A Personal Account of The History of Okinawa
Years ago, when I began researching my ancestry, I came to an unsettling realization that what was taught about Okinawa did not reflect my lived experience, nor that of my relatives or ancestors.
Much of what the world knows about Okinawa is told through a distinctly Japanese lens. Okinawa is labeled a region of Japan. The language is reduced to a dialect. Spiritual traditions are dismissed as primitive. The people are portrayed as simple or unrefined.
I quickly recognized this as the language of dehumanization used in systems of colonization.
Colonization is defined as the systematic erasure and replacement of a people's culture, language, governance, and spiritual life. It involves the seizure of land, suppression of native languages, demonization of traditional beliefs, forced assimilation, and the rewriting of history to favor the colonizer. It extracts material and cultural resources while using shame, punishment, and dehumanization to suppress resistance.
Although the term annexation is often used to describe what happened to Okinawa, the historical timeline I share below reflects a familiar pattern of colonial occupation and erasure.
The Ryukyu Kingdom
From the 15th to the 19th century, Okinawa stood at the center of the Ryukyu Kingdom was an independent maritime polity that governed the island chain stretching between Kyushu and Taiwan. The kingdom operated its own diplomatic networks, taxation system, and religious structures. Shuri Castle served not only as a seat of political power but also as a ceremonial and spiritual center, where sacred women leaders known as noro guided rituals, protected the land, and served as priestesses to the royal court.
The Ryukyuan worldview was animistic and deeply relational. Political and spiritual authority were intertwined. Knowledge systems ranging from herbal medicine to seasonal ritual calendars were transmitted orally and preserved through matrilineal inheritance. The kingdom engaged in tribute relations with Ming and Qing China while maintaining regional trade with Korea, Southeast Asia, and Japan. This period is characterized by cultural fluidity, diplomatic agency, and relative autonomy.
1609: Satsuma Invasion and the Beginnings of Vassalage
In 1609, the Satsuma domain of southern Japan invaded the Ryukyu Kingdom, initiating what scholars often term “semi-colonial subjugation.” Though the kingdom remained nominally independent, it was compelled to pay tribute to both China and Japan. Ryukyuan officials were forced to obscure Japanese control during Chinese envoys’ visits. This strategy maintained the kingdom’s tributary relationship with China while concealing its growing dependency on Japan.
This dual tribute system laid the groundwork for cultural suppression. Political sovereignty was hollowed out from within. While Ryukyu continued to operate its own institutions, many decisions were now mediated through Satsuma, introducing extractive taxation and curbing external diplomatic agency. This marks an early phase of colonization which consisted of indirect control, resource extraction, and cultural constraint under the guise of strategic diplomacy.
1879: Formal Annexation and Cultural Erasure
The Meiji government’s 1879 annexation of the Ryukyu Kingdom marks a pivotal shift from indirect rule to overt colonization. Under the pretext of national unification, Japan dissolved the Ryukyuan monarchy, abolished its hereditary systems, and replaced the kingdom with Okinawa Prefecture. This process is often referred to euphemistically as haihan chiken (“abolish the han and establish prefectures”), yet its implications mirrored colonial policy elsewhere: indigenous governance was dismantled, and cultural expression was pathologized.
Key markers of colonization during this period include:
Linguistic suppression: Uchinaaguchi and other Ryukyuan languages were banned in schools. Children were forced to wear hōgen fuda (dialect tags) as punishment for speaking their mother tongue.
Spiritual marginalization: Matrilineal religious leaders were stripped of their authority. State Shintoism was promoted as the national religion, replacing ancestral practices with imperial ideology.
Cultural assimilation: Ryukyuan clothing, naming conventions, and rituals were framed as “backwards.” Japanese dress codes, curriculum, and national holidays were imposed to foster conformity.
Historical revisionism: The Ryukyuan past was reframed as peripheral to Japanese history, often depicted as a stepping stone toward modernity rather than a sovereign civilization in its own right.
1945: War, Displacement, and Military Control
The 1945 Battle of Okinawa brought catastrophic loss. Civilian casualties exceeded one-third of the population. Cultural sites were bombed, family lineages severed, and entire villages eradicated. Survivors faced mass internment, starvation, and the loss of ancestral lands. This trauma was compounded when, rather than being incorporated into postwar Japan, Okinawa was placed under U.S. military administration from 1945 to 1972.
Under American rule, the islands became a militarized frontier of the Cold War. Indigenous land was seized for base construction. Local governance was subordinated to U.S. military authority. Cultural preservation was deprioritized in favor of geopolitical utility. This second occupation layered a new form of colonization atop the previous one, effectively erasing Okinawan agency in determining its future.
1972–Present: Reversion Without Reparations
When administrative control was returned to Japan in 1972, it was presented as “reversion” or return to national belonging. However, cultural sovereignty was not restored. U.S. bases remained intact. Economic disparity widened. Environmental degradation escalated due to military pollution. Sacred sites continued to be desecrated or rendered inaccessible.
Today, Okinawa comprises less than one percent of Japan’s landmass but hosts over 70 percent of the U.S. military presence in the country. This enduring militarization, despite consistent protest by elders, youth, and religious leaders, constitutes a continuing occupation.
Reclamation
Okinawa’s history reflects all core features of colonization: seizure of land, suppression of language, dismantling of governance, spiritual disenfranchisement, cultural assimilation, and the rewriting of historical narratives to serve the occupying powers.
Honoring my ancestors requires reclamation of truth. Okinawa is not simply a region of Japan. It is the remnant of a sovereign kingdom.
This journey has lead me to listen to Okinawan voices, to acknowledge the history of colonization, and to reveal the systems that continue to occupy the land and suppress Indigenous self-determination.
Ancestors who walked before me,
those who sang to the sea and spoke to the stones:
May your names be Spoken with reverence.
May your wisdom rise like mist from the Forest.
May the Kami know we have not forgotten. May the Utaki awaken beneath our feet. May the silence be broken by memory,
and the forgetting be healed by Offerings of Food, Art, Song, prayer, and praise. Ukaji deebiru. Nifee debiru.
-Jade
