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  • The Goddess of the Wind and Okikurmi
  • Kayano Shigeru
    Translated and introduced by Kyoko Selden

Kayano Shigeru (1926-2006) was an inheritor and preserver of Ainu culture. He was a collector of Ainu folk utensils, teacher of the prominent Japanese linguist Kindaichi Kyōsuke, and recorder and transcriber of epics, songs, and tales from the last of the bards. He was also a fierce fighter against the construction of a dam in his village that meant destruction of a sacred ritual site as well as of nature. In addition, Kayano was the compiler of an authoritative Ainu-Japanese dictionary, a chanter of old epics, and the founder of a museum of Ainu material culture as well as of an Ainu language school and a radio station. He was the first (and so far the only) National Diet member to address the assembly in Ainu. Finally, Kayano was an inspiration behind today’s appreciation of Ainu culture, in which young people, Ainu, and non-Ainu of various nationalities, join to celebrate and explore aboriginal cultures and their contemporary development. This movement includes youthful attempts to create new forms that combine traditional Ainu oral performances with contemporary music and dance.1 Ainu Rebels, a creative song and dance troupe that formed in 2006 (and has been on hiatus since 2010), for example, is constituted mostly of Ainu youth but also includes Japanese and foreigners. The group draws on Ainu oral tradition adapted to hip hop and other forms and also engages in artistic activities that combine traditional Ainu art with contemporary artistic elements.

The three major genres of Ainu oral tradition were kamuy yukar (songs of gods and demigods), yukar (songs of heroes), and uepeker (prose, or poetic prose, tales). The Ainu linguist Chiri Mashiho (1909-61, brother to Chiri Yukie who is included in this issue) located the origin of Ainu oral arts in the earliest kamuy yukar, in which a shamanic performer imitated the voices and behaviors of gods. In Ainu culture, everything had a divine spirit: owl, bear, fox, salmon, rabbit, insect, tree, rock, fire, water, wind, and so forth. Some spirits were not so esteemed or were even regarded as downright wicked, while others were revered as particularly divine. This gestured mimicry apparently [End Page 138] developed into kamuy yukar, or enacting of songs sung by gods, in which a human chanter impersonates a deity. Kamuy yukar later included songs of Okikurmi-kamuy (also called Kotan-kar-kamuy) about Okikurmi, a half-god, half-human hero who descended from the land of gods to the land of the Ainu to teach humans how to make fire, hunt, and cultivate the kotan (hamlets) where they lived.

The following story by Kayano, published in 1975 (reprinted in 1999) as a children’s book with Saitō Hiroyuki’s illustrations, is an adaptation-translation from an old kamuy yukar dramatizing a contest of strength between the goddess of the wind and the demi-god Okikurmi.

I am Pikatakamuy,Goddess of the Wind from the land of the gods.I have the power to fly through the skyand to raise winds at will,whethera gentle wafta strong gustor a stormy blast.

In the land of the godsand in the land of the humans,women need be good at embroidery.I lived at my house in the land of the godsand passed my daysalways embroidering.

One day,I stopped my hand that held a needleand chanced to lookacross the land of the humans.A village caught my eye.

It was a big village of the Ainu.How cheerful the village looked!All the villagerswere busily working.Children and little dogs ran about joyfully.My old habit began again:“All right, I’ll dance the dance of the windsand scare the humans—” [End Page 139] so I thought.Once I felt like playing tricks,there was no restraining myself.

Right away, I put onlayers of very beautifulwind-stirring robes,storm-hurling gownsthat I had embroidered.Then, with a swoopI flew up to the sky.I flew and flew across the sky—

And on landing on a lofty mountain,I chanted...

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