How might "Ainu history from an Ainu perspective" be (im)possible? : Examining the editing of Ainu history using the resources of Kaizawa Tadashi

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  • 「アイヌ側から見たアイヌ史」はいかに不／可能か : 貝沢正資料からみる各アイヌ史の編纂について
  • 「 アイヌガワ カラ ミタ アイヌシ 」 ワ イカニ フ/カノウ カ : カイ サワ セイ シリョウ カラ ミル カク アイヌシ ノ ヘンサン ニ ツイテ

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Abstract

Alongside the passing of the Ainu Policy Promotion Act in 2019, “research in which Ainu are the (initiating) subjects” became a government assigned task of national policy. However, Ainu becoming the (initiating) subjects of research has always been inconsistent with the teleology of postwar history writing in Japan and its developmentalist view of history. There has also been a lack of available materials from the Ainu themselves and Ainu historical research has fallen behind other fields. This paper describes the perspective and resources that originate from the relationship between the author of this paper – “me” – and Kaizawa Tadashi, a driving force behind Ainu movements up until the 1990s. It examines Kaizawa’s efforts to edit an Ainu history project. The paper looks at Kaizawa’s persistence in trying to create an “Ainu history as seen by the Ainu” – of which there are almost no other examples. It investigates his three attempts at writing and editing an Ainu history. The paper, in its exploration of the possibility of “Ainu history as seen by the Ainu”, concludes that the Ainu History (5 volumes) published by the Ainu Association of Hokkaido was an example of failure, and Nibutani an example of success.

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