Indigenous

It is widely known that there are Indigenous people in North America, but did you know that there are Indigenous people in Japan?

The Ainu are the native people of Hokkaido, the northern island of Japan, and some of their nearby Russian territories. They have been living in those lands since the 17th century. They were living by trading fish and fur which were obtained by fishing and hunting with foreign people including Japanese. They didn’t have a writing system, therefore, they handed down history and life hacks orally. However, this brought a crisis in the extinction of the language later.

In 1869, Japan officially decided to integrate and colonize the northern island Hokkaido. The government of Japan forbade Ainu people their language, original culture and customs, and forced them to follow a cultural assimilation policy. The government also forbade their livelihood, hunting and fishing, and gave them poor lands for farming. They soon fell into poverty.

There is a report that says there were around 77,000 of the Ainu before, but unfortunately, there is no reliable result. Their population is estimated to be about 13,000 as of 2017. Only 0.7% of the population can still speak their original language.

This sounds familiar in Canada.