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Answerman - Why Do So Many Anime Take Place in High School?

High school life in Japan must be very different from high school life in the United States. Our high schools were hellholes of bullies, gangstas, queen bees and wannabes, holier-than-thou smart kids, and brutal castes.

Part of the reason kids admire the classic American superhero is that they basically symbolize freedom that many kids don't feel they have. Those superheroes get to do whatever they want, they're always in the right, and they look cool. Compared to being forced to go to school, listening to teachers, dealing with overprotective parents, and even hormones - the superhero life looks amazing. Those superheroes are also generally portrayed as adults. It's another reason for kids in the west to yearn for adulthood rather than youth or childhood, and is related to the desire by many to learn to drive ASAP.

Not at all. Japanese even has a word for refusing to go to school, toukoukyohi, which is a response to bullying, and also there are hikikomori, those who just stay holed up in their house in order to avoid dealing with school and such. Japan also has a very high rate of suicide in young people. If anything, I would think Japanese culture makes it worse, as social conformity is so heavily emphasized, and mental illness such as depression is stigmatized.

Also in the culture though is the concept of beauty in the ephemeral. The temporary nature of adolescence, I think, has an extra appeal as a result. But primarily, I think it has to do with the age of their primary target audience.

Japan also has a very high rate of suicide in young people.

meruru wrote:

Japan also has a very high rate of suicide in young people.

While Japan still ranks among the highest in developed countries concerning suicide, she did experience a drop below 30,000 for the first time in 15 years.

Not everyone goes to college, not everyone does any particular job... but everyone has gone to High School. So it is easier to tell these stories because the viewer is guaranteed to be able to relate very easily.

It's still very sad and telling that suicides among Japanese kids peak on the first day of school each year.

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The smaller peak represents the start of the second semester.

So many unexplainable Japanese quirks emerge from Japan's obsession with all things seishun. The deep, unshakable love of cute. The questionable high school uniform fetish. The middle-aged women in professional roles pitching their voices up high and dressing in a way that appeals to this particular phenomenon (so maybe a little young for their age). Teen idols, male and female, and the eerily provocative ways they're often photographed.

Hmm, that's interesting. So there's probably a whole lot of the darker side of Japanese school life we're not seeing in most anime and manga. I wonder if there'll be many stories in the future about that darker side, but I guess the escapist nature of anime and manga will keep that at a minimum.

It's still very sad and telling that suicides among Japanese kids peak on the first day of school each year.

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The smaller peak represents the start of the second semester.

The numbers were also high in early April when the first semester begins in the Japanese school calendar.

It's a pretty obvious question. Kids are the ones watching anime in Japan, for the most part. Why do the characters tend to be in high school? Because the kids watching are approaching that age. You can argue the kids watching are probably younger than high school age, but that just means they're looking forward to those years because it makes them feel adult without the pressures of actually being one/dealing with jobs. Anime creators make the shows with young characters so the viewers can better identify with them.

I feel like much of the discussion here misses Sevakis's third paragraph:

Quote:

So many unexplainable Japanese quirks emerge from Japan's obsession with all things seishun. The deep, unshakable love of cute. The questionable high school uniform fetish. The middle-aged women in professional roles pitching their voices up high and dressing in a way that appeals to this particular phenomenon (so maybe a little young for their age). Teen idols, male and female, and the eerily provocative ways they're often photographed.

If the "high school setting is relatable" argument holds, then why don't we see those "quirks" in the U.S.? High school is relatable to kids in the U.S. too, right? Sevakis seems to be suggesting that the popularity of anime featuring teens and high school settings is merely a byproduct of a deeper fascination with youth in Japan. The "why" is not entirely clear, but it appears to go beyond the fact that high schoolers appeal to pop anime's target demographics.