During the Tokugawa Shogunate's rule in Japan, the samurai class sat atop a four-tier social structure. Below them were farmers and fishermen, artisans, and merchants.

Some people, however, were lower than the lowest of merchants; they were considered less than human, even.

Although they were genetically and culturally indistinguishable from other people in Japan, the buraku were forced to live in segregated neighborhoods, and could not mingle with any of the higher classes of people.


Buraku were universally looked down upon, and their children were denied an education.

The reason? Their jobs were those designated as "unclean" by Buddhist and Shinto standards - they worked as butchers, tanners and executioners. Another type of outcast, the hinin or "sub-human," worked as prostitutes, actors, or geisha.

I used to consider the plight of the buraku just a part of history. However, a few years ago, the New York Times ran an article about the discrimination that descendants of buraku face even today.

According to this article, buraku families still live in segregated neighborhoods in some Japanese cities. Denied many basic rights, some try to change their names to conceal their origins. Others join the yakuza, or organized crime syndicates; approximately 60% of yakuza members are from burakumin backgrounds. Nowadays, however, a civil rights movement is having some success in improving the lot of modern-day buraku families.

It's just amazing to me, that even in an ethnically homogenous society, people will still find a way to create an outcast group for everyone else to look down upon.

Sometimes, I can't help but wonder about our species...

Print of a hinin actor from the Library of Congress Prints and Photos Collection.