Ainu
Americannoun
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Ainus,
plural
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Ainu
plural
-
a member of an aboriginal population of northernmost Japan.
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the language of the Ainu.
noun
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a member of the aboriginal people of Japan, now mostly intermixed with Mongoloid immigrants whose skin colour is more yellowish
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the language of this people, sometimes tentatively associated with Altaic, still spoken in parts of Hokkaido and elsewhere
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of Ainu
Ainu: man
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The Ainu lived in self-governing communities across the island and maintained their own traditions under Japanese imperial rule.
From BBC ● Apr. 30, 2025
Dr Munro lived and died among the Ainu while studying their culture in northern Japan.
From BBC ● Apr. 30, 2025
For example, Hitoshi Watanabe focused on ethnographic data about the Ainu, an Indigenous population in northern Japan and its surrounding areas.
From Scientific American ● Oct. 17, 2023
Although Watanabe documented Ainu women hunting, often with the aid of dogs, he dismissed this finding in his interpretations and placed the focus squarely on men as the primary meat winners.
From Scientific American ● Oct. 17, 2023
After that, except for a single dot representing the Ainu in Japan, the Hair Belt ends.
From "Middlesex: A Novel" by Jeffrey Eugenides
From far-off Hokkaido, lured by an enterprising Tokyo promoter, a tribe of Japan's aboriginal Ainus came to stage the first touring performance of their ancient bear festival.
From Time Magazine Archive
The Bushmen of Australia, the Ainus of Japan and the Dravidians of India have survived from a stock almost as remote.
From Time Magazine Archive
For Tokyo audiences, the Ainus only pretended to kill the bear and drink his blood.
From Time Magazine Archive
His evidence is that the Ainus, unlike any other tribes in northern Asia: > Wear loincloths in summer.
From Time Magazine Archive
As between whites, Indians, Eskimos, Ainus, Filipinos, and Singhalese, the average differences Page 198 were small, and much overlapping occurred.
From Human Traits and their Social Significance by Irwin Edman
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