2020: Indigenous Diplomacy: Sakhalin Ainu (Part 2)

Minderheiten in Japan: Ainu, Buraku, Ryukyu people, Koreans
Source: The Asia-Pacific Journal | Japan Focus Volume 18 | Issue 23 | Number 5 | Article ID 5513 | Dec 01, 2020
Mit freundlicher Erlaubnis von Japan Focus


Indigenous Diplomacy:
Sakhalin Ainu (Enchiw) in the Shaping 
of Modern East Asia
(Part 2: Voices and Silences)

Tessa Morris-Suzuki

Abstract:
Indigenous people are often depicted as helpless victims of the forces of eighteenth and nineteenth century colonial empire building: forces that were beyond their understanding or control. Focusing on the story of a mid-nineteenth century diplomatic mission by Sakhalin Ainu (Enchiw), this essay (the first of a two-part series), challenges that view, suggesting instead that, despite the enormous power imbalances that they faced, indigenous groups sometimes intervened energetically and strategically in the historical process going on around them, had some impact on the outcome of these processes. In Part 2, we look at the Nayoro Ainu elder Setokurero’s intervention in imperial negotiations between Japan and Russia in the early 1850s, and consider what impact this may have had on the experiences of Sakhalin Ainu during the early phases of Russian and Japanese colonial rule in Sakhalin.


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