Forum - View topicChicks On Anime - Shoujo Fans in Fandom
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ArthurFrDent
 Posts: 466 |
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I'd love for our article writers and guest to take on a more technical approach to the differences between genres. What gender a work is aimed at... how is it aimed as a storytelling construction. Then maybe there will be more to make sense of...
For example what is the entrypoint into the story, and what character do you identify with? How is a story aimed? Seems like this would explain far more preferences than just the dry, generic terms like shuojo. I have to say I don't read as much manga [due to it's expense] than I watch anime, and maybe THAT is also a difference in brain wiring, so maybe I'm missing the issue. FWIW I'm a guy. There is no denial that I like certain things and don't like others. That isn't based on what I'm SUPPOSED to like. It's not something that I think about in such rigid high-order terms. I'm old enough not to care about that type of thing. Y'all seem really defensive on this, why do you care what other people think of what you read, or watch, personally, for yourself? Anywho, it also bears remembering that a lot of the decisions about direction and content are really MARKETING decisions, and tend to be quite conservative, meaning risk averse. Base assumptions about what the target audience wants, similarly would flow from the kernel of truth that is a stereotype. Guys might shy from flowers but drink up good industrial background. It's a safe assumption so they run with it. Assumptions on both sides abound like that. What drives the story, what things are highlit and what are off in the distance somewhere... Even if Sara, Casey, Bamboo and I sit down and read the same manga at the same time, we will all take different things away from it, and those things are a product of who we are as individauls a lot more than they are some kind of construct based on gender... even though, yes, we will see it different, since we are different genders. It's supposed to be like that... |
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Joe Mello
 Posts: 2260 Location: Online Terminal |
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Because that's how the society works. It's all hierarchy, and having a common knowledge base allows movement between the tiers. |
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ANN_Bamboo
ANN Contributor
 Posts: 3904 Location: CO |
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Gah, that's actually my fault. The second quote should actually be attributed to Casey. I've changed that segment in the original text. Sorry!!! |
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Ktimene's Lover
 Posts: 2242 Location: Glendale, AZ (Proudly living in the desert) |
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I have developed a respect for shoujo even though I have read more shoujo manga than seen shoujo anime. I highly enjowed Kare Kano. A fine piece of work.
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Cloe
Moderator
 Posts: 2728 Location: Los Angeles, CA |
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Yeah, that was Casey, not me. Sorry about the confusion. I do like Berserk, but I like it because of its hyper crazy levels of gore and its amazing soundtrack. I'm sure there are plenty of other ladies out there who agree with me.  I'm always one to assume that many women enjoy media based on things *other* than hot guys.
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zanarkand princess
 Posts: 1484 |
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Yeah. Of course I can't like Berserk or Tenjo Tenge for any other reason then the guys. Seriously there are plenty of hot guys in anime and I don't have to get through all of this gore and fighting that I obviously don't like just to find one. The fangirl label is always annoying though. People just assume they know all about the type of fan you are because of what you are reading/watching at this moment. |
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Faceman
 Posts: 300 Location: Boston |
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BD and Sara, thanks for clearing that up. It's easy to understand how such a long conversation can get mixed up once in a while.
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moichispa
Posts: 26 |
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Thanks for your great article as always.
Well, as Sara said she enjoys a lot gore scenes of berserk. I haven't reading berserk but I do enjoy gore scene on Higurashi and umineko series. Don't think that for be a girl we have to like just shoujo manga. Yeah I follow the shoujo Vampire knight and some yosei as VampirePrincess miyu and Ai yazawa wiorks But actualy I follow more shonens. But I think that my favorite genre is Seinen But sometimes it is strange (more to outside manga viewers) the fact that a innocent girl ( I do know not why but everybody that met me at the first time thinks that for me) would like those stories with blood, murderers, battles, complex characters and strange stories. Yeah, I do love them. bye moichispa |
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rinmackie
 Posts: 1040 Location: in a van! down by the river! |
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I'm also one of those females who like stuff outside of my demographic. My tastes have always been hard to pin down and I outgrew most romance stuff years ago. But I do like shojo but I also like other genres, too. Of course, I'm really big into vampires; I like Vampire Knight AND Hellsing. (And I'm probably one of the few who've fantasized about a crossover.)
I want to thank pparker for saying what I was thinking about the remarks concerning Tezuka. The whole "Tezuka is sexist" comments really irked me. Don't get me wrong, I consider myself a feminist, and I believe in diversity and being sensitive to peoples' feelings but this kind of political correctness always rubs me the wrong way. I don't like being told what I should read, but I don't like being told what I shouldn't read (or watch) either. Plus, a lot of shojo manga written for and by women have been criticized for being sexist. Course, that wouldn't necessarily stop me from reading them. Normally, I'd have zero interest in a manga like Hot Gimmick but because I've heard so many terrible things about it, I'm tempted to read it. Guess I'll have to check out Tezuka's stuff as well.  As for being offended, that's something I'll decide for myself.
As for identifying with female characters, why should I have to? I can relate to any character regardless of gender so long as he or she can capture my interest. For example, in Vampire Knight, I relate more to one of the male leads than the main female character. I don't automatically expect a female character to be interesting or to be more like me. |
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Levitz9
 Posts: 1022 Location: Puerto Rico |
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If I may put up an alternative... someone wrote in the interview the paradox that women can read anything with flowery men in it and be considered fangirls. I'd like to put up a counterpoint (is this the right word?). I'm not so much a fan of 'action' manga; the most action-packed thing I've read would be Black Lagoon or a few volumes of GetBackers. I've also been collecting a large number of shoujo-oriented manga recently; the main reason for doing so is that I find the girls in shoujo cuter than the girls in shonen (hey, after a week of hard schoolwork, I wanna rest my eyes on something nice, okay?). The most I've gotten from people is just awkward glances because I'm reading Shoujo. Nobody seems to think the less of me, though.
I agree in that women are a between a rock and a hard place, as opposed to men in whatever it is they read or do. I think, though, that part of it must come from the mangaka themselves for assuming that women only want pretty-boys. (Despite the fact that there are many mangaka, no doubt, who avoid this trend). There's also the fact that most guys just shoehorn anything romantic in the 'girls' category. I have a friend who was positive that Oh, My Goddess!' and Love Hina were shoujo. I'm also reminded of Guin Saga, which was made by a woman; a lot of people (as far as I was told) were assuming she'd make some yaoi scenes in there, and eventually she did, just to spite them. |
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Pocky Monster
Posts: 237 |
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Interesting discussion,made me think.
As for my interests, I like both shounen and shoujo equally; I'm not really partial to either. I'm more of a seinen and josei lover, but I also enjoy kodomo series. I also happen to be a BIG yaoi and yuri fangirl,and have a thing for moe-type series... Reading this thread really reminds me how diverse anime fandom is. |
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HellKorn
Posts: 1669 Location: Columbus, OH |
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Casey's Dororo review. I would definitely advise reading the responses to it, as well. I find Casey's stressing of Tezuka's female characters is pedantic and reductive, though; not all of them can be dismissed as socially regressive portrayal of women, and the criticisms become so pointed where they're the only real negatives extolled at any lengths. It's like someone harping on Joseph Conrad, H.P. Lovecraft, Richard Wagner, D.W. Griffith for their racism, Dave Sim and Robert Crumb for their views on women (though to vastly different degrees for each) or Alan Moore for his OCD-like knowledge and approach to his stories. It's respectable and important to approach and discuss all aspects of a work, but one shouldn't reduce it that easily -- particularly not when it is by one of the most important human beings to influence art (where Tezuka's impact is even more critical than something like The Birth of a Nation or Battleship Potemkin). The kind of approach that Casey takes isn't ultimately constructive to the work, unlike how another reviewer would, say, show how Bertolucci's sympathies with Communism are not tempered enough in 1900, therefore hurting the narrative's structure and development. (And mind you, I'm not even much of a Tezuka fan; the only work of his that I love is Black Jack, and have more than my criticisms of his manga.) That said, I really like the article. The fanboy sexism is more overt in North American comics, I find, though it's pronounced in a different way for anime/manga. What I wish was mentioned is how a lot of moe titles are designed to fall back on a kind of melodrama that is more typically associated with shojo series more than shonen -- and while they all have their overwhelming share of naive elements, for better or for worse, the ideas about romance strike me as too similar between moe and shojo (even though their approach to the material is radically different). So this makes it more bizarre whenever a fan of a moe series is hurt and just dismissed a review because it's done by a female, because the stereotype of women enjoying cute, fluffy and dramatic things isn't totally unfounded. |
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Youkai Warrior
 Posts: 505 Location: Sarayashiki |
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Interesting article again this week, but I felt that this was a bit feminist. Not all girls are labled fangirls. I'm a girl, I like both shonen and shojo manga, and I have not been labled a fangirl. And while manga and anime appeals to females, you make it sound as if females are the only ones that manga and anime should be aimed at. That's what it sounded like to me. Anime and manga appeal to both males and females, and it always will. So maybe females do buy manga more. I don't want to say this, but girls like to shop. I know I do, and as an anime/manga fan, I shop for anime and manga. Guys don't shop, at least not often. (They shop, they just don't want to admit it.) Yes, girls are labled in the anime/manga community, and that sadly is because of actual fangirls who have given all other female fans a bad name. Why isn'y shojo very popular or accepted? Because simply put, there is much shojo out there that is just plain stupid. Shonen manga tends to be more exciting, and I have read many shonen manga, drawn by men, that have better-looking bishonen than shojo. Now I do read shojo, but only a few, and the ones I read have a story, some sort of excitement and appealing characters. I look for the same in shonen, it just so happens shonen tends to have this more.
However, you did touch down on the treatment of female fans in the anime/manga community and in other fandoms. Yes, it's true. While not all girls are labled fangirls (like me) it has happened that female fans have been judged in this way. Again, it's not our fault, and it's not the males fault either. Like I said before, it was overracting fangirls that gave some of us that label. It was an interesting article all in all, but could you try to lighten up on the whole feminist thing? On the target audience thing. I agree yet disagree with this. Yes, there are some things that are aimed at a certain audience. I agree with that. Believe it or not, Harry Potter was actually aimed at a young audience. Here is where I disagree with target audience. Harry Potter appeals to people of all ages. Children as well as adults like it. This is when the whole target audience breaks. Yes, some things are aimed at this or that audience, but there are things that will get the attention of people outside that audience. Examples: adults who read children's books, anime fans reading non-Japanese or non-anime books, straight men listening to Erasure, girls reading boys comics. It happens. Also Bamboo and Sara I so agree with you, I loathe Twilight too. It's crap. |
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Cloe
Moderator
Posts: 2728 Location: Los Angeles, CA |
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Hm, good point, but could you not be so feminist about it? I don't like it when ladies have opinions. |
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scrapps
Posts: 43 |
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Thank you SO much! If you hadn't said this, I would have. I didn't really get the idea that any of the panelists felt more manga should be aimed at women, the "Feminist Agenda" has obviously worked on me! I've always assumed that the reason it's so easy to dislike shoujo and it's heroines, is because girls in shoujo seem to be more flawed than their shounen counterparts. At least that's been my impression from what I've read of both genres. |
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