Part 1: Definitions

(5 @ 5 points each = 25 points)
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/25

Choose 5

Define the terms below (1-2 sentences) and then illustrate the significance of the term/phrase using an example from class (3-5 sentences).

1. Ainu-Mosir

2. The silence of Indigenous people

3. Golden Kamuy

4. transnational Indigenous exchange

5. human zoo

6. reciprocity

7. Tokyo Ainu

8. Ainu Studies

10. settler colonialism

11. “art” as a weapon to express Indigeneity

12. objectification of Indigenous culture

13. tradition

14. tourist Ainu

15. removal of Ainu remains from cemeteries

Part 2: Short answers:

(3 @ 10 points each = 30 points)
_____ / 30

Choose 3.

Respond to the following prompts in about 150 words.

According to Danika Medak-Saltzman, what made the photographs of Indigenous peoples taken by Jessie Tarbox Beals different from the works of other photographers of her time?

Nate Renner, ethnomusicologist, describes how awkward his communication became with the members of Team Nekaop once he had revealed his identity as a student in anthropology. Explain the context/historical background of this experience.

Kanako Uzawa’s lecture at the University of British Columbia was titled “Recasting Indigeneity in Museums through Performing Arts.” Choose one topic from her lecture and discuss how it is relevant to this course.

According to the article “The Silence of Indigenous People,” Mai Ishihara’s book
Autoethnography of “Silence” is the first publication in Japan containing “autoethnography” in the title. What is ethnography? How is autoethnography different from ethnography?

Based on the readings, lectures, videos, and discussions so far, discuss one example that embodies the idea of Ainu Renaissance.

Part 3: Essays

(2 @ 15 points each = 30 points)
_____ / 30

Choose 2

Respond to the following prompts in about 300 words.

Briefly explain the historical contexts of Tokyo Ainu and urbanized Indigenous populations in the United States. What are their struggles? What are their future agendas?

Briefly summarize the points highlighted by Danika Medak-Saltzman in “Transnational Indigenous Exchange.” Then, discuss how her work intersect with the lives of contemporary Ainu leaders such as Bikky Sunazawa, Kayo Sunawaza, and/or Kanako Uzawa.

What does resilience mean? Choose

any
two readings from Weeks 1-3 and discuss how each reading helped you form your understanding of this concept.

According to Nate Renner, how do Team Nekaop restore and recontextualize Ainu ceremonial music in their performance? How does this approach help them facilitate “a feeling of connectedness” to a global Indigenous worldview?

Part 4: Close reading

(1 @10 points)
_____ / 10

Choose 1

For each passage you choose to write about:

Interpret the passage. What is the significance
of the passage in the context of the work and our class discussions? (200 words)

1. Mark K. Watson, ann-elise Lewallen, and Mark J. Hudson, “Beyond Ainu Studies: An Introduction” (p. 10).

[W]e are not arguing for the resurrection of an earlier Ainu Studies. Instead, building on an expression used by Uzawa Kanako in this collection of papers … we want to endorse the need to move beyond its legacy at a time of historic change within the Ainu political movement. Of course, in broaching this subject, we accept that tensions inevitably remain and it would be naïve to assume that this “post” stage of Ainu research is universally acknowledged by all Ainu or across all disciplinary, national, and linguistic borders or generational divides. Our position, therefore, is not to propose an untenable axiom but rather initiate a new conversation and point of departure on the subject of Ainu research.

2. Chisato O. Dubreuil, “Introduction,”
From the Playground of the Gods (p. xxi).

It … stunned Bikky to learn that Native Artists could be “successful and respected”—not just souvenir artists with little artistic skill, as many Japanese believed about the Ainu.

3. Brett L. Walker, “Introduction,”
The Conquest of Ainu Lands (pp. 5-6).

I purposefully do not refer to Ezo as the Japanese frontier, as is common practice, because as a conceptual tool, the notion of the frontier peripheralizes Ezo in relation to the process of state formation and economic development of Japan. When Ezo is positioned as a frontier, widespread trade, cultural interaction, economic growth, and state expansion in Ezo are often case as part of the pageantry of Japanese national progress, rather than as the subjugation of the Ainu homeland, that place Ainu considered to be their hunting and fishing grounds and the core of their sacred order.

4. Tessa Morris-Suzuki, “Tourists, Anthropologists, and Visions of Indigenous Society in Japan” (p. 46).

“[T]raditional culture” is actively created in changing local circumstances.

5. Mark K. Watson, “Tokyo Ainu and the Urban Indigenous Experience” (p. 81).

The historical situation of Ainu outside of Hokkaido demonstrates how the normalized representation of Ainu as integral to the Hokkaido landscape reproduces received ideas of geography (region, locality) and authenticity (culture, race) that in no way reflect the true (urban, national, international) dimensions of contemporary Ainu society.

6. Kayo Sunazawa, “As a Child of Ainu” (p. 96).

As for me, what can I, as an Ainu person living in Malaysia, 6,000 kilometers from my homeland in Hokkaido, do? I see the strength of Indigenous peoples elsewhere rising above their situation and trying actively and passionately to do something about it. Most important of all, I see many young Indigenous people and even children already beginning their journey to know their identity, their culture, and to protect their way of life and resources. I have seen how empowering this knowledge is for them.

Part 5: Final Paper Project (1 @5 points)______________________________________________
/5

Spend a few minutes for brainstorming about your final research paper (there is a brief description of this assignment on page 2 of the course syllabus). Describe an idea you currently have and explain how your project is relevant to this course.