I have translated many Australian plays into Japanese, some of which have been staged in Japan and Australia. The first work I translated was John Romeril’s The Floating World in 1993, which was produced in Tokyo and Melbourne in 1995. Since the early 2000s, I have translated many more Indigenous Australian plays into Japanese, including Stolen (published in 2001) by Jane Harrison, The 7 Stages of Grieving (2001) by Wesley Enoch and Deborah Mailman, Up the Ladder (2003) by Roger Bennett, No Sugar (2006) and The Dreamers (2006) by Jack Davis, and The Story of the Miracles at Cookie’s Table (performed in Japan in 2006) by Wesley Enoch, most of which were produced by Japanese theatre companies with the assistance of Indigenous Australian theatre practitioners (see Sawada 2006; Curran 2007). I would like to explore how important the Japanese presentation of Australian Indigenous plays has been in the Japanese context. Naturally, this context includes the indigenous Ainu people of Japan. In this paper, I will make clear the social circumstances of the Ainu and then investigate the relationship between indigenous peoples and contemporary performing arts. Finally, I will discuss the possibility of promoting Ainu theatre through the use of models borrowed from Australian Indigenous theatre making and other sources.

Before entering these discussions, I will note how a “boom and bust” in the economy and in certain kinds of theatre created a space for minority theatre in Japan. The first “boom” of Japanese political theatre was the first generation of the Shingeki or New Theatre movement. It was epitomised by the Tsukiji Little Theatre which was founded in 1924 by Osanai Kaoru and Hijikata Yoshi, who had been influenced by the proletarian movement during his stay in Europe. They adopted the theories of Émile Zola, Anton Chekov and others in their argument that theatre should represent the issues of the modern day, most notably those of the rising middle class and its relations with other groups, including the working classes. Although Shingeki remained persistently left-wing even after World War II, it suffered a barrage of criticism, which was aroused in part by the desire to reconstruct the existing framework of modernised Japan in the post-war environment (Kan 2003). The weakening of Shingeki was accelerated by the emergence of the Shôgekijô or Small Theatres movement in the latter half of the 1960s (Peter Eckersall details this movement in his text Theorizing the Angura Space, 2006). The first generation of Shôgekijô was also political, but the tendency of Shôgekijô theatre practitioners to develop formally innovative works later tended to make this work become increasing depoliticised as well, especially as Japan entered the Bubble Economy period, 1986-1990. So paradoxically, the economic boom of this period produced a “bust” or absence of political theatre in Japan, and it is only now with the bust and collapse of the Bubble Economy that Japanese theatre is again returning to political topics. This shift in the economy and in Japanese theatre practice has therefore created a space in which theatre about or by Japanese minorities might begin to emerge.

Australia-Japan Theatrical Exchanges

In the 1970s, many Japanese theatre companies actively performed in foreign countries. Before the 1970s, such overseas presentations had been limited to traditional theatre forms such as Kabuki and Noh. The modern Japanese theatre form Shingeki mimicked Western Naturalist theatre (Kan 2003), so its value was not recognised in Western countries. In contrast, the first generation of alternative theatre forms such as Suzuki Tadashi and Terayama Sh?ji was highly praised around the world because of their theatrical expressions that emphasised “Japan-ness”, and these productions were therefore invited to various international art festivals (Ozasa 1980, 211).

Many alternative theatre companies of the 1980s also staged performances at international festivals. In the 1980s, Butoh companies such as Byakkoshha, Sankaijuku and Suzuki Tadashi’s company gave performances in Australia and made a lasting impact on Australian theatre. Festivals held in Australia have also played a role in showcasing Japanese theatre. For instance, the Adelaide festival hosted the Australian premiere of Kabuki forms (1978) as well as Noh and Kyogen (1988). Following the traditional theatre performances, Tenkei Gekijo (1984), Kishida Jumusho + Rakutendan (1992), Tomoe Seiryo and Hakutobo (1994), Dumb Type (1994), and Ishinha (2001) appeared at the Adelaide festival (Parsons & Chance 1997, 160). More importantly, Wada Yoshio – the director of Kishida Jimusho + Rakutendan theatre company – maintained an interest in Australian theatre even after the Adelaide festival, as will be discussed below.

One of the most important works from the point of view of Australian-Japanese theatrical exchange was the Japanese production of John Romeril’s The Floating World.2 It was the first Australian play to be staged in Japan. Translated by myself, the Japanese production of The Floating World was presented along with Japanese playwright Tanaka Chikao’s Maria no Kubi (The Head of Mary) at the Japan-Australia Cultural Exchange Program in 1995. This program was jointly produced by the Tokyo International Festival and the Melbourne International Festival (Sawada 1996).

The exchange between both countries’ playwright associations that started at the end of the 1990s inspired other Japanese playwrights such as Sakade Yoji and Saito Ren, who discussed the possibility of a collaborative project with John Romeril involving theatre artists from Japan, Australia, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia and Malaysia. They chose landmines as the theme for the collaboration. Sakade Yoji participated in the collaborative meeting held in Singapore and wrote a short work on the topic, which was developed into a full-length play entitled Darumasan ga koronda. It premiered in Japan in 2004 and earned the most prestigious theatrical awards such as the Yomiuri Theatre Award, the Asahi Performing Arts Award and the Tsuruya Nanboku Drama Award that year (Sakade 2005). This demonstrates that Australia-Japan theatrical exchanges, which became active following the bust of Japan’s Bubble Economy, provided opportunities for Japanese playwrights to produce works with political and social themes.

Japan is yet to overcome its stereotypical image of Australia as a country with just koalas and kangaroos. Australian theatre was almost unknown in Japan until the 1990s. However, Australian plays are now becoming popular in Japan since Japanese theatre practitioners like Wada Yoshio have continued to present Australian plays, and I too have published Japanese translations of many Australian plays, including: Away and Furious by Michael Gow, Cosi, The Golden Age andRadiance by Louis Nowra, Diving for Pearls by Katherine Thomson, and Silent Partner,Scissors, Paper, Rock and To Whom It May Concern by Daniel Keene.

Australian plays have been attracting interest especially from Shingeki theatre companies since 2000. Joanna Murray-Smith is one of the most popular Australian playwrights in Japan so far because of her humanist subject matters such as the agony of the middle-class, which resound with the audience of Shingeki theatre.

This popularity of Australian plays arose as a backlash against Japanese theatre companies that were presenting too many British and American plays along with classics such as the works of Shakespeare and Chekhov. A report in a Japanese newspaper about Shingeki theatre companies presenting works of Bulgarian, Czech and Chilean playwrights says the following:

Shingeki companies were originally good at presenting Western plays. However, Shakespeare and Chekhov are no longer “mirrors reflecting the present”. These attempts at finding excellent dramas regardless of their country or period of origin will stimulate and bring diversity to Japanese theatre (Imamura 2003, 8). 3

The popularity of Australian plays, especially in recent years, rose because Japanese theatre practitioners have sought such “stimulation and diversity”, as in the case of East European and South American theatre.

In 2006, an Australian drama festival called Dramatic Australia was held in Japan as one of the official programmes of the Australia-Japan Year of Exchanges, and I was Chief Executive of the festival. Many Australian plays were translated into Japanese and performed at the festival by Japanese actors, including: Milo’s Wake by Margery Forde and Michael Forde, Secret Bridesmaids’ Business by Elizabeth Coleman, Ruby Moon by Matt Cameron, Cosi by Louis Nowra, Cookie’s Table by Wesley Enoch, Love Child and Rapture by Joanna Murray-Smith, The Return by Reg Cribb, Stolen and Rainbow’s End by Jane Harrison, The Drowning Bride by Michael Futcher and Helen Howard, Wicked Sisters by Alma de Groen. Dramatic Australia succeeded in inspiring Japanese theatre practitioners and developing Japanese theatre goers’ interest in Australian theatre. Kimura Natsuko, an actor at Theatre Company Kaze, argues that many Australian plays staged at the Dramatic Australia festival inspired her with their characters who had been marginalised in the society but have an energy and liveliness (Kimura 2007).

Director Wada Yoshio continues to present Japanese versions of Indigenous Australian plays. Questionnaires conducted at some productions show that the Japanese audiences’ knowledge of Indigenous Australian people is poor. A majority of the audience members learnt about Indigenous Australian people for the first time through these plays (Sawada 2004a). One may wonder why Wada risks losing box-office appeal by directing Indigenous Australian plays. Wada started his career as a stagehand at the company headed by Terayama Sh?ji, a prominent figure in the post-war Angura [Underground] theatre movement. Wada says that he decided to direct Australian Indigenous plays because Terayama and his company Tenjô-Sajiki and other leading figures of Angura theatre never dealt with issues of Japan’s own indigenous peoples (Wada 2003). Wada therefore approaches Japanese indigenous issues through Indigenous Australian plays. The main reason why he approached indigenous issues in this way rather than directly through with the Ainu is that there are still significant obstacles to involving the Ainu in Japanese contemporary theatre, as is described below. Therefore, Wada intended to learn how to engage with indigenous issues from the practices of Australian and Canadian indigenous theatres. He also has pursued dialogues with the Ainu by collaborating with an Ainu musician on some of his productions of Australia Indigenous plays. In 2001, he made a series of presentations of Indigenous Australian plays, starting with Jane Harrison’s Stolen (2001), and Wesley Enoch’s and Deborah Mailman’s The 7 Stages of Grieving (2001). Wada also collaborated with Wesley Enoch, having Enoch direct his company’s production of Cookie’s Table (2006) and the pair co-directed Jack Davis’ The Dreamers (2005).

Staged in 2001, Stolen made a great impact on Japanese audiences and was staged again in 2002. That same year, both the original Playbox and the Ilbijerri productions of Stolen were staged in Japan at the Tokyo International Arts Festival. Despite a small audience, reviews and audience questionnaires showed that the productions conveyed considerable information and emotional resonances to the Japanese audiences which were appreciated (Sawada 2004a). In the review of these productions, Japanese critic Koshimitsu Terufumi described how the work presented the facts of the Stolen Generations to the Japanese, revealing “an important role of theatre” (Ichinose & Koshimitsu 2003). It would not be an exaggeration to say that the Playbox production of Stolenbecame one of the most important productions to come to Japan in the history of Japanese contemporary theatre. Stolen had considerable impact on Japanese theatre practitioners and audiences by showing (again) the important social role that theatre can play. It also revealed a problem of Japanese contemporary theatre as pointed out by critic Ichinose Kazuo: “The sphere of interest of the audience, especially the young audience, is very narrow” (Ichinose & Koshimitsu 2003, 74-103).

Of course not only the audience should be blamed for this narrowness. Apart from Hirata Oriza and Sakade Yoji, few playwrights are tackling political subjects in their productions today. Since the 1980s, Japanese theatre has tended to avoid social issues and concentrated on technique. Although many Japanese playwrights wish to deal with social issues, they hesitate to do so because they assume that the audience desires only entertainment. The playwrights have thus concentrated on technique to meet the audience’s demand for entertainment. One of the social issues that is the most difficult for Japanese theatre to deal with is the issue of Japanese own cultural and ethnic minorities. This issue has been almost taboo in Japanese theatre and culture, and it was necessary to deal with this issue very carefully. Stolen and The 7 Stages of Grievingreminded the audience of the distance between most Japanese and the nation’s minority peoples, as well as the fact that the issue of minorities was rarely discussed in Japan (Sawada 2004).

The Representation of Japan’s Indigenous Peoples in Theatre

Now let us explore the social and political circumstances of Japan’s indigenous peoples. In Japan, there has been a deep-rooted understanding that Japan is a culturally and racially homogenous nation (Oguma 1995; Harootunian 2003). This claim is often made by Japanese politicians for instance, despite being criticised by the mass media. This myth of homogeneity has remained dominant in post-war Japan and has encouraged the neglect of Japan’s indigenous peoples. In her research on Japan’s indigenous Ainu peoples, the Australian scholar Tessa Morris-Suzuki argues that:

Although there are studies on the history of the Ainu in Japan, these studies have been regarded as just local history of Hokkaido, the northern part of Japan and the homeland for the Ainu, and have never had a significant influence on studies of Japanese history as a whole (2000, 38).

According to Morris-Suzuki, this conceptual structure has served to conceal the existence of the Ainu from the Japanese people in general.

In 2008, Japan heard a significant piece of news about the Ainu. On 6 June, the Diet unanimously passed a resolution recognising the Ainu as indigenous people of Japan. The resolution was adopted by both chambers, acknowledging the Ainu’s hardships such as discrimination and poverty. It also urged the government to officially recognise them and promote policies to address their problems (Inamori 2008). Historically, the Japanese government has refused to acknowledge the existence of any ethnic minority in Japan. At the Diet in 1982, the Japanese government insisted that the Ainu were not an ethnic minority because the same political and social systems applied to all Japanese citizens, irrespective of their backgrounds (Nakamura 1994). One may wonder from where this attitude of the Japanese government towards the Ainu originates. Within Japan’s national borders, the following minorities groups may be found: the Ainu, the Okinawans (whose nation-state was absorbed into Japan in the 17th century), Korean residents who moved to Japan as a result of the Japanese colonisation of Korea following 1910, and the Burakumin who have been discriminated against due to the Japanese traditional caste system even though they are ethnically “Japanese”. All of these minorities—except for the Burakumin—have their own ethnic identities. Japanese policy has however concentrated on improving the minorities’ social status and living standards and bringing this up to the same level as that of the mainstream Japanese people, rather than recognising their ethnic and cultural distinctiveness. This seemingly adequate policy to abolish discrimination in Japanese society has made the minorities’ ethnic identities invisible. This kind of treatment of the minorities has been adopted for so long that their existence has very little influence on the Japanese national identity.

So how have the Ainu and other minorities been represented in Japanese theatre? Shingeki, as a left wing theatre, has dealt with the issues of labourers, the existence of US military bases in Okinawa, the A-bombs, and the Burakumin. However, this list did not include the Ainu. Furthermore, because of the rise of Shôgekijô theatre, Shingeki theatre came to be regarded as old fashioned. Although Shingeki practitioners and audience still maintain an interest in politics, Shingeki’s importance as a contemporary Japanese form is decreasing. Shôgekijô dramaturgs were even less interested in the issue of minorities than Shingeki artists. While Kara Juro, Satô Makoto and Terayama dealt with the issue of Koreans, who were more familiar “minorities” to them, Suzuki never even mentioned the issue. The Shôgekijô movement and the generations that followed it had little contact with the cultural activities or political movements of minorities. Although it is possible to find an Okinawan company Gekidan Sôzô artistically influenced by the Shôgekijô movement, the movement never had any real effect on the Ainu. Moreover, the Ainu issue became taboo not only in Japanese society but also in the world of Japanese theatre. There are some Japanese theatre practitioners who even say that since the Ainu have assimilated with the Japanese, the issue has already been resolved (Wada 2001).

Although Japanese theatre has begun to recover its capacity to deal with political issues since the “Boom and Bust” of its economy and its theatre, major playwrights and theatre companies are still not displaying any interest in the indigenous Japanese peoples. This is a reflection of the fact that many deep-seated problems concerning the Ainu in Japanese society remain unresolved. For example, it is not possible to tell how many Ainu live in Japan since there are no official census of their population. This is because the government assumes that there is no ethnic minorities in Japan, which in turn demonstrates the thoroughness of the assimilation policy for the Ainu. Only a limited number openly declare themselves to be Ainu and many conceal their identity for fear of discrimination.

Recently, however, a new movement has begun to emerge among Ainu people born out of the 1960s. Musicians and artists such as the Ainu Art Project, the Ainu Rebels and Oki are trying to express contemporary Ainu culture through the art of music, unlike the political activists of the 1970s. Most of them cannot speak the Ainu language and grew up without learning Ainu traditions, which reflects the history of the Ainu’s assimilation into mainstream Japan. They do not intend to restore traditional Ainu culture as it was; rather, they have chosen to combine Ainu culture with those contemporary cultural avenues most readily to them and their generation, such as rock, hip-hop and reggae. Thus, they express both the traditional culture they adore and their distance from it through music. The Ainu who live in Hokkaido have been reluctant to recognise those living in the Tokyo metropolitan area as Ainu. However, their achievements have recently begun to be appreciated in Hokkaido as well (Oki 2002).

In this regard, it is true that theatre has lagged behind music? Is it possible to express the contemporary life of the Ainu people through theatre, and what might be needed to do so? Aside from musical activities, the leaders of the Ainu Rebels and the Ainu Art Project continually lecture on their identity in Tokyo and other cities. This tradition of storytelling is similar to that of the Australian Indigenous people. This offers the possibility that one might adapt these young Ainu artists’ stories and turn them into theatrical pieces, as was the model for several Australian Indigenous plays, such as Stolen.

This does not imply that there is no theatre indigenous to the Ainu. In Akanko, a tourist destination in Hokkaido, the Ainu community makes its living through tourism. They live in a small village called “Ainu Kotan”, which consists of souvenir shops, Ainu restaurants and a theatre. In 2009 I travelled to Akanko to investigate Ainu performances. As a tourist attraction, the theatre holds shows performed by the villagers daily. Each performance includes classical Ainu dances and a short play. The classical dances, authorised by the government as an intangible cultural property, are performed in a traditional form (The Akan Ainu Industrial Arts Association, n.d.). The short play Ten Kakeru Eiyu No Monogatari (a story about a hero flying in the sky) is an entertainment show that includes electric music, dances, action scenes and some traditional dances. It tells the story of an Ainu hero who saves the Ainu people from gods who are angered at their wasting of the natural environment. It should be noted that the story does not deal with the friction between the Ainu and the mainstream Japanese. Indeed, most of the characters in the piece are not human but gods, and there has been some criticism levied against the Ainu community for not representing contemporary Ainu people (Honda 2007).

In addition, a few small, one-off production plays about Ainu issues are created by the mainstream Japanese. They are not productions by large theatre companies, but small, one-off productions. For example, a theatre company in Kushiro, Hokkaido, presented a play about the life of an Ainu postman who died in the line of duty. This play was written, directed and performed by non-Ainu. Another ethnic Japanese theatre-maker wrote and performed a one-woman play about the life of Chiri Yukie, a female Ainu poet who died young. Initially the author had presented a series of one-woman pieces about the lives of the famous writers of modern Japanese literature, and was advised by an audience to present a play about the Ainu. It was not until she started her research for her new play that she learned about Chiri and the history of the Ainu. She wants to present her play in Hokkaido, but it is not certain if she will be able to collaborate with Ainu performers or whether her play will attract Ainu audiences (Koizumi 2009, 33).

In 2009 an alternative theatre company, the Mokele Mbe Mbe Project (the name comes from the name of a monster in Africa which emerges with the rainbow), produced a play called Ry?kô-no-oto-wo-tadore (Follow the Sound of a Flowing Light) in the Tokyo metropolitan area. I conducted an interview with the company’s writer and director, Oikawa Hitoshi. This play too was written, directed and performed by non-Ainu. It depicts the story of a young Japanese man who works as a sanitation worker in Tokyo. He is attracted to a young Ainu woman who works with him, and thus discovers the existence of the Ainu in contemporary Japanese society. Although the protagonist starts to study Ainu culture in order to get closer to her, she leaves him to go to Hokkaido. In addition, the play includes some scenes which are not directly related to the main story, such as Ainu folklore, poems by Chiri Yukie, episodes by the Japanese linguist Dr Kyôsuke Kindaichi (who is regarded as a pioneer of Ainu studies), Ainu songs and dances, the performance of a Turkish musical instrument and Western tap-dancing. This was a very small production, and the company performed it only four times in a small theatre with an audience capacity of twenty. In the beginning, the company thought it would be easy to develop the production with many Ainu collaborators. However, it was not long before they found this was not the case. According to Oikawa, some Ainu people responded negatively to the fact non-Ainu were making a play about the Ainu (Oikawa 2009). Indeed, many Ainu have criticised the representations of Ainu in mainstream Japanese culture and drama for presenting an inaccurate picture of Ainu culture (Sawada 2004a).

When the members of the Mokele Mbe Mbe Project learned of this situation, they wondered whether to continue to work on a play about the Ainu at that time. The company members concluded that all they could do was to portray the story of a Japanese man who glimpses a fragment of Ainu culture and society. In the final version of the play, the protagonist investigates Ainu culture, but fails to find what it is, and wanders vaguely through various imagery of the Ainu such as myths and folklore—this making up the climactic scene of the production. The question raised is why do the Japanese not know Ainu culture, even though they are familiar with such foreign cultures depicted in the play, such as traditional Turkish music and tap-dancing? In the end, the company was able to gain the cooperation of the Ainu woman Yumino Keiko, who sang traditional songs at the end of the play (Oikawa 2009).

In contrast to theatrical works created by the Ainu themselves (like Ten Kakeru Eiyu No Monogatari discussed above), plays on these topics produced by ethnic Japanese people tend towards a redemptive structure, condemning the Japanese colonisation of the Ainu and discrimination against them. Whilst it is important for the Japanese people to know this colonial past, it is nevertheless true that such a story always ends up with a miserable description of the Ainu. According to members of the Mokele Mbe Mbe Project, Yumino from Follow the Sound of a Flowing Light expressed the desire that the artists not talk about the discrimination in society too much and not to make the Ainu people’s history appear tragic.

These and other difficulties have meant that non-Ainu theatre practitioners have presented few plays about Ainu in recent years. The alternative of Japanese-Ainu collaboration is however a difficult path to successfully initiate. Ainu often respond negatively to plays about them created by non-Ainu people. Creating a play that makes Ainu people feel miserable not what most Ainu people want. As the Australian Indigenous playwright Jane Harrison has observed, one of the purposes of Indigenous theatre is to celebrate Indigenous culture and to provide Indigenous audiences with enjoyable or uplifting stories (Harrison 2008). In the Japanese social context, it is quite difficult for a non-Ainu to create such a work for an Ainu audience, which is why it is most important that a play about the Ainu should be made by the Ainu people themselves.

However, young Ainu performers worry that they would be exploited by the mainstream Japanese. Since they are not satisfied with the representations of themselves created by the mainstream Japanese, they are determined to decide how they should be represented, and so far they have chosen hip-hop, rock and reggae. This is not only because such music very close to them, but it also distinguishes their own artistic expression from that of their elders. So far, the more venerable artistic form of theatre has not been included in the new generation of Ainu artists’ modes of artistic expression.

In October 2009, as the first step to developing a future collaboration with Ainu performers, I organised an Ainu and North American Indigenous Peoples Dance Workshop and Lectures as part of the Waseda University Global COE programme. I invited Sakai Mina, the leader of the hip-hop group the Ainu Rebels, and Dayster Jones, a pioneer of North American indigenous contemporary dance, as the lecturers. Sakai introduced her work as a hip-hop performer, as well as teaching participants traditional dances and choreographing a new piece which used some techniques derived from traditional Ainu dance. The purpose of this workshop was to remind participants that the Ainu people exist in contemporary Japanese society and that young Ainu are contemporising their traditions through the use of accommodating multicultural forms such as hip-hop.

The 2008 Diet resolution roused an interest in the contemporary Ainu people in Japanese society. Recently, television and newspapers have started to cover the work of young Ainu such as Sakai (Tanaka 2005; Yamada 2008). Mainstream Japanese theatre-makers have also started expressing its interest in the Ainu and creating some plays around Ainu themes. The Japanese presentation of Australian Indigenous plays represents one method for pursuing Japan’s own indigenous theatre. I am concerned about Japanese indigenous theatre and hope that our presentation of Australian Indigenous plays contributes to its future. However, there are many difficulties. Theatre is not one of the Ainu’s traditional art forms, and many Ainu people remain afraid that the mainstream Japanese might ridicule or misrepresent them. Therefore Japanese such as myself must have to wait for the spontaneous interest in theatre to arise amongst the Ainu if we are to participate. To this end, I intend to keep up a dialogue with them concerning the possibilities for Japan’s indigenous theatre, to introduce Ainu to some of its forms, and to more broadly consider the possibilities for cross-cultural exchange.

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Sawada, Keiji (2006). Gendai engekito bunkano konkou-o-sutoraria senjûmin engekitono nihon nohonyakuengekito nodeai [Contemporary Theatre and Cultural Confusion: The Encounter Between Australian Aboriginal Theatre and Japanese Translation Theatre ] (Tokyo: Wasedadaigakushuppanbu, 2006).

Tanaka, Chikao (1995). The Head of Mary: A Nagasaki Fantasia , tr. David Goodman (Sydney: Currency).

Thomson, Katherine (2000). Diving for Pearls , tr. Keiji Sawada (Yokohama: Oceania Press).

Tanaka, Yoichi (2005). “Sakai Mina san: Ainu minzoku no sahô de kekkonshiki wo ageta [Ms Sakai Mina, Who Held a Wedding Ceremony in the Traditional Ainu Manner]”, Asahi Shinbun 30 Apr. 2005, 2.

Wada, Yoshio (2001). Personal Interview with author, Tokyo, 18 Dec. 2001.

Yamada, Rie (2008). “Kokoni Ainu: arinomama no kimi de ii [Here is the Ainu: Just Be yourself]”, Asahi Shinbun (evening edition) 12 Nov 2008, 1.

(1.) Unless indicated otherwise, all Japanese and Ainu names are given with the surname or patronymic first, and then the first name, whilst all other names follow the Euro-American convention of first-name, surname.

(2.) Considerable scholarship exists on the cultural politics of The Floating World itself. See Sawada 1996 & 2004; Gilbert 1998 & 2001; Gilbert & Lo 2007; Griffiths 1993; Dennis 1995.

(3.) Translations from the Japanese by the author unless indicated otherwise.