Staff Profile

2020.03.30.

Special field

Educational Anthropology

Research theme

Education, and educational research, for and by indigenous peoples

Detailed contents of research

I have been working with the Ainu people of Japan now for 15 years on the possibilities for developing an Ainu educational system. Unfortunately, restrictions at the administrative level have made the implementation of such education nigh impossible. As a result, my research has focused on tangential matters; identity formation, cultural transmission, factors influencing positive self-ascription, the Ainu rights-recovery movement. Since becoming employed at Hokkaido University, I have been trying to broaden my research efforts into effectual intercultural understanding relating to the Ainu people. In 2012, I was also responsible for a major Japan Agency for Cultural Affairs survey on the status of transmission of the Ainu language. From 2014, I worked to establish a working group on Ainu Indigenous knowledge under the auspices of a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science grant.

Simplified curriculum vitae

MA Cross-Cultural Studies, University of Alaska Fairbanks, 2005; PhD (Education) Kyushu University School of Human-Environment Studies, 2012. Research Administrative Assistant, Kyushu University, 2009-11. Specially Appointed Associate Professor, Hokkaido University Research Faculty of Media and Communication, 2012, Associate Professor, 2013; Professor, 2019.

Research achievements

1. Jeffry Gayman and Masayuki Ueno, 2021. Questioning current issues in the higher education sector for Japan’s Ainu People In Peter J. Anderson, Koji Maeda, Zane M. Diamond and Chizu Satou (Eds) Post Imperial Perspectives on Indigenous Education: Lessons from Japan and Australia. London: Routledge, pp. 169-185.
2. Gayman, Jeff, 2021. Challenges Surrounding Education and Transmission of Ainu Indigenous Ecological Knowledge in Japan: Disparate Valuations of a People and their IEK. In Shonil Bhagwat and Thomas Thornton (Eds) Handbook of Indigenous Environmental Knowledge: Global Themes and Practice. London: Routledge, pp.136-145.
3. Kanako Uzawa and Jeff Gayman, 2020. Japan. In Dwayne Mamo (Ed). The Indigenous World 2020, 34th Edition. Copenhagen: International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs, pp. 267-273.
4. Tsuyoshi Hirata, Ryūkichi Ogawa, Yuji Shimizu, Tsugio Kuzuno and Jeff Gayman, 2020. Paradoxes and Prospects of Repatriation to the Ainu: Historical Background, Contemporary Struggles, and Visions for the Future. In Cressida Fforde, Honor Keeler and Tim McKeown, Eds, The Routledge Companion to Indigenous Repatriation: Return, Reconcile, Renew. Pp. 238-258. London: Routledge.
5. Jeff Gayman (Editorial Supervisor) The Spirit of Huci: Four Seasons of an Ainu Woman (計良智子著　『アイヌの四季：フチの伝える心』)。札幌：寿郎社
6. Gayman, Jeff (2018). Ainu Puri: Content and Praxis of an Indigenous Philosophy of a Northern People. In John Petrovic and Roxanne Mitchell (eds) Indigenous Philosophies of Education Around the World, pp. 211-227. Routledge.
7. Uemura, Hideaki and Jeffry Gayman (2018). Rethinking Japan’s Constitution from the Perspective of the Ainu and Ryūkyū Peoples. Special Issue of The Asia-Pacific Journal Japan Focus. 16(5), March 1, 2018. Online. https://apjjf.org/2018/5/Uemura.html
8. Jeff Gayman (2016) (Book Review) Beyond Ainu Studies: Changing Academic and Public Policies. Mark Hudson, ann-elise lewallen, Mark Watson, eds. Japan Forum, 27(4), pp.563-566. School of Oriental and Asian Studies: University of London.
9. Gayman, Jeffry (2015). Breaking through Impasses in the Ainu Rights Recovery Movement: A Case Study of one Transformational Activist-Disciple Relationship. Senri Ethnological Studies. Osaka: National Museum of Ethnology.
10. Gayman, Jeff (2014). Ainu. In, Neely, Sharlotte (ed.), Native Nations: The Survival of Fourth World Peoples, 55-72. Vancouver: J.Charlton Publishing.

Society Affiliation

American Anthropological Association, Native American and Indigenous Studies Association

Classes in charge

Graduate School: Theory of Ainu Indigenous Education

Detailed profile