Japanization
According to The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, "To japanize" means "To make or become Japanese in form, idiom, style, or character".
Victories against Russia and Qing dynasty China saw the focus of expansionism also shift south with the policy of Nanshin-ron ("Southern Expansion Doctrine").
As a result, Japanization began to have a negative meaning because of military conquests and forced introduction of Japanese culture in colonized and conquered areas.
Ezo (蝦夷) (also spelled Yezo or Yeso) is the Japanese term historically used to refer to the people and the islands to the northeast of Honshu.
The inhabitants of these islands, the Ainu, historically suffered from economic and social discrimination, as both the Japanese government and mainstream population at the time regarded them as primitive and backwards.
The majority of Ainu were assimilated as petty laborers during the Meiji Restoration, which saw the annexation of Hokkaido into the Japanese Empire and the privatization of traditional lands.
During the 19th and 20th centuries, the Japanese government also denied the rights of the Ainu to their traditional cultural practices, such as hunting, gathering, and speaking their native language.
Prior to this time, however, the kingdom, while technically remaining a Chinese vassal state, had been under the long-term influence of the Satsuma Clan since the invasion of 1609.
[3] The Kominka movement (1937 to 1945) can be viewed as a continuation of the ongoing process of assimilation and a crucial part of the Japanese Empire's wartime mobilization, which was not intended to grant constitutional rights to the colonized.
[7] Thirdly, the "recruitment of military volunteers" (志願兵制度, shiganhei seidō) drafted Taiwanese subjects into the Imperial Japanese Army and encouraged them to die in the service of the emperor.
Fourthly, the religious reform promoted the Japanese State Shinto and attempted to eradicate traditional indigenous religion, a hybrid of Buddhism, Daoism, and folk beliefs.
