Forum - View topicSlice of life genre seems to be used incorrectly frequently
|
|
| Author | Message | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
Calathan
 SubscriberPosts: 9112 |
|
|||
|
I've noticed that the "slice of life" genre seems to frequently be used in the encyclopedia on anime where it doesn't belong. If you try to add or audit the "slice of life" genre, it gives you the following description:
It also defines slice of life as being incompatible with drama, which is defined as:
Despite those definitions, tons of things seem to be listed as "slice of life" when they either have lots of action or conflict or are clearly dramas. There are things like Tenchi Muyo OAV 2 and Sailor Moon SuperS that just seem nothing like slice of life. There are things like Kino's Journey and Mushishi which depict a character's everyday life, but where that life involves constantly dealing with dangerous and unusual situations that seem completely unlike what the genre was intended for. And then there are things like From Up On Poppy Hill and Honey and Clover that seem to be exactly what the drama genre is described as. I just went through and audited about 20 that seemed clearly wrong to me, and I'm sure there are a lot more from shows I'm not familiar with. I was wondering if anyone could somehow clean up the things that are listed as "slice of life". I think it is being misused so often that just leaving it to the audits is problematic as a lot of people seem to be using it without reading the actual description. I know that the audit system helps in that an encyclopedia editor doesn't have to be familiar with the show, but in this case I think it is failing to work right for this one genre. It would really be helpful if someone could just pick out any that they are familiar with that are obviously wrong (e.g., I think anyone who is even vaguely familiar with Sailor Moon or Tenchi Muyo could tell that those aren't slice of life anime). Also, I tried to audit slice of life for The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya season 1, but it wouldn't let me because it said the audit was closed. It said that there were 30 votes for slice of life vs. 19 for neither slice of life nor drama. I'm assuming I must have been one of the 19 because I think otherwise it would have let me vote and made it an active audit again. In this case I think the 19 people were right and the 30 were wrong. The slice of life genre description says "Even if the setting is uncommon, the events presented are always commonplace to ordinary life within that setting". Haruhi Suzumiya seems to be about fantastic things happening in a setting that is mostly the real world. While fantastic things commonly happen to the main cast, that doesn't mean it is normal to the setting, but instead is because the show follows a very non-ordinary group of people. I was hoping that the decision from the audits could be overruled if the staff agrees that it isn't slice of life. |
||||
|
||||
Touma
 Posts: 2651 Location: Colorado, USA |
|
|||
|
I think that we should stay with the audits because slice of life and drama are subjective.
If there is a difference of opinion about the genre then the majority should decide which is used. If there is no difference of opinion then the audit will show that. Personally I think that Mushi-shi is slice of life, but I voted for drama in the audit. I think that the show is both slice of life and drama but the encyclopedia says that a show cannot be both. Since I had to pick one I chose drama because I think that it fits Mushi-shi better. There are other slice of life shows that I feel the same about. They are slice of life but changing them to drama might be better for people who are doing a genre search. But those are just my opinions. Actually I think that we should be able to apply both genres to a show and I do not understand why they must be mutually exclusive. But that is a somewhat different topic. EDIT: This is off topic but I will ask here because it is sort of relevant. For three days now there has not been anything for me to audit. This has never happened before. Have the audits stopped for some reason? Or is it just that nothing that I have seen needs to be audited? |
||||
|
||||
|
Calathan
Subscriber Posts: 9112 |
|
|||
|
I think the problem is that people are using their own definitions of the genres, rather than reading what the instructions say. It is very reasonable to consider Mushishi a slice of life series by some definitions, but I don't think there is any reasonable way to say it is slice of life by the one definition the encyclopedia uses. Ginko's whole life revolves around dealing with unusual phenomena, and every episode of the show presents a situation where the everyday life of the people involved has been disrupted. There is absolutely no way that is compatable with the description of slice of life as presenting events that are ordinary to the setting; in fact, it is exactly the opposite. Dan (or someone on the ANN staff) has chosen genres for the encyclopedia that everyone is supposed to use, and we need to stick with them so that the genres are meaningful to people searching the encyclopedia for shows they might want to watch. If we let slice of life mean whatever anyone who votes in an audit personally thinks it should mean, then no one will have any idea what to expect when they start watching a show labeled slice of life (or even worse, they will expect it to mean what the encyclopedia says it means and then be disappointed when the show doesn't fit that description at all). That is why I think the staff should just overrule the auditors when they have voted in a way that doesn't match how the genre is defined in the encyclopedia.
|
||||
|
||||
|
Touma
Posts: 2651 Location: Colorado, USA |
|
|||
|
I just realized that the search page does not provide definitions for the genres or themes. Also, the lexicon does not have definitions for "drama" or "slice of life."
When we do audits we are given definitions, but people doing a genre search will be using whatever definitions they are familiar with. Maybe the search page could have definitions? There are too many themes for definitions to be practical, but there are not many genres. |
||||
|
||||
|
Shiroi Hane
Encyclopedia Editor
 Posts: 7580 Location: Wales |
|
|||
|
Well, the genres were all defined here when the new system was put in place and we have also had a thread on drama VS slice of life
|
||||
|
||||
 |
All times are GMT - 5 Hours |
|
|
|
Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group