboration with composer Masashi Hamauzu, she is creating a contemporary sound that includes an amplified tonkori, with lyrics in English, Japanese and Ainu. "I'm now taking an Ainu language course," she says with a smile. "It's so important that the language is revived."

Like most Ainu, Ms. Sakai isn't fluent in the language (in which "Ainu" means simply "the people"). The language, which appears to have no genealogical connection with any other language family, is considered "critically endangered" -- one step up from extinct -- by Unesco, which cites a 2006 poll by the Hokkaido government that just 14 people believe they could teach it. Always spoken rather than written, the language was eventually recorded by transcribers in katakana, a Japanese syllabary, as well as Roman letters and Russian Cyrillic.

The Ainu epic narratives, called Yukar, were barely saved from extinction by transcribers such as Matsu Kannari, an Ainu who served as a Christian missionary. From 1926 until her death in 1961, Ms. Kannari (who wrote as Imekanu) recorded thousands of pages of the dramatic tales. Many are about gods, ancestors and heroes, and some are more than 8,000 lines long. Miraculously, they are still recited from memory by studious Ainu like Jirota Kitahara, 33, a bear of a man with a thick Ainu-style beard. Mr. Kitahara began learning the Yukar in earnest at 18, listening to old tape recordings of Yukar performances with his parent's Ainu music group.

"The Yukar are kind of like action movies," he explains. "Part of one epic I recited today is about a warrior who falls in love with a very beautiful lady he discovers among the enemy -- a kind of 'Romeo and Juliet' theme." Mr. Kitahara's performance on the large Tokyo stage was far from the homey irori -- sunken hearths -- where Ainu storytellers of old entertained their audiences. But he captivated his audience, young and old, with a vigorous, undulating delivery that reverberated throughout the hall. Following tradition, he was accompanied by an assistant who set the tempo with the beat of a stick. While the Ainu language, Yukar, storytelling and folk tales are slowly gaining interest among the Japanese, Mr. Kitahara says there's a long way to go.

Illustrator and manga artist Sayo Ogasawara's solution lies in online picture books. Written in Japanese and Ainu, her "digital books" are part of a series of illustrated Ainu folk tales for children available on the Ainu Culture Center Web site. Kids can click onto tales like "The Girl Who Became a Woodpecker" that teach about Ainu history. (In the best fable tradition, they also carry morals. The woodpecker story's: Take care of your elders...or else!)

"My mother didn't teach me about Ainu things," says Ms. Ogasawara, who grew up in Hokkaido and now lives in Tokyo. "Ainu of her generation wanted to get rid of their heritage." Half-Japanese, she began to learn about her Ainu heritage in junior high school when writing a report on her family. Intrigued, she decided to learn more on her own. Tall with a graceful step, Ms. Ogasawara, 34, became a dancer and back-up singer with the Ainu Rebels. Now as she creates a new genre of Ainu art, she says, "There's so much I want to share. I'm still learning."

Embroidery artist Shizue Ukaji, 76, knows well the struggle to learn and the joy of sharing her heritage. "When I was a child, I really wanted to draw pictures, but like most Ainu we were so poor we had no pencils or paper to draw on," she recalls. In time, as a young adult, she was able to follow her passion. Protesting for Ainu rights followed, despite objections from many fellow Ainu. Now, as an elder, she is deeply respected for her years of dedication to the cause.

Drawing led Ms. Ukaji to embroidery and appliqué a decade ago. She may spend as much as a year making one of her traditional attusi robes, with appliquéd geometric patterns and intricate embroidery; they're prized for their beauty and worn for special occasions. (The traditional Ainu patterns, bold and stylized, have no representational meaning, though cuffs and hems are often embroidered with thorn-like shapes -- as Ms. Ukaji explains, to "prevent evil spirits from entering the body.") Once made of fish and animal skins and later with textiles woven from tree bark and plant fibers, the robes are now mostly cotton.

One day, her embroidery led to an epiphany. "I realized, when threads are bound together, they become strong and something new," she says, pointing to a beautiful new attusi robe with geometric appliqu[eacute] not unlike an abstract painting. Inspired by her ancestors, she used a material made from woven plant fibers. "Threads like these are important for all of humanity."

—Lucy Birmingham is a writer based in Tokyo.

Politician’s dam

by Andrew Finkel

Sunday's Zaman

The dinner conversation turned -- as statistically it must do at least once in a person’s life -- to the subject of Shigeru Kayano. He was, I discovered, a champion of the Ainu people -- now few in number -- who inhabit parts of the northern islands of Japan. He appears to have been one of those rare biopic heroes whose sense of justice propelled him from a modest life into center stage. He was a self-taught ethnographer of his own people who was elected to the Japanese Diet. There he confounded his fellow members of Parliament by insisting on asking parliamentary questions in his mother tongue. His efforts resulted in the repeal of an 1899 law that declared the Ainu to be “a former aboriginal people” in need of civilization (read: assimilation) and even banned them from a customary life of hunting and fishing. It was not until 2008, two years after Kayano’s death, that the Ainu were declared an indigenous people.

One of Kayano’s pyrrhic victories was his campaign against the forced appropriation of sacred land for the Nibutani Dam. Though the dam was built, the court ruled for the first time in 1997 that the Ainu had cultural rights that needed to be respected. The dam’s history is a depressing tale. It was originally commissioned to provide water for a new industrial park some 100 kilometers away, but even when that project was cancelled, the dam went ahead. A seijika damu -- “a politician’s dam” -- was how one engineer described it in an account by the Japan scholar, Millie Creighton. It was part of the “iron triangle” which worked to the benefit of politicians, bureaucrats and businesses but which did relatively little to help the local economy, she writes. On top of it all, the dam actually failed in 2003 when a typhoon caused it to silt up entirely.

It won’t come as a great shock that my sudden interest in an island people many miles from my İstanbul desk comes from concerns closer to home. There are some 8-12 million Kurds in Turkey, (depending on one’s definition) but only (at the very most) 200,000 Ainu remain. So the issue of whether Turkey should plough ahead and build the Ilisu Dam on the Tigris River is a problem of a different order. The project was first investigated in 1954, had a ground-breaking ceremony in 2006 but is a long way from completion. It faces a determined coalition opposition. This has come from an environmental lobby concerned that the flooding will submerge most of the medieval settlement of Hasankeyf and affect valuable ecosystems along the Tigris. There is also a political lobby which believes the project is less about developing the Southeast but transferring hydroelectricity resources westwards to the rest of Turkey, leaving in its wake damage to a landscape and an uprooted population. Then there is a now less powerful geo-political lobby which believes that Turkish control over the course of the Tigris will eventually bring it into conflict with its southern neighbors.

The counter argument is that Turkey needs energy, that hydropower is cleaner than the alternatives, that Ilisu is the largest of many projects on the Tigris that will create opportunity and jobs. The Southeastern Anatolia Project (GAP) administration that oversees the dam, says it has taken on board the need to mitigate the impact of the project. This has not been the view, however, of the export credit guarantee agencies from Germany, Switzerland and Austria. who came up with a list of 150 deficiencies and after a moratorium last year finally pulled out altogether.

The Turkish government is still determined to build and is appealing to domestic Turkish banks to step into the breach. The sensible thing would be to pause to take stock. It does not need to look as far as Nibutani in Japan to realize that it needs to do the cost-benefit analysis once again. And it should do so in the context of its much trumpeted democratic initiative to win the hearts and minds of the Kurdish Southeast. It may well be that local people are all in favor of Ilisu and the dam after that and the dam after that and after that. But their voice needs to be heard. The debate needs to be out in the open. Otherwise Ilisu will be, as they say in Japanese, just another politician’s dam.

Children's stage group put on performances of Ainu musicals in Tokyo

Mainichi Shimbun

SAPPORO -- A children's performance group here will stage musical performances featuring Ainu culture next week.

The Sapporo Kodomo Musical Ikuseikai, a group from Hokkaido Prefecture, will perform two original musicals at the New National Theater in Tokyo's Shibuya Ward on Oct. 6 and 7.

Through the musical pieces featuring Ainu, an ethnic group indigenous to Japan's Hokkaido area, some 40 children aged 5 and 15 will depict the splendor of Ainu culture and the message of coexistence.

The theater group was established by director Mariko Hosokawa, 78, in 1981. Born in Nagasaki, Hosokawa moved to Sapporo in 1958 when she married her husband. She then came across Ainu culture, and became captivated by the lifestyle of the aboriginal Ainu people.

At the same time, however, Hosokawa came to learn about the deep-rooted discrimination and prejudice against Ainu people. Hosokawa says that she founded her musical troupe because she wanted to introduce her Ainu knowledge to children, who are far more open-minded than adults.

In 1979, the group performed its first Ainu musical with the participation of about 100 children in Sapporo. Hosokawa received a vast number of threatening calls.

"I thought someone might come to kill me," said Hosokawa. "It was a spirit of rebellion that pushed me. I wanted to denounce the discrimination through the musical."

During the Tokyo performance, the children will perform "Pororintan," a musical production based on the life of Hosokawa's late Ainu teacher Shigeru Kayano, the first Ainu to become a member of the Japanese Diet, and "Hitotsu no owande tu miku miku," an Ainu saga called "Yukar."

None of the 40 children performing the musical has Ainu background; however, they hope to promote understanding of the ethnic culture among people.

"Ainu people respect all living creatures including animals and plants. I want people in Tokyo to realize how great that is," a 10-year-old boy from the troupe said.

Last year, the Japanese Diet officially recognized Ainu as Japan's indigenous people. The government is now moving forward to establish new laws to protect Ainu from discrimination and poverty.

It has been 30 years since Hosokawa started her activities in the hope of eradicating prejudice against Ainu people. "We've finally come this far," Hosokawa said.

Click here for the original Japanese story.

Ainu to launch new national group

The Japan Times

SAPPORO (Kyodo) The indigenous Ainu plan to launch a national organization possibly by the end of this month in an effort to urge the government to establish new legislation to improve their lives and promote their culture, sources said Tuesday.

The Sapporo-based Ainu Association of Hokkaido and the Ainu Utari Renrakukai, an umbrella body of groups of Ainu living in Tokyo and its vicinity, plan to hold an inaugural meeting of the new body in Tokyo later this month, the sources said.

The Ainu, who have lived for centuries in Hokkaido and Russia's Kuril and Sakhalin islands, have their own language and customs. But the government beginning around the late Edo Period (1603-1867) promoted their assimilation.

The Ainu population is currently estimated at about 25,000.

The Ainu Association of Hokkaido said the new national body is intended to share information among various Ainu groups, consolidate their opinions and build a consensus among them.

In July, a government panel on policies concerning the Ainu released a report that urged the state to take concrete steps to improve their lives and promote their culture through new legislation.

Many Ainu expect the next prime minister, Yukio Hatoyama, to effect policies to promote their livelihoods and culture, the sources said, noting he hails from a Hokkaido constituency.

Hatoyama, president of the Democratic Party of Japan, is certain to become prime minister following his party's historic victory in Sunday's general election for the House of Representatives.

The past forced assimilation caused the Ainu to lose much of their land and become impoverished.

In the July report, the panel acknowledged that the introduction of land ownership and assimilation policies implemented while the government was modernizing the state dealt a serious blow to the Ainu and their culture.

Language of power is focus in legal action over sackings

by Melanie Newman

Times Higher Education

Professors who taught dying tongue say university 'fabricated' claims.

Three academics who were sacked by a Japanese university on charges of "academic harassment" have claimed that they were ousted for attempting to teach an indigenous language.

The professors of educational linguistics, who have asked not to be named, are bringing legal action against Hokkaido University of Education after being fired by the institution in February.

Academic harassment - a relatively new concept in Japan - is defined as the abuse of power of one's academic position.

The university has accused the academics of "violating the human rights of the students under their supervision" by forcing them to work on an "extraordinary volume of assignments" for their own research purposes.

As a result, nine students suffered physical or psychological problems including hallucinations, the institution claimed.

Reports in the Japanese media have highlighted the fact that the three staff had chosen the indigenous language of Ainu as a theme for collaborative research for students majoring in English-language education.

The Ainu people are indigenous to northern Japan, where Hokkaido University is situated.

Historically marginalised, their language is now on the verge of extinction.

Recommendations made recently by a government committee to tackle discrimination of the Ainu people have been opposed by some conservative groups in Japan, which fear that the measures proposed could open the door to land claims and affirmative action.

At the time of their sacking, the three Hokkaido professors were teaching Ainu courses, with the approval of the university, and developing Japanese-Ainu dictionaries.

In 2007, two of the professors started constructing a database of books written in Ainu held by Japanese libraries, enlisting the help of student volunteers.

The professors said that while it was true that some students made complaints, the university "exploited these complaints and fabricated a story about harassment".

In a statement to Times Higher Education, they say the university accused them of "creating a cult group and engaging in mind control of the students".

The professors allege that their department head was told by a senior manager to stop them from teaching Ainu, a claim denied by the university.

After they were removed from their jobs, the Ainu language and culture classes they taught were scrapped, the professors say, adding that Japanese-Ainu dual-language signposts within the university have been taken down.

Yoshiya Goto, the university's executive director, denied that the teaching of the Ainu language had played any part in their dismissal and reiterated the allegation that the professors had "abused students' human rights".

He said: "Our resolution was not arbitrary but was based on a thorough investigation and followed the appropriate procedures. Their complaint is therefore entirely false."

He added that the professors had applied for an injunction against their dismissal at the Sapporo District Court, but their attempt had failed.

Panel to urge gov't to support Ainu through legislation

from The Associated Press

TOKYO, June 29 (Kyodo) — A government panel discussing policies concerning the Ainu people plans to urge the Japanese government to take legislative proceedings to support Ainu people's livelihoods, the panel's head said Monday.

The panel agreed to propose in a report, which will be issued at the end of July, to promote policies to enhance the livelihood of Ainu people, Koji Sato, a professor emeritus at Kyoto University, said at a news conference.

"Considering the history that the state policy promoting modernization resulted in causing great damage to the culture of indigenous Ainu people, it is necessary for the state to take initiative to draw up and implement policies with responsibility," Sato said.

The policies include promoting Ainu studies and culture, and beefing up understanding of Ainu people through enhanced education, Sato said, adding that the report is unlikely to mention detailed contents and timing of the legislation.

"We share a view that it is significant for the government to show the public how it will work with the issue with certain philosophy and stances through legislation," Sato said.

The panel also agreed to mention in the report the history of the Ainu people, who were driven into a position to become subject to the government's modernization policy and suffered from discrimination, Sato said.

The report is also expected to mention that there are still disparities between Ainu and other people in such areas as university advancement rates.

The Ainu people live primarily on the northern main island of Hokkaido and have their own language and culture. They suffered under the government's assimilation policy that deprived them of their land, language and customs.

The panel was set up after the central government recognized the Ainu as an "indigenous people" in June last year and pledged to work to "promote current Ainu policies and establish comprehensive measures" based on that recognition.

The recognition came after the United Nations adopted the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in September 2007, which outlines the collective and individual rights of an estimated 370 million indigenous people.

Japanese filmmakers persist with historic film

by Kathryn Marmon

from examiner.com

Japanese volunteers filming “TOKYO Ainu” are still in production but a promotional short can be viewed on YouTube.The short documentary opens with scenes in Shiba Park, the site of the Hokkaido Aboriginal Training School where 38 Ainu were taken by force in 1872 from their homes in Hokkaido. The adjustment was great, and impossible for five souls who were unable to make the changes necessary to save their lives.

The Tokyo population is about 42 million. Among them, living undiscovered until recently, are about 5,000 Ainu. They have left Hokkaido, not all together willingly, but out of necessity to find jobs, acquire education and to avoid discrimination.

“We wanted to go back, but couldn’t afford to,” said one man in the film, who is not named.

Still, Ainu who moved to Tokyo found they were still the object of discrimination. Some became afraid to admit to their Ainu heritage. Despite opposition, even from close friends who tell them to give up, the Ainu people are persistent in their campaign to be recognized as an indigenous people. Some are beginning to believe they have made progress and are grateful to elders who set out on this quest for freedom. Young Ainu are anxious to learn about Ainu ways of living, preparing their food, and about their music, in order to become self-reliant.

The promotional documentary shows footage completed as recently as July 2008.

Yoshiko Kayano, “TOKYO Ainu” Film Production Committee member, recently agreed to an interview.

EX: Can you tell me about your progress? Has the film already been

released?

YK: When the shooting of the film started in the spring of 2007, the focus was on an Ainu elder Haruzo Urakawa, who had been single-handedly building an Ainu cultural facility, and the tentative title was "Haruzo, an Ainu." As the shooting progressed, the film's focus was changed to include the whole Ainu community in Greater Tokyo and the title was also changed to "TOKYO Ainu." As a result, the completion of the film has been delayed. Now we hope to complete it by the spring 2010. One big problem we are facing is the financial one, because the production of the film has been financed only by supporters' purchase of cooperation vouchers and donations.

EX: Are they happy with the film, so far?

YK: They still need to shoot several more scenes and people and then start to edit them. So far, only the promotional footage was completed, but we all expect that this film is going to be a very important one.

EX: What further projects does the production company have planned?

YK: Not necessarily about the Ainu. This is not a production company. When an Ainu elderly woman made a passionate plea: "Please make an Ainu movie for us. Please document our voices for the future generation," the production committee was

established and found a director Hiroshi Moriya (a former TV director / now a freelance film director and a vegetable farmer). The committee consists of five members who all work volunteer for this film. The committee was established to make this film and currently don’t have any concrete plan to make another film, but we all hope to find a way to keep these filmed interview records as an archive and make available so that the following generations of the Ainu can learn from them.

EX: What is the name of the production company and do they have a website?

YK: The name of the committee is "TOKYO Ainu" Documentary Film Committee. The website in English is:

http://www.2kamuymintara.com/film/eng/top.htm

We hope many people will visit this website and learn about this film project, and give what they can.

Hiroshi Moriya: Director, Editor, Film

Produced by: “TOKYO Ainu” Film Production Committee

TOKYO Ainu filmmakers tell about Japan’s indigenous people

by Kathryn Marmon

from examiner.com

Indigenous people around the globe are finding their voices and rewriting history, or should it be called, correcting history, because now they are included. The film industry is another medium enabling indigenous filmmakers in their efforts to let the world know of the existence of ancient cultures thought to have long ago disappeared.

In the spring of 2007, the filming of a documentary about the Ainu culture in Tokyo was begun. The film, “TOKYO Ainu” is a series of interviews with various members of the Ainu community of Tokyo thought to have been assimilated and so no longer in existence as their original ancient culture.

The traditional homeland of the Ainu, Japan’s indigenous people, is Hokkaido, formerly Ezo. Today, the number of Ainu living in greater Tokyo has been estimated to be between 5,000 and 10,000. The major city offers economic advantages and the people suffer less discrimination according to one interviewee who has participated in the film.

In the film, Ainu who have relocated to Tokyo but have retained their Ainu identity, reveal how their culture affects their life among other Japanese who don’t understand them and what pressures they must deal with.

Like other indigenous cultures, the Ainu also experienced the loss of their ancestral land and means for survival. Under the Meiji government from 1861 to 1868, the Ainu were chased from their villages and prevented from practicing their traditional hunting, fishing and other customs.

Also, like other cultures, the Ainu were forced to live under a new policy of assimilation so that the Meiji government could develop and exploit Hokkaido’s natural resources.

The film, “Tokyo Ainu,” is the first of many Ainu films to come, I am sure. It will allow the present generation of Ainu to define themselves and to leave an outline for future generations.

For more info:

More about Ainu

"TOKYO Ainu" website

Preview film on YouTube

Ainu still lead underprivileged lives, survey finds

by Keiji Hirano

from The Japan Times

Many Ainu lead underprivileged lives, with their income and university advancement rate remaining low, according to a survey by the Hokkaido University Center for Ainu & Indigenous Studies and the Ainu Association of Hokkaido.

Their average annual household income stands at ¥3.56 million, around 60 percent of the national average, and the college advancement rate among Ainu below 30 years of age comes to 20.2 percent, compared with the national average of 42.2 percent, the preliminary figures of the survey show.

"I believe this data will serve as a useful reference for the government in compiling its policies on the Ainu," said Teruki Tsunemoto, chief of the Hokkaido University center.

The survey, the largest ever on the indigenous minority, was conducted in October by sending questionnaires to individual Ainu aged 18 to 84 living in Hokkaido and to Ainu households.

Responses were received from 2,903 households and 5,703 individuals.

Among the households, 5.2 percent are receiving welfare now and 4.8 percent did so in the past, compared with 3.5 percent for all of Hokkaido and 2.1 percent nationwide in fiscal 2006.

Reflecting the high welfare rate, 33.5 percent of the individuals consider themselves impoverished, while 40.5 percent said they have trouble making a living to some degree.

Overall, less than 70 percent make it to high school. Of those who do, 10 percent drop out, the survey found. The dropout rate for Ainu who enroll in four-year universities and colleges is even worse at 19.1 percent.

Around one-third of the respondents wanted to proceed to higher education, of whom 76.1 percent said they gave up further education due to financial reasons.

"The survey indicates even if young Ainu manage to enter universities, many of them drop out due mainly to economic difficulties," said Tsunemoto, who is also a member of a government committee working to enhance Ainu policies.

"This means it is not enough to support their advancement to higher education. We need to (financially) help them continue their studies, and the government's measures for the Ainu should be built on this recognition," he said.

Underlining his comments, more than half of the respondents said they expect the central and local governments to expand support measures so more Ainu can advance to higher education.

The government panel was set up after the Diet recognized the Ainu as an "indigenous people" last June following the adoption of the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in September 2007. The declaration outlines the collective and individual rights of the world's indigenous people.

The eight-member panel, which includes Hokkaido Gov. Harumi Takahashi and Ainu Association of Hokkaido chief Tadashi Kato, will issue its report this summer.

"I have believed that a sufficient educational background is the key to improve the economic situations of the Ainu, and my view has been underlined by the survey," said Kato, who has served 18 years as a counselor in the town of Shiraoi, Hokkaido.

The survey suggests Ainu are by and large becoming unfamiliar with their traditional culture.

More than 60 percent of the respondents having no experiences of working to preserve and hand down the Ainu language, storytelling, as well as songs and dances.

Kato said, however, that such results are inevitable because "we are an ethnic group for which many things were banned," referring, for example, to the past assimilation policy of prohibiting the Ainu from speaking their own language.

"I hope we could work with the government so the Japan of the 21st century will be a society where various ethnic groups can live together," Kato said.