Forum - View topicShounen, Shoujo and other demographic indicators
|
Goto page 1, 2 Next |
| Author | Message | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Tempest
 I Run this place.ANN Publisher  Posts: 10425 Location: Do not message me for support. |
|
|||||||||||||||
|
Shounen and Shoujo are not genres, they are demographic indicators.
Romance and Action are genres. Here are the most basic anime / manga demographic indicators: Shoujo : Aimed at Girls Shounen : Aimed at Young Boys Josei : Aimed at Young Women. Sienen : Aimed at Young Men For more detailed descriptions of these demographics, please click on the links. Here are a couple common misconceptions: 1) If it's romance, its Shoujo. This isn't true, there's a lot of romantic titles aimed at older women and at guys. There's a whole "shounen harem" genre of manga (ie: Love Hina) aimed at guys, adn there's also the more down to earth shonen/seinen romance titles like Maison Ikkoku. 2) If it's in a magazine, it belongs to that magazine's target demographic. This is a good basic way to find out what demographic a manga is geared towards, but its not flawless. There have been exceptions. Essentially, if a manga is in a magazine, it's either geared towards that magazines demographic or found to be acceptable to that magazine's demographic. There are shoujo titles that are written for girls, but are popular enough with guys. These titles will often be put into a shounen magazine to attract more female readers to the magazine. [Can someone give me an example, I can't think of one off the top of my head] 3) Every title falls into a demographic. This is a common problem, we often hear people say "if it isn't Shonen, what is it, because it certainly isn't Shoujo." Some titles just aren't that clear cut. It's quite commong, and quite intelligent for a writer to sit down and work a story so that it will appeal to both girls and guys. A good example, Azumanga Daioh. Most North American movies are produced in the manner. 4) If it doesn't contain certain key elements, it isn't {insert demographic}. For example, if the main character isn't a guy, it isn't shounen, or if it doesn't contain romance, it isn't shoujo. This is completely false. Female protagonists are extremely common in shounen, there are Shoujo title with no romance, shounen title with no action, etc... I'd like to actually expand this post into an article, but not before some discussion. Are there mistakes inwhat I wrote, or any notes that should be added? Perhaps I should add a list of common traits for various demographics? Also, what are the other demographics called? For example the adult male (older than Seinen) titles like Salary Man Kintaro. -t |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
dormcat
Encyclopedia Editor
 Posts: 9902 Location: New Taipei City, Taiwan, ROC |
|
|||||||||||||||
|
Ah, thank you, tempest. This settles down lots of disbutes, but we've had many similar discussions before. How about making this thread sticky?
By the way, for all English websites I've visited, I found Dr. Marc Hairston's lecture has an extensive explanation on demographics. Highly recommended.
The basic question is, should we keep Shounen and Shoujo as genres (right now Action is covered by Shounen and/or Adventure, but neither Shounen nor Adventure requires Action. Example: Kino's Journey), or take them out and establish a new database field as "Demographic indicator?" Dan mentioned that he was going to replace Shounen with Action more than two years ago, though. 
You forgot "young."
Ugh  My shounen indicator sticks with the sanbonbashira (三本柱; "three pillars" or "triumvirate").
IMHO artworks by Naoki URASAWA, such as Happy! and Yawara, are quite typical Shounen Sports but featuring female protagonists.
Frankly, I can't think of any Shoujo title without Romance elements...any example?
IIRC the subtitle of Boys Be was "Shoujo romance tailored for boys." I'm not sure it's either original or added by Taiwanese licensor, though.
Eh, lots of typo.... 
I want to learn it too. 
I feel that although US manga market is booming, titles in this genre / demographics are very scarce, while some of the best manga are out from this genre, such as Kintarou (we don't have its manga?! Adding...), Kachou Shima Kosaku, and Sanctuary. Those are what I called "Corporates/Politics" genre. Other than these male-themed ones, there are also female oriented ones, like WARU (adding...) by Jun FUKAMI (深見 じゅん). P.S. I don't know a single female Sid Meier's Civilization player in real life, but Fukami-sensei is definately a hardcore one. 
|
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
NeoSam
Posts: 41 |
|
|||||||||||||||
There are many manga targeted at male audience('coz there are bieng serialized in a shounen/seinen/seijin or bishoujo magazine) that have many female fans but nontheless still have a main target audience: which is male audience. examples like: 1)Tactics(which I mentioned before) have mostly female fans but even so its described by the author(yes the author said so) that its a shounen manga(bieng serialized in a shounen magazine it sure should be). 2)Tsubasa also has a large female fans but is serialized in a shounen magazine and described by Clamp(yes they said so) as a shounen manga. 3)Prince of Tennis(serialized in a shounen magazine): it has mostly female fans and most POT DVDs according to a japanese site are mostly bought by female, but its still a shounen anime/manga. Can you give me an example of the opposite of what you are saying: a manga serialized in a shoujo/josei magazine that are aimed towards male audience.(yes I mean its considered a shounen manga but its serialized in a shoujo or josei magazine). If you can find manga like this then you can say Azumanga Daioh is not shounen otherwise Azumanga Daioh is serialized in a shounen magazine so its a shounen manga. (sorry for bad english, please don't flame I don't mean to offend anyone) Last edited by NeoSam on Sun Jan 30, 2005 8:57 am; edited 1 time in total |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
NeoSam
Posts: 41 |
|
|||||||||||||||
There is also Seijin anime/manga which are targeted at Adult male audience. Seijin manga magazines: targets adult men. Business Comic is a seijin manga magazine. There is also Bishoujo which targets male audience (I don't know what age, but its not for boys because many of these magazines have ecchi manga), for example: Dengeki G's magazine, Dengeki Teioh magazine, Magical Cute magazine, Comptiq magazine. All Dengeki magazines are aimed at male audience some of them are considered shounen magazines and some are considered bishoujo magazines. there is also Yuri manga magazines, which are written/drawn by men and for men.(I don't know under which demographic these magazines fall(seinen or seijin)). just like there are Yaoi/Shounen-ai manga magzines that are written/drawn by women and for women. |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
dormcat
Encyclopedia Editor
Posts: 9902 Location: New Taipei City, Taiwan, ROC |
|
|||||||||||||||
Still dichotomizing after all those discussions we have?
Maybe it's time to take out demographic indicators from genre once and for all. |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
NeoSam
Posts: 41 |
|
|||||||||||||||
is dichotomizing=classifying ? 
sorry for that, but I'm not dichotomizing anything, japan is the one that is dichotomizing anime and manga. as I remember from a friend who bought the AzuDai manga, he got it from a store from the shounen section, yeah you won't find it in the shoujo or josei section, other japanese manga shops will have AzuDai in the same section which is the shounen section of the shop. please do not say that I'm dichotomizing anything, Japan is the one that is doing that. (sorry for bad english, please do not flame, I don't have any bad intentions) |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
Pepperidge
 Posts: 1104 Location: British Columbia, Canada |
|
|||||||||||||||
|
Yeah... I don't think that should be used as a "genre" anymore. I mean, why on earth are Berserk, Ikkitousen, and Tenjou Tenge classified as a shounen?
|
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
NeoSam
Posts: 41 |
|
|||||||||||||||
Yeah your right. Tenjou Tenge is serialized in Ultra Jump magazine which is a seinen magazine so Tenjou Tenge is seinen manga/anime. Berserk is serialized in Young Animal magazine which is a seinen magazine so Berserk is a seinen manga/anime. Ikkitousen is serialized in Comic Gum magazine which is also a seinen magazine so Ikkitousen is a seinen manga/anime. Classify right or don't classify at all, that is my honest opinion. (sorry for bad english, please do not flame, I don't have any bad intentions) |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
dormcat
Encyclopedia Editor
Posts: 9902 Location: New Taipei City, Taiwan, ROC |
|
|||||||||||||||
You don't have to repeat it in every post; we've got your point. If you've got enough time to retype this sentence, go get a dictionary, use UPPER CASE for the first letter in a sentence, and write "you're right" instead of "your right."
That's due to the limitation of a physical store. Shopkeepers categorize merchandise (books, video, music, you name it) in different genre (e.g. Action, Drama, Comedy, Family, Sci-Fi, Horror, etc), but in a physical store one item could only be categorized under one single genre tag. I've never seen, and I don't expect there will be, a book/video/music store would have a section labeled "Mixed Bag" or "Items do not fit in any other category in our shop." If you shop around, different shops might keep the same item under different genre.
IMO while Berserk is seinen without question, both Ikki Tousen and Tenjou Tenge have stereotypical shounen storyline. It was their graphical nature (too much fanservice and more realistic combat scene compared with most shounen manga) making them inappropriate on shounen manga magazines.
There's no absolute RIGHT way. The purpose of this thread is trying to collect different opinions, not "classify with my way or don't classify at all." |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
NeoSam
Posts: 41 |
|
|||||||||||||||
wow a big discovery, yeah I'm not good in english. as to the word, I didn't find it in the dictionary, yeah I guess I have a crappy dictionary.
I didn't know how to answer this, so I asked a friend(yeah the same friend), a big anime/manga fan, yeah a real otaku ^^; , thats what he told me:"There is always a definite main target audience, it always depends in which magazine its bieng serialized, some of these magazines might have a broad audience but still these magazines have a definite target audience in mind. as to a shounen manga or shoujo manga bieng put in different sections in different shops I have never stumpled upon this even with quite famous titles, but sometimes you will come across mistakes from the shop keeper like one time I found Love Hina manga put in the shoujo section, Does that make it a shoujo manga? even shounen manga that have mostly female audience will always be in the shounen section of the shops." ok I had to translate his words.(please no picking on my english) this friend of mine lived in japan for about 5 years and he bought manga and anime from many shops.
I never said to classify with my way, because this isn't even my way, this is how it is in japan. even a manga that can appeal to both sexes has a definite target audience, which is the target audience of the magazine. ok I'm going to quote something from another site: http://www.reimeika.ca/nikkou/raamfaq.html
this is exactly how it is.(and no I'm not the guy that is mentioned in the site) ok this is all I have to say, I'm not posting in this thread anymore.(yeah you can be happy about this) |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
Diedrupo
Posts: 58 |
|
|||||||||||||||
|
After rereading this post, it seems like I pretty much agree with it.
At first I thought you were trying to say that it's a misconception that "if it's serialized in serial X, it's only for that audience", but then I realized you meant that it's a misconception because it doesn't necessarily mean it is exclusive for that audience. I think the reason why NeoSam and others like myself want to harp on the demographics issue is because although demographics is nothing more than marketing, when it is perceived to be more than that, it feels like something of the original culture is lost. It's similar to how the word hentai just refers to a pervert or perverted action in Japan, but it got twisted into meaning Japanese cartoon pornography when it got westernized. Shounen and Shoujo have become westernized (and not the other terms because they don't seem to be as popular) and people have come to think that shounen = action and shoujo = romance. That couldn't be further from the truth. BTW someone mentioned that they have never heard of a shoujo with no romance. Well romance is a very fluid subject, and could range from heavy romance to very light romance elements. I am sure there are plenty of shoujo manga that have light romance elements, or no romance at all. In fact, one that comes to mind is that cafe manga starring a group of heterosexual boys who have misadventures similar to the Azumanga cast. As far as I could tell from reading it, there was no romance at all. Just nothing but boys acting crazy, drawn and written in a way to cater to girls (not to mention done by a female artist). |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
R.G.
Posts: 684 |
|
|||||||||||||||
Now I'm intrigued.Somebody should license THAT particular title. |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
Terrabull
Posts: 3 Location: Illinois |
|
|||||||||||||||
|
defenition of genre:
A category of artistic composition, as in music or literature, marked by a distinctive style, form, or content. So Shonen or Shojo COULD be genre's. In the US it is probably a good way to divide them since I doubt we'll see many outside that window for a while. Also because this term apparently carried over from Japan it would appear to be a definate genre marker in Japan as well. Sometimes you will hear about a genre target for shows in the US, but most of them are done to be as widely ranged as possible, and never focus on a specific audience. Shonen without action: Maison Ikkoku, I'm only about halfway through Chobits, but there has been no fighting so far. Some mild action, but compared to most Shonen there is no action in Chobits (once again, so far). Snonen without romance: Clamp School Detectives (or at least the amount I read.) Shojo w/ action: Card Captor Sakura had lots of action. |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
Pepperidge
Posts: 1104 Location: British Columbia, Canada |
|
|||||||||||||||
|
Maison Ikkoku and Chobits are both seinen, not shounen. That's the thing, lots of titles that AREN'T shounen are being labelled as such, and it's kind of misleading sometimes, especially with titles like Berserk and Tenjho Tenge.
"Shoujo" and "shounen" do not indicate definitive styles. They define what demographic the title was intended for in Japan. |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
R.G.
Posts: 684 |
|
|||||||||||||||
What's the title so I'll know what to look for? |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
 |
All times are GMT - 5 Hours |
|
|
|
Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group