The Ainu are Japan's dirty secret. They are referred to as "former aborigines", a hidden shame that threatens to disrupt Japan's colonial myth of cultural uniformity.
Ainu Moshir included most of the Hokkaido until the mid 19th century, when Ainu social, economic, cultural and linguistic independence was subsumed by a mythological beast.
This beast was the new construct of Japanese modernity - centralised, monocultural, monolingual, united. The state struggled to present this false monocultural image, and the Ainu were a threat to this image. So in 1868 they colonised Hokkaido, which was also rich in resources and land. Japan took on some Western affectations to achieve this, including the concept of "terra nullius" as well as discourses of civilization" and "primitivism" to justify Ainu dispossession.
The dispossessed Ainu, after being stripped of their land, were also stripped of their names and language. They were given Japanese names and forbidden to speak their native language.
Then in 1899 the Japanese parliament introduced the "Hokkaido Former Aborigines Protection Act", an assimilationist policy under which Ainu were forced to merge their identity with the rest of Japan. The term "former aborigines" left no doubt as to the governments stance on Ainu sovereignty.
