#the author literally did want as many people as possible to read about the ainu | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

homiro · 3 months ago

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#all weebs should be legally required to read about japanese imperialism both inside and outside the country that is now labeled as “japan”

Couldn't have put it better if I tried, prev.

The Ainu have not intentionally forgotten their culture and their language. It is the modern Japanese state that, from the Meiji era on, usurped our land, destroyed our culture, and deprived us of our language under the euphemism of assimilation. In the space of a mere 100 years, they nearly decimated the Ainu culture and language that had taken tens of thousands of years to come into being on this earth. ~Kayano Shigeru (1926-2006) Our Land Was a Forest: An Ainu Memoir

#book rec #important #ainu people #indigenous peoples #ainu mosir #kayano shigeru #i've also read this book #if anyone wants it and can't access it let me know and we'll figure it out #the author literally did want as many people as possible to read about the ainu #and he's passed on in 2006 #back to the land of his ancestors and the kamuy no doubt #the kamuy must have received him well for everything he did and how hard he fought to preserve what was left of the ainu culture #and language #but it hurts so much to know that he was one of the last living native speakers of the language #i don't even know if there are natives alive today or if the language is only taught as a second language in ainu mosir/hokkaido #but it's good that they're making an effort to teach it which was what he wanted #homiro said some shit #i'm very passionate about this and hope my phd project is acceped because i want to write about them #but not in a pity kind of way but rather in a resilience kind of way #yeah #the speech he gave to the old lady who helped him translate a yukar had me bawling like a baby but it was what made me want to do it #and think that pity is very colonial like positive post-colonial ideas or something like the poor peoples who were abused #instead reparations should focus on preserving the culture and giving rights to the peoples #like... the ainu were only recognised as an ethnic minority and an indigenous people of the japanese nation in 2008. let that one sink in.#and it was because of UNESCO and UN pressure to preserve these cultures and give rights to indigenous peoples #so yeah #weebs really need to learn about the culture and history of japan and the japanese empire #and also not think that the ainu didn't fight much like the native americans they also fought but that was before the meiji era #because one thing ppl need to understand is that people get oppressed by colonisers when they resist oppression with all they have #if the wajin/shamo/japanese didn't have guns they'd have been crushed and for that i have resent my own ancestors

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