Chances are you haven’t met an Ainu speaker in Japan. After all, Google’s Endangered Languages Project puts the number of native speakers at fewer than five. But the Ainu people once populated a wide ...

Almost every 14 days, a language dies; that’s about 26 languages a year. And over 2,500 Indigenous languages are currently in danger of disappearing forever — that’s more than a third of our world’s ...

An online “talking dictionary” first launched in 2009 is attempting to preserve and pass on the Ainu language spoken by the indigenous inhabitants of Japan's northeastern island of Hokkaido and ...

More than a century after colonisation, the Ainu language almost vanished. Now machines are listening to hours of old recordings and learning to give it a new voice. The cassette player would catch ...

SAPPORO, JAPAN — For someone who grew up ashamed of her ethnic identity, they are powerful words. “You are beautiful just as you are. Don’t be afraid,” Mina Sakai sings to a young, enthusiastic crowd ...

Ainu Stories: Contemporary Lives by the Saru River is the UK-first exploration of the contemporary stories of this Northern Japanese indigenous culture. Visit in the remaining weeks to experience four ...

In 2009, UNESCO in its “Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger” designated the Ainu language as being critically endangered. As the most dire of the five categories — only extinct is worse — used in ...

My name is Quinlan - I am a guide in north Japan, certified international sake sommelier, and WMA certified Wilderness First ...