Talk:Manga/Archive 4

Citation needed
When I added the etymology section with it's references, Timothy Perper put citation needed tags to all sentences that have already their references. What should I refer any further? Please tell me. --Kasuga 13:54, 2 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Sorry, Kasuga, but most of your statements are not referenced. You need specific references to the works of the authors you mention. You cite Kern's 2007 book, apparently without noticing that we have already cited it and his 2006 IJOCA symposium on kibyoshi. You need page references to Kern if you if you intended to use him to support your statements. Moreover, Kern barely discusses Hokusai; if you look at the new bibliography we added in our revision, you'll find a convenient reference to Hokusai's manga. Those are the kinds of citation you need, and I, for one, would like to see some more references to the Japanese literature. Timothy Perper 14:39, 2 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your quick reply, Timothy Perper. I rewrote the sentences and the reference's information based on the material that I own. I deleted the Mankaku Zuihitsu because the material doesn't refer to the book. Are you satisfied in it? If something is insufficient, please tell me in this talkpage before putting tags to all my sentences. --Kasuga 15:31, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Sayonara
God be with you, folks, and I mean that sincerely.

I can no longer take any responsibility for the content or structure of the manga article. Kasuga just inserted some changes, in obvious genuine good faith and with every intention of helping. His contribution lacks citations for a number of statements, and he cites Adam Kern's book apparently without knowing that it has already been cited in the revision (he added a new reference). That leads to some musing.

Wikipedians seem very proud that "anyone can edit Wikipedia." In one sense, they should be proud, but in another sense, Wikipedia is -- or should be -- cause for considerable, shall I say, modesty. One cannot build a coherent building simply by putting bricks and planks wherever one wants; one needs a plan. That's what artchitects are for. But this article, and a great many articles on Wikipedia, have neither architects nor architecture: they are more or less random and incoherent jumbles of facts, opinions, information and misinformation all heaped together and fiercely protected by their amateur carpenters and brick-layers.

I have years of experience on the internet and have rarely seen flame wars as vicious and as hate-filled as the edit wars on Wikipedia. These are not about content, not in the sense of what the article says, but about ego, turf wars, and ownership. Right below this editing box it says "Encyclopedic content must be verifiable." Well, not really, because the norm on Wikipedia is not to use citations at all, but to insert "original research," and half-complete ideas all felt to be True by someone. The result is not merely an incoherent jumble, but an incoherent jumble of half-truths and opinions.

When I began editing and revising the manga article about a month ago, I had hoped to reshape it into a useful architecture. With the invaluable help of Peregrine Fisher, we were able to get fairly far -- up to the history of shojo manga, and, over on my user Sandbox Timothy Perper/Sandbox5, a first draft of the sections on shonen manga, gekiga, and the role of women in shonen manga. We put in nearly 100 references, and the three sections I just mentioned would have added more -- with the result that our contributions were throroughly referenced.

That would have finished the section on the History of Manga After World War II, to be followed by the next section, about the History of Manga Before World War 2. That then would have ended the history sections, and we were planning next to insert sections on Manga Genres and Their Stylistics. It would have introduced another 50 or so references.

What I had not anticipated was the egotism, turf warring, and claims of ownership (though not in that word) that descended on the article. You'll have to forgive my naivete -- I work, and have worked for some 40 years, in professional print scholarship, where the rules are very different. Some of things I've seen and read on Wikipedia, especially about turf warring, would get people fired from a job within minutes if they tried it in the real world out here -- but Wikipedia isn't the real world out here. It's more like a high school playground, with angry and hostile kids screaming and pushing and shoving. It's no wonder that out here -- in the real world, I mean -- Wikipedia is treated like a high school newspaper: a great source of not quite trustworthy news about pop culch and not quite trustworthy summaries of somebody's coursework in something or other. Wikipedia has many miles and years to go to overcome that, and it might never.

A harsh judgment? No, not really. Wikipedia lacks the structure to become anything else. As long as you allow egotism, turf wars, and ownership battles to rule the roost, you will have only amateur work. As long as you do not recognize the need for planning an article rather than throwing bricks in a pile and hoping they will magically become a castle, you will have only jumbles of incoherent stuff, none of it referenced, all of it defended ferociously by various people against who I do not know.

I will make one further change to the manga article. A while ago, I promised Kasuga that I would replace some material temporarily removed about the history of manga before World War II. I am going to do that next, creating a new subsection to receive it. I can't vouch for its accuracy or verifiability; you'll have to take that up with Kasuga. But I did promise him I would do it, and so I will.

In any event, sayonara. God be with you, and I mean that sincerely.

Timothy Perper 14:39, 2 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Well, there's a reason why we do have guidelines. Unfortunately, sometimes, even those guidelines become disregarded by many users simply because they do not know about them or forget about them.  Plenty of this kind of in-fighting occur in 9/11 articles in particular.  So, while, all that occurs, it's all a matter of handling it. KyuuA4 06:43, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Reverted changes made by two anonymous users
On October 7, 2007, two anonymous users made a bunch of changes in the manga article. User 190.40.176.127 spent most of their time changing "American" into "U.S.A." regardless of grammar. I reverted many of these, but kept them when "American" seemed too broad -- then I made it into "US". Whereupon anonymous user 69.134.91.171 came along and added a sentence in the opening that said that manga means only Japanese manga. User 69.134.91.171 did not bother to read the article; no, they know it all without reading. So 69.134.91.171 simply ignored OEL manga, Amerimanga, la nouvelle manga... I took that out too. (sigh).They'll be back with their hobbyhorses and invincible ignorance.

Timothy Perper 07:40, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

What to do with what we've been given
So looks like we've not now got an awesome, long, sprawling "History and Characteristics of Manga" section and...well, the same poor article we had all along. So, here's some things I think we need to do: Once that's done, we can start working on the rest of the article and maybe see about getting that up to GA status. Now's a good time to make that push since we've been given a good start.--SeizureDog 11:21, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Take "History and Characteristics of Manga" and stick it into History of manga and see about getting that to be a GA. Any idea how much of history was left unfinished?
 * Condense this article's History section to fit the summary style.
 * Change Japanese titles to their English ones.
 * Fix up some of the odd refs. (e.g. "...non-narrative extensions of time.[6][7][46][47](McCloud, 1993, pp. 77-82)[53]")
 * Adapt "Shōjo Manga" and "Shōjo Manga and Ladies' Comics from 1975 to Today" section into "History" section at Shōjo.
 * Fix that "History of Manga Before World War II" section. It's a mess right now.


 * Your opening sentence -- "not got"? It depends on what you mean by "awesome," but I'd certainly say the article is long and sprawling, Too long. And certainly sprawling.


 * How much history was left unfinished? The section on shonen, with subsections on gekiga and on the role of women and girls in shonen manga (which is quite complicated).


 * "The History Before World War II" section was written by Kasuga. I think it's POV, like the section Kasuga added on "Etymology." Kasuga has adopted one of several viewpoints (described, BTW, in the "Overview" section) and included no discussion of alternative views (e.g., Kinsella's or Inouye's).


 * I'd like to fix the McCloud reference also, but it points to a peculiarity in the Wikipedia referencing system.To fix it, you either put the page references into the text OR you create a separate footnote for each page reference... these can't be combined for a citation that appears several time. Over to you.


 * Some of the Japanese titles may not have translations, and if they're in the references, the reference becomes inaccurate if you translate it. That comes with the territory of doing an English-language article about a topic that deals extensively with non-English sources.


 * In my opinion, the History of Manga article is not in good shape at all. It needs more than merely attaching the material I wrote. Ditto the article on shojo manga.


 * The long section on English-language (OEL) manga is not in the purview of the article, which, it says way up on top, is about East Asian comics. I didn't write that description, BTW. It was there when I got there, and it defines what the article is supposed to be about. The present section in the manga article on English-language (OEL) manga is for the most part pure unreferenced Original Research and lots of opinion. I suggested a while ago moving the section to the existing article "Manga Outside Japan."


 * Note added later, about Frank Miller. The present article asserts without any sources that Frank Miller was strongly influenced by manga. The article cites two Wiki articles, one to Miller himself (which merely repeats the unsourced statement) and the other to decompression in comics (which doesn't mention Miller at all). So I suspect that somebody heard this about Miller, or decided it for themselves, and just put it in. I flagged it as dubious -- discuss because it's the kind of poor referencing that plagues many Wikipedia articles: someone just throws pseudofactoids into an article, maybe true, maybe false, but certainly unsourced and therefore Original Research. I agree with KyuuA4 -- this is why Wikipedia has guidelines. Timothy Perper 17:17, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Indeed. I've found the poorly shaped anime-influenced animation article undergo that kind of scrutiny, where listed items had to be cited. In a good way, it shows that claims regarding "influence" do need a source.  After all, anyone can simply say, "so and so" is influenced by "this" - without any backing. While painfully "annoying", it is necessary. KyuuA4 19:27, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree with you. Timothy Perper 22:04, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * If you remove the "Overview of History" and "History and Characteristics" sections -- as you've wanted to do all along -- what's left? Much of the other current material is either wrong (the present section on Gekiga, for example) or Original Research, aka unadulterated opinion (the OEL material) or POV, like the quote from TokyoPop's Stuart Levy (this was addressed in the discussion pages a while ago). I think -- you can disagree if you want -- that the article needs a plan or an architecture, not piling on more planks and bricks and hoping that it will magically become a Good Article. That won't happen without a plan.


 * WP:SUMMARY. All that history content has to be summarized -- after the move. The history of manga article would be greatly improved by it.  Looking at it now, it's in horrible shape. KyuuA4 19:27, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Well, I have to admit that the history of manga article is really very badly done. When you say "summarized," that seems to mean here, in the main article, with the longer, more detailed material going to the more specialized article -- or at least that's how I understand WP:SUMMARY.


 * What do you mean by "after the move"?


 * Who is going to do the summarizing? That's trickier than it sounds, because the historical material in the present article is already a summary.


 * And then what happens to the material, as bad as it may be, that's already in history of manga?


 * Also, the history material in the present article is not complete -- I wasn't able to finish the shonen section, through the press of other activities.


 * And an additional complication. There are no articles on shōjo manga or on shōnen manga. The manga-related material is under shōjo and shōnen, which is linguistically completely wrong. The words "shōjo" and "shōnen" mean girl(s) and boy(s). If we get all bent out of shape about writing shōjo without the macron, as shojo, then we might as well get bent out of shape about this too. There are some redirects in here that might have to be unredirected.


 * Timothy Perper 22:04, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * The problem -- again, my opinion -- is that Wikipedia articles tend to become pulpits for specific points of view held adamantly by an editor and contested by everyone else. Then the "everyone else" starts putting in their opinions, and the whole thing becomes a screaming mess. Take a look at the article on Jazz, on Nihonjinron, on Lolicon ... or this one.


 * Well, good luck with it...


 * Timothy Perper 15:38, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Ugh, the worst typos are the ones that completely change the meaning of the sentence. "Not" was supposed to be "now", and I've corrected it. I'll do an actual reply to comments later tonight but I'm rather in a rush to be somewhere at the moment.--SeizureDog 21:37, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Hello again, Timothy Perper. The theory of the current etymology section is the most common in Japan. But I might overlook the more accepted theories because my knowledge is imperfect. If you think the current section to be POV, you should add more theories the section with their reference.


 * I shall try to do that, although my knowledge of the Japanese sources is also imperfect. If you will give me a few days, I will try to fill in with other non-copyrighted material (see below).

"The History Before World War II" section was originally contributed to your subpage as mere references. I didn't expect that you copy it to the article. (Moreover, your copy is the GFDL violation obviously (because you didn't cite the original page's name), but I won't pursue it.) --Kasuga 10:34, 12 October 2007 (UTC)


 * This is a very serious matter and requires immediate action. Yes, you put that material on my user subpage, and I therefore believed -- in good faith, I want to assure you -- that it was to be included in the article. I see that I was in error, and my apologies. I will now rectify the mistake.


 * There is only one solution to the copyright issue, and that is to remove the section from the article. The original material was not accompanied by a copyright notice, and I assumed -- as is the case for all Wikipedia contributions made by all editors, you and me both -- that the copyright was clear.


 * My apologies. I was using a bit of jargon. "The copyright was clear" means that there are no problems with the copyright -- the path is clear to using the material. It doesn't mean that the material is clearly (= obviously) copyrighted. I hope that makes my meaning more obvious.Timothy Perper 16:13, 12 October 2007 (UTC)


 * This does not have anything to do with my citing the original name of the page; citation of a page name does not transfer the copyright. But you have now assured me that the material is copyrighted.


 * The section must therefore be removed. That is not optional. Look immediately below this editing box for the sentence "Content that violates any copyright will be deleted."


 * I have therefore removed the entire section. This is very unfortunate -- extremely unfortunate -- but please note that I have acted with what is called "due diligence," which, as I understand it in US law, means that I repaired the mistake as soon as it was brought to my attention, that is, this morning, October 12, 2007.


 * If you or anyone else wants to restore the deleted material, they must now assure themselves (and Wikipedia) that the copyright has been properly transferred.


 * Once again, I assure you that this was a good faith mistake on my part, and that I intended neither malice nor harm.


 * Timothy Perper 11:36, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Usage Question
Is the term "manga" used in Japan to refer to foreign works as well? I.e., would Superman be counted as a manga in Japan, like how anime can also refer to foreign cartoons, or do they use a different term to refer to foreign comics?--75.57.240.101 18:11, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * While we have yet to see Superman in "animanga" form, we do have the Powerpuff girls in "two" versions. Regarding "anime", the Japanese use it as a blanket term.  However, we - Westerners - tend to separate the Japanese from everyone else. KyuuA4 19:20, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, Superman and Batman could be called manga in Japan, since the word simply means printed cartoon or comic. But it would be more common and/or colloquial to say komikku. Here'a an example, copied from the amazon.co.jp website entry for a Batman komikku -- which is written in katakana inside the parentheses. The URL is right below.


 * BATMAN 1 (1) by 麻宮 騎亜  (コミック - 2000/11)
 * http://www.amazon.co.jp/s/ref=nb_ss_b/503-9646693-9675153?__mk_ja_JP=%83J%83%5E%83J%83i&initialSearch=1&url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=Batman&Go.x=9&Go.y=6&Go=Go


 * The word komikku is simply the word "comic" written in Japanese. It refers to any and all of what we in the US call "comics."


 * Note that there's a small "tsu" immediately after the "mi" in komikku -- the "tsu" is NOT pronounced but is a symbol indicating that the following consonant is doubled.


 * Timothy Perper 21:25, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Manga can be called komikku also. Here's an example.


 * てんでフリーズ 2 (2) (コミック) by ISUTOSHI (著)
 * http://www.amazon.co.jp/exec/obidos/ASIN/4063143090/250-9509631-8810623


 * Timothy Perper 22:29, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Removed Copyrighted Material
In the section "What to do with what we've been given", Kasuga-san has said that the material in the section "The History Before World War II" is copyrighted and that it was placed in the article in violation of copyright.

I have therefore removed it completely, together with the section heading. I am acting here with what I believe US law calls "due diligence," which means, again as I understand it, that mistakes like this must be rectified as soon as they are called to one's attention. Therefore DO NOT REVERT this deletion. It is not vandalism but is mandated by the Wikipedia policy, quoted immediately under this editing box, that "Content that violates any copyright will be deleted."

Kasuga-san's posting is dated "10:34, 12 October 2007" and my removal is dated "11:38, 12 October 2007" (both are UTC).The error was made in the good faith belief that there were no copyright impediments to including the material, and was made without malice or intention of causing harm. Moreover, the material was deleted in only a little more than an hour after Kasuga-san notified me about the copyright situation.

Once again, do not revert this change.

Timothy Perper 12:00, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Classification of Manga
What is the intent of that section? I believe, that's where the "genre" section used to be. As it stands, what's the purpose of it? KyuuA4 06:17, 16 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Good question! My guess is that its original purpose is lost in history somewhere... it should be replaced. Right now, the opening has been challenged as NPOV and under any circumstances the Stuart Levy quote should go into the OEL manga article. The second section doesn't seem to say much of anything at all beyond the obvious, that there are lots of different kinds of manga.


 * The difficulty, it seems to me, is avoiding OR, aka personal opinion, while still providing a system for classifying manga. One can use (and cite) publisher's descriptions, like horror, action, sci-fi, and so on. Comic book shops don't seem to use classifications except by author -- or at least our local comics shop does that -- and the big web vendors of manga, like Anime Castle, don't use genre classifications either. They just list it all and let *you* decide what you want. Some years ago some American comics fans tried to create a genre classification and it ended up with some major flame wars and a classification that no one ever uses.


 * In my own sources, I don't know of anyone who has successfully created a classification of manga beyond the no-long-as-obvious-as-it-once-was shonen/shojo distinction. For my own collection, I use *very* broad classifications -- romantic comedy, serious romance, angst, action-adventure, superheroines, picaresque, horror, humor, and "not classified." Examples are Love Hina. Maison Ikkoku, Peach Girl, Lone Wolf and Cub, Sailor Moon, Jing King of Bandits, Tomie, Sgt. Frog, and Buddha by Osamu Tezuka. Someone else would divide it up differently. I can't justify my classification except as something I personally find convenient -- which doesn't work for Wikipedia.


 * Timothy Perper 08:46, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Moved section here for later use: KyuuA4 (talk) 22:31, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Classification of manga
While 'manga' is defined as "a Japanese comic book or graphic novel", some people contend that manga defines a style rather than a country of origin. This viewpoint can most predominantly be seen by the manga publisher Tokyopop, which markets original English-language manga. "Manga is like hip-hop. It's a lifestyle. To say that you can't draw it because you don't have the DNA is just silly." —Stu Levy, Tokyopop CEO However, like any artistic medium, there is no true set style for manga. Manga can range from the realistic to super deformed. Therefore, when manga is referenced as a style, it generally is specifically referring to the moe style of manga common to the fantasy genre and the most familiar style of manga to foreign readers.

Types of manga
With an immense market in Japan, manga encompasses a very diverse range of subjects and themes, satisfying many readers of different interests. Popular manga aimed at mainstream readers frequently involves sci-fi, action, fantasy and comedy. Notable manga series are based on corporate businessman (the Shima Kousaku and Salaryman Kintaro series), Chinese cuisine (Iron Wok Jan), criminal thriller (Monster) and military politics (The Silent Service). As a result, many genres apply equally well to anime (which very often includes adaptations of manga) and Japanese computer games (some of which are also adaptations of manga).

Manga are often broken up into demographics such as kodomo (children), shōjo (young girls), shōnen (young boys), josei (women), and seinen (men).

She comes; she goes
Wikipe-tan just got pulled again by our watchdog of the Manga page, SeizureDog. OK with me; I don't care one way or the other. Timothy Perper 21:49, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
 * She keeps popping up both here and the anime article. It's just iritating to me since she's never been in a comic nor animated. I have no problem with her being in Moe anthropomorphism or Fan service, she's good examples there. I just hate how she's being forced into articles she doesn't belong just because she's free. --SeizureDog 03:14, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Forced? There's nothing forced about Wikipe-tan.  If anything, she serves as a generic model for one type of anime/manga character.  It's difficult enough as it is to describe anime/manga in general.  Plus, the term "official" to anime/manga can be moot, especially when the manga article has reservations for a doujinshi section.  Regardless, in a similar fashion, inclusion or exclusion of Wikipe-tan is... either-or. KyuuA4 10:25, 14 November 2007 (UTC)


 * So we're back again to no picture. How about the idea of some time ago simply to put in the kanji for manga? I don't think Wikipe-tan is being included because she's free, but because she does typify one kind of manga/anime drawing style for depicting girls and women. I mean she's cute and harmless, unlike Motoko Kusanagi, who's gorgeous and deadly, or Cutey Honey, who's sexy and deadly, or Gardina, who's sexy and friendly, or -- and so on endlessly. Or we could use Lord Sesshōmaru, from Inu-Yasha. But -- we've been over this before -- no individual image is going to capture the essences of manga. So I still like using the kanji and nothing else.Timothy Perper 14:21, 14 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Well, good to go with the kanji then; as it would be "objection free". KyuuA4 18:35, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Perhaps using a small Tezuka image, particularly Astro Boy, would be a good choice? It would use an image that could be generally agreed-upon as being iconic.--75.68.233.187 19:40, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Well, no. Here are some reasons. Above all, the iconicity of Astro Boy depends on imagining that manga is still graphically defined today by an image as old as Astro Boy, and that it is legitimate to use a masculine figure for the icon rather than a feminine figure, like Belldandy, Cutey Honey, Sally, Oscar, or Sailor Moon. Next, the use of a single image as an icon implies that manga is monolithic and is legitimately represented by a dominant or overarching image of one character. "Yes," the reader -- sophisticated or naive -- will say, "Yes, he is the prototype, the archetype of all manga!" Next, I question the wisdom of us imposing a POV on manga that says that one character typifies all manga -- and that is what an icon must do. So I do not agree that Astro Boy should be our symbol: manga is too complex, and historically and graphically too diverse, to be represented in a single face, style, or sex.

And, as I say below as well, please sign your name when you edit, and don't do so anonymously.

Timothy Perper 01:30, 15 November 2007 (UTC)


 * We put up the kanji image. It's from 1798, so it's in the public domain. Let's gather some comments about it, and see what happens. Timothy Perper (talk) 00:11, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Mis-use of Rozen Maiden under Josei
Other subgenres of shōjo/redisu manga have also developed, e.g., fashion (oshare) manga, like Ai Yazawa's Paradise Kiss and horror/vampire/gothic manga, like Matsuri Hino‘s Vampire Knight, Kaori Yuki's Cain Saga,[95] and Peach-Pit‘s Rozen Maiden, which interact with street fashions, costume play ("cosplay"), J-Pop music, and goth subcultures in complex ways.

Rozen Maiden is actually a seinen manga, not a shoujo or josei piece. I have replaced the reference to Rozen Maiden and the interview with Peach-Pit with a reference to Mitsukazu Mihara's manga DOLL and a link an an .mp3 interview with her, feeling that this is a good Josei equivalent to Rozen Maiden that incorporates a lot of the same popular culture elements as Rozen Maiden, particularly the Goth-Loli angle, which I suspect is what the original author was referencing.--75.68.233.187 19:37, 14 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Please sign your name to your edits, and don't use an anonymous ISP.


 * Why don't you ask what the original writer intended (me, in this case) rather than suspecting? This procedure is called obtaining consensus. Then I'd be able to ask you to cite the standard by which you know that Rozen Maiden "actually" is seinen manga, not josei. And I'd be able to ask you if it makes a difference, given the convergence among these styles or forms of manga.


 * The reference to an mp.3 interview with Mihara went nowhere on my machine (an iBook using Safari), so I deleted it.


 * Timothy Perper 01:09, 15 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Generally, a manga is categorized by the magazine in which it ran. Rozen Maiden ran in Monthly Comic Birz, a seinen manga magazine. It is, therefore, seinen, as it is aimed at that demographic. It is most definitely not aimed at the josei demographic. It's about target demographics, not necessarily art style as art styles do not necessarily belong to one demographic over another (there are exceptions). ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:48, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, Nihonjoe. But there are still some problems.

One is fairly narrow, but important: the lack of consensus about how the demographic is identified. By "consensus," I don't mean only anong us here, but in general. As far as I know, no authoritative Master List exists of manga magazines defining their (single or sole) demographic. So we're left again with impressions and criteria from artwork, style, and so on, but this time about the magazine as a whole. Some, of course, are clear -- Flower Comics vs. Shonen Jump -- but others are not, like Garo.


 * That is your opinion. However, manga magazines in Japan (and the manga which run in them) have been classified like that for over 20 years. All you have to do is go into any bookstore carrying manga in Japan (new or used) and you'll see the manga divided up that way. First by demographic, then by publisher, then by author, then by title. It's a very accepted way of sorting them by demographic. Artwork style has nothing to do with it as styles can be similar across demographics. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 18:21, 17 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I can't agree with you here, Nihonjoe. The intended demographic for Shonen Jump is built into the title itself -- shōnen. Likewise for the Flower Comics line -- the title and cover designs display the demographic = shōjo. That isn't opinion. We need Wiki-verifiable evidence here, something I'm bringing up because the manga article has a good deal of unverified assertion that is opinion -- one of the reasons I do not think it is yet a Good Article. Some Japanese bookstores may organize their shelves one way, and others other ways -- impressions from visits to Tokyo aren't enough to document an industry-wide standard for sorting manga by demographics. These are interesting and important considerations, but they don't YET provide the kind of evidence this article needs. For example, I would like someone who can search Google in Japanese to find some good sources for the origin and use of these demographic labels -- not opinion, but actual sources. Not blogs, but reliable sources. Until then, the manga entry isn't at the Good Article level. Yet. Timothy Perper (talk) 01:05, 19 November 2007 (UTC)


 * It doesn't matter if you agree with me or not as this isn't my opinion. The fact remains that you can go into ANY bookstore in Japan and find the manga sorted that way. Because it is so ingrained in the system there, I seriously doubt you will ever find an academic discussion of it, much less a discussion of why it's done that way. And this isn't just from visits to Tokyo (as I've only been there twice), and it's not an impression. I've visited 50 or so bookstores in Japan, all over the country, and all different sizes (from little mom-and-pop stores to huge retail chains) and ALL of them do it that way. Without exception. It's not my opinion that they do it that way; it's just the way they do it. I had to learn that so I could actually find manga I was looking for. I personally find it a little cumbersome to have things sorted like that, but that's the way they do it. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:19, 19 November 2007 (UTC)


 * As for the intended demographic for Shounen Jump and the imprint Flower Comics, I've never argued that those weren't what they said they were. They are very obviously shounen and shoujo/josei (respectively, since Flower Comics publishes for both shoujo and josei titles). I don't even know why you brought it up. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:22, 19 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Why did I bring it up? Because you said it was my "opinion" that the demographics of Shonen Jump and Flower Comics were obvious from the titles. Your comment is a little above here, right after my sentence on Garo. But it's not my opinion.


 * Let me try to explain what I'm getting at. So far as bookstores in Japan, you have impressions and opinions, but we need more than that for discussing the issue. You may be right, but I can't cite it as "Nihonjoe said so." Please remember, I am not debating how bookstores in Japan organize manga. I am discussing how we, in the US, can write about manga in a Wiki article or elsewhere. I need references and citations.


 * You do not have to cite references for things accepted as fact (see here: "Subject-specific common knowledge – Material that anyone familiar with a topic, including laypersons, recognizes as true."). You may not accept it as fact, but that doesn't change the fact that every bookstore in Japan sorts manga that way. It's as normal as eating rice with every meal there. You don't have to cite sources about it. It's just a fact. Go to any bookstore in Japan and you'll see. All of them sort manga this way. All of them. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:18, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * And that has been, and is, one of the major problems with many of the articles on manga and anime on Wikipedia, not just this one, but others also. Well-intended, helpful people contribute observations, impressions, opinions, and experiences -- which is very nice and open-ended -- but the results are not useful. I, as a reader, have absolutely no idea why such a person asserts the truth of X, Y, and Z, and therefore I can't use or rely on their statements. You may be right, but more is needed than personal experience.


 * That's neither here nor there. This isn't about other articles; it's about this one and you stating up and down that everyone else is wrong about how things work in Japan with regard to demographic. Go look at the archives of this page and the project page and you'll see it's been discussed to death already. If the publishers and bookstores in Japan accept it as common practice, why should we question it? That's where all of these things were published in the first place, so sorting by the demographics used by the publishers (and therefore by the bookstores) seems incredibly logical to me. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:18, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * My wife Martha and I are currently editing a book on graphic novels and libraries (it's not our first book together, either). She and I have published, in the scholarly print literature, a number of peer-reviewed papers on manga, and are also currently book review editors for a peer-reviewed scholarly journal that deals with manga, anime, and the fan arts. We're also working for TokyoPop adapting one of their manga. She and I do a lot of this kind of work -- and trust me when I say we need more than well-intended impressions. We need to cite facts and references -- and I'm not talking about Wiki, but for the work we do for other venues as well. You can call my attitude "pride" -- or worse -- but it's simply professionalism: we have to have references that link this to that, whatever they may be. If I say I have to know why you, or someone else, says that P, Q, and R are true, it's because we can't use it otherwise. It's not a matter of saying you aren't well-intentioned; you obviously are. Instead, we need to know why you say something.


 * For example, in the manga we're adapting, we have been asked to to add some factual sidebars on certain topics. We need real citations, real books, real sources -- not Wiki-impressions about these topics. The manga we're adapting isn't a Wiki-sandbox; it's the real world. We can't cite Wikipedia and say, "Well, Nihonjoe went to Japan 50 times, and he said -- " Sorry -- that's just the way it is.


 * I hope that's clearer.


 * Timothy Perper (talk) 08:17, 19 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I have yet to see any manga published in the States that has a bibliography (except for a couple which are using manga to explain some educational topic, and then they only tend to have "For further reading on this topic, please read x, y, or z."). Manga are generally not scholarly works, though. You don't have to have hard sources for everything. You can just ask the Japanese publisher, or a Japanese person to explain some unclear or interesting point of the manga. Putting cultural sidebars in a manga is not anywhere near as stringent as an academic review. And regardless of that, not all facts need citation if they are just stating generally accepted knowledge. Again, go to any bookstore in Japan (and even the larger Japanese bookstores in the States) and you'll find the manga arranged in the order I described. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:18, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The issue is not what Japanese bookstores do. That fact -- I have no reluctance accepting your description -- simply has no bearing on how the English-language Wikipedia does or should identify the demographics of manga. Bookstores can shelve books in any fashion at all, as a matter of tradition, company policy, service to customers -- anything. These ways of shelving books are not generally known to most people, at least not in the US, and these customs are therefore not part of general knowledge (e.g., like assuming that the moon can sometimes be seen in daytime). So, yes, for a US audience, you do need some references. I know of no publisher in the US that uses shelving customs of Japanese bookstores to determine how manga is marketed in the US.


 * We are not adding "cultural sidebars" to the manga we're working on. Contractual obligations prohibit me from discussing it in any detail, but we are adding scholarly references about various biological facts. (Beyond that I can't go.) We need facts throughout, not impressions, and especially not opinions.


 * Please see my comments, below, for some sources.


 * Timothy Perper (talk) 20:00, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Second, and more broadly, even if we can identify the magazine's "true demographic" with 100% verifiable certainty, it does not follow that all the manga in the magazine are aimed at that demographic. One reason is cross-over readership.


 * Cross-over readership has nothing to do with it. Just as the target audience of most animated Disney films (families and young children) doesn't necessarily include everyone who watches them, shoujo manga isn't only read by shoujo, shounen manga isn't only read by shounen, and seinen manga aren't only read by adults. That doesn't change who the target readership is. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 18:21, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

A third point is defining what it means to say "aimed at." Is a demographic defined solely and only by the intentions and narrowly defined marketing purposes of the editors or is it defined by who actually buys the magazine or by who actually reads it including pass-along readers? As far as I know, there is no single and universally agreed upon definition for any of these questions.


 * See above. The magazines have to define a particular demographic for many reasons, including where to advertise, from whom to accept (or seek) advertising, layout choices (as shoujo, shounen, and seinen manga tend to have very different layouts, especially on the cover), and so on. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 18:21, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

So we're left without any clear criterion for saying that "Monthly Comic Birz" really is this, that, or the other thing -- only opinions and impressions. For Shonen Jump, the "shōnen" part is in the title, but no demographic comes to mind at all from the title of "Monthly Comic Birz." Thus, right now, the web is filled with references to Monthly Comic Birz's decision to stop serializing Rozen Maiden -- which tosses us right back in the soup about identifying the genre of the **manga** from a putative identification of the demographic of the **magazine** it appeared in.


 * As I wrote above, what you (or I) think of how the publishers identify themselves is irrelevant. When they establish a magazine, they very clearly define what audience they are going for and include manga series and other content based on that. Yes, there will always be anomalous readers which don't fit into their target demographic, but that doesn't change who the target demographic is. You're over analyzing things here. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 18:21, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

Fourth, I am unsure of the value of these labels except as broad generalizations useful primarily for chapter titles in books or in articles here on Wiki. Let's take romance as an example, surely a "shōjo" topic if ever there was one. However, a recent issue of Protoculture had a (very good) essay on "shōnen romances," defined NOT by where the stories appeared but by graphical and other characteristics (an example is Maison Ikkoku).

Finally, these labels were developed in the 1960s-1970s, and have undergone considerable modification since then. It is simply no longer true that girls read manga with lots of flowers and big eyes and boys read manga with giant robots and ninja warriors. Modern manga is marked by the dissolution of previously distinct boundaries, a point that Paul Gravett makes in his book on manga. In 1983, yes, Fred Schodt was able to make a fairly sharp distinction between shōjo and shōnen manga, but 25 years later, those distinctions are very blurry indeed.


 * The vast majority of readership for shoujo magazines remains shoujo. The same is true for shounen and seinen magazines. Again, there will always be anomalous readership, but that doesn't change the target demographic. Shoujo manga magazines today still contain mostly ads aimed at young girls, manga aimed at young girls, and other content aimed at young girls. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 18:21, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

Taking all these factors into consideration, I am simply not convinced that the genre labels are very useful except as general pointers. That's how we used the terms in our revisions to the manga article. Genre labels tend to become hand-waving impressions and should not, in my opinion, be used as rigorous definitions of style, artistry, or putative sales demographics.

Timothy Perper 15:38, 15 November 2007 (UTC)


 * This is why the demographic was separated out from genre. The demographic is not a genre, and that's why we separated it out. It's meant only to indicate what the target audience was when it was published, not to indicate who all the readership was or is. Target demographic and actual readership have always and will always be different to some degree. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 18:21, 17 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Note added later by TP. Actually, I just noticed something about the original wording. I'm talking about the sentence that said "Other subgenres of shōjo/redisu manga have also developed, e.g., fashion (oshare) manga..." I really should have written it slightly differently -- to say something like "Other subgenres of manga have also developed from shōjo/redisu manga, like fashion (oshare) manga..." Not that I'm going to change the wording in the article, because I think it's pretty clear (or I hope it is) that the focus throughout this section is on how shōjo manga developed into a variety of subgenres, some now fairly distant from the cliches of flowers and starry eyes of 1980's shōjo manga. Thus, it's striking that both Rozen Maiden and Dolls fit into the same general subgenre -- not that I think it's really worthwhile defining that subgenre according to a rigid set of criteria. In the future, we can address genres and subgenres in a different subsection. Timothy Perper 17:13, 15 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Is a demographic defined solely and only by the intentions and narrowly defined marketing purposes of the editors or is it defined by who actually buys the magazine or by who actually reads it including pass-along readers? I'm going to guess -- demographic categorization depends on the creators, editors, and the rest of the production staff.  To place consideration on market behavior would not work simply because the consumer market does not conform to demographic "templates".  People buy what they buy - as demonstrated by cross-over readership.


 * I am simply not convinced that the genre labels are very useful except as general pointers. I can agree on that yet take on the view that genre labels are simply there.  Here's somewhat of a "tentative" list over at anime.  As a casual viewer/reader, I tend not to pay much attention to them anyways.  In any case, genre criteria should be loose, rather than rigid. KyuuA4 17:29, 15 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Demographics defined by creators, editors, and production staff: yes, I think these folks do visualize who the readers are likely to be, and at least to some extent shape the manga or anime to fit what they know about such readers. The problem is that I don't know any solidly documented, researched examples of how this works or how well it works when it's done. By "solidly," I mean good work by serious journalists, crtitics, or even researchers, not impressions of how it works written by fans or blogsters. There's some common sense to it, but that won't get us very far outside of obvious stuff that Baki the Grappler is unlikely to have been designed to appeal to 14 year-old girls. By that I'm not asking if it appeals to 14-yo girls, but if it was designed to appeal to them -- and I think it's fairly obvious that it wasn't. By the same token, it might seem to be commonsense that complex melodramas about Loli-Goth girls weren't designed for 22-yo young men, but -- contrary to what we've been hearing about it, that means that Rozen Maiden isn't seinen at all but some kind of shōjo/redisu. In any event, I completely agree that these genres should be defined loosely! Timothy Perper 21:52, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Man, it's crazy how you make a well-intentioned, researched change to a article and it turns into a scream-fest. In any case, when making the original change, my criteria was that Rozen Maiden had been serialized in Birz, which--at least according to  Wikipedia--is a seinen magazine. I believe I had read from other sources that this was the case as well (such as in popular publications or mailing lists) though, sadly, it was too long ago for me to remember where it was. DOLL, on the other hand, is listed as Feel Young, which, likewise, is listed in Wikipedia as josei. Of course, it is possible that all of this information, coming from wikipedia, is erroneous, but I find that unlikely, especially since Feel Young is listed as also having published Moyoco Anno (famous for Happy Mania, another josei manga) and Erica Sakurazawa (whose fame in the josei publishing world hardly needs to be mentioned for anyone interested in the subject.) Of course, this having also been gleaned from Wikipedia and only verified by my own knowledge, it is also possible that this is not the case either. But it is now becoming increasingly less likely, because that would be quite an monster piece of fabrication. (Maybe the Japanese are having a big joke on us.)


 * Sadly, there is less information on Birz, both via Wiki and Google. Apparently, Rozen Maiden is the only series of note in the US that it has published. I could point out several items that make Rozen Maiden apparently seem more like a seinen series. For example, the protagonist is male. One could point out the fetishist nature of the dolls. (though the Dolls in Mihara's piece also have fetishist elements.) However, I consider using the content of a manga series to sort it into a male/female target audience classification extremely un-scholarly. The fact is that a manga is not sorted by it's content into its' target audience, it is sorted by, as Nihonjoe has pointed out, who the target demographic is. Although I have not been to Japan, I do know something of the publishing industry, having taken some classes in media and journalism. It is definitely true that magazines, even in America, advertise to advertisers based on who they are selling their magazine to. Since there has already been a lengthy tirade btwn Nihonjoe and Mr. Perper on this subject, I shall leave it at this: things can only be reduced, factually, so far. The fact is that as annoying as it is from a scholarly perspective to rely on people like Nihonjoe saying "that's how it is," eventually, we have nothing more than an observer's word for it that, say, an object is green. And the fact remains that any "scholarly" book on manga is relying on precisely that when you cite it. Nonetheless, a book has recently come out cataloging manga that has come out in the US. Maybe I can take a gander and see if I can find an "official" word on this phenomenon for you.


 * Finally, even if Wiki is incorrect and Rozen Maiden is a josei series and DOLL is not (or is one of less note), and even if, as Timothy Perper has said, target demographics are bleeding--even from the perspective of publishers--there is currently more available evidence to support the fact that DOLL is josei as opposed to Rozen Maiden, and DOLL has the advantage of incorporating most of the same elements, making it an excellent replacement in the article. Even if the two series similarities are noted (i.e., dolls, gothic-loli fashion), there are still significant differences between them in subject matter and tone, which, if anyone is interested in hearing about, I can get back to them on after I've had some freaking breakfast.--Sailor Titan (talk) 17:59, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

Fixed Reference
Somehow -- maybe some random act of vandalism, of which there have been more than a few -- a reference got lost. It kept on producing a citation error message. I fixed it. Grrr. Timothy Perper 22:56, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

New edits by Sesshomaru
Thanks for your careful editing of various details. Such corrections are always useful. I added a reference to Kern where it had been omitted, and removed the citation needed tag. But one change I changed back. Sesshomaru had taken the sentence "Tezuka never explained why Astro Boy had such a highly developed social conscience..." and had replaced "Astro Boy" with "the character," which is certainly well-intended but makes the sentence vague: What character does this refer to? Notice that we could make it read "Tezuka never explained why he had such a highly developed social conscience..." where "he" is meant to refer to Astro Boy, but given the sentence structure, it might also mean Tezuka! So I put back Astro Boy's name and now there is no doubt of what the sentence means. Timothy Perper (talk) 14:59, 17 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Oh, and BTW -- it will help if you post comments/explanations for your edits here on the discussion page. It avoids miscommunication of all sorts. Timothy Perper (talk) 15:08, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I thought "Astro Boy" was being overused, I changed it to "the character" for that reason. Whatever seems best I suppose. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 18:37, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I now have a tiny concern: can't quite figure out how to wiki-link "Japanese" once each section in the page; is it Japanese, Japanese or Japanese ? Hope I made myself clear. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 23:38, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
 * once each section? Japanese should only be wikilinked once—in the first instance—and that depends on the context of the sentence. Anything more would be considered overlinking. You may be able to get away if the context is different from the previous instances. And finally I would suggest Japanese literature as the most appropriate link in the first instance. --Farix (Talk) 23:49, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Strange, I've been told numerous times that it is perfectly acceptable to wiki-link the same word once each section. Farix, which "first instance" are you referring to? Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 23:56, 17 November 2007 (UTC)


 * For longer articles, it's acceptable to wikilink something farther down which was wikilinked a ways above. If the sections are very short, then there would be no reason to wikilink once per section, but if they were longer (perhaps needing to scroll a bit to see the whole thing unless you have a really high resolution monitor), then I could see wikilinking multiple times in one article. The whole point of that guideline is to make sure articles aren't over-wikilinked. As long as you keep it reasonable, it's fine to link more than one time. I generally only wikilink multiple times if there is a wide separation between the two wikilinks. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 20:51, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

Talkpage banner
It seems that we've had a number of editors add the Talkheader banner to the top of the talk page. Not only does this banner only add to the cutter at the top of the talk page, it should only be added when it is really needed. That is why the banner is not automatically added by MediaWiki. Since we haven't had any significant problems with talk page behavior, the banner isn't needed and, per the banner's instructions, should not be added to this talk page. --Farix (Talk) 19:26, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

Good Article?
Someone nominated the Manga entry as a Good Article. Since I contributed extensively to certain parts of the article, I want to comment -- not to vote, since I can't -- but to make some observations.

Frankly, I am quite reluctant to call the entry a Good Article as it stands. In fact, it has quite a number of serious problems, ranging from original research to lack of citations, to dealing with material not consistent with the description of what it's supposed to deal with, and length and sprawl.

When Peregrine Fisher and I, plus some other folks, began to revise this article a while ago, we rewrote the introduction and the history sections, adding a good many citations to each. Most of them are to print sources, not blogs or personal opinion pieces on the Web. Well, goodie for us -- but there are long sections of the article without any citations or with only minimal citations. That's not good.

In my own opinion -- that's all it is, an opinion -- the worst section at the moment is #6, International Influence and its subsections. Personally -- and I've said this before -- I think that material should be moved to the OEL or international manga articles, because the description of the manga article explicitly says it's about Japanese manga. I don't have anything against international manga, or whatever you want to call it; I don't think it belongs in this article. Right now, Section 6 is merely a collection of impressions and opinions without any serious documentation at all. Not good.

Other sections -- gekiga, for example -- also have a number of unreferenced assertions and opinions. These sections read as if they were written by enthusiastic fanboys who had impressions about stuff but who didn't know very much about the actual history of manga. They didn't do their homework, substituting OR for real reading and knowledge of what other people have written about the history of manga styles. Thus, gekiga originates partly in radical politics of the 1960s (documented by Fred Schodt in his 1983 book), rather than guesswork about rental libraries. The image associated with the gekiga section -- Marmalade Boy -- is from a fairly typical shōjo manga, rather than from gekiga. Also not good.

The manga article is a work in progress. It can, and slowly, will be improved, But I don't think it's a Good Article by a long shot. Not yet.

Timothy Perper (talk) 01:08, 18 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Here's an example of what I mean. The following is an unedited, unreferenced, and incomplete draft of some material I was putting together about gekiga a while back (I have other things to do than edit Wikipedia...). So don't bother saying that I've left out references -- I know that. Instead, this is the kind of approach I think we need to discusss gekiga.


 * Gekiga literally means "drama pictures" and refers to a form of aesthetic realism in manga (Schodt, 86, ch. 3). Gekiga style drawing is emotionally dark, often starkly realistic, sometimes very violent, and conspicuously lacks the self-consciously stylish flavor of noir drawing (and animation) to focus on the day-in, day-out grim realities of life, often drawn in gritty and unpretty fashions (Schodt, 86, ch. 3). Schodt (1986, ch 3) suggests that gekiga manga arose in the late 1950s and 1960s in response to left-wing and working class political activism. Sampei Shirato's 1959-1962 Chronicles of a Ninja's Military Accomplishments (Ninja Bugeichō) was the story of Kagemaru, the leader of a peasant rebellion in the 1500s, and dealt directly with oppression and class struggle (Schodt, 86, pp. 70-71). Hiroshi Hirata's later gekiga Samurai dealt with uprisings against the Tokugawa shogunate. Koike and Kojima's Lone Wolf and Cub is also gekiga (Schodt 86, ch 3).


 * Gekiga and the social consciousness it embodies remains alive in modern-day manga. Ira Ishida and Sena Aritou's IWGP: Ikebukuro West Gate Park is a gritty story of street thugs, rape, and vengeance set on the social margins of the wealthy Ikebukuro district of Tokyo. Likewise, Kitsune Tennouji's Rape + 2πr is set amidst brutal fights between high school gangs, the title a dark reference to the high school curriculum of "geometry plus rape" in the underbelly of Tokyo's wealth. The best known example to readers in the United States may be Katsuhiro Ōtomo's Akira, an apocalyptic tale of motorcycle gangs, street war, and inexplicable transformations of the children of a future Tokyo.


 * I wanted to use an image from Akira to illustrate the point, in this case about motorcycle gangs in Tokyo. And those two paragraphs are it -- no more. No speculations, just descriptions, sources, and references. If we get enough of this kind of thing, maybe we can make the Manga article into a Good Article, but it's going to take some work.


 * Timothy Perper (talk) 01:33, 18 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Forgot something. For the comparison between noir and gekiga, I had in mind the differences between Lone Wolf and Cub or Rape + 2πr on the gekiga side, and Yu Aida's Gunslinger Girl on the noir side. It's a trickier distinction than it sounds. Timothy Perper (talk) 01:43, 18 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Well, part of the nomination process is to get comments such as this. I suggest putting a link to this discussion on the nomination page. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 20:55, 18 November 2007 (UTC)


 * It's a pretty good article, but not a Good Article. At the minimum it should have a ref for eac paragraph, which this article does not.  It also should have page numbers for the book references that it does have. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 23:53, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

Demographic Labels for Manga
I want to break this out rather that squish it into a bunch of other paragraphs above. Here's more about the problems of using demographic labels.

If a readership changes -- for example, widens out because cross-over readership of one kind or another is increasing -- publishers and editors do NOT say haughtily "That makes no difference. The demographic is X, not X + Y. We, not them, define the demographic." If a readership widens out, publishers and editors are very quick to expand their advertising and their product descriptions on websites and in print. No, I don't have any usable references, but I've seen this process over several decades of experience in various forms of publishing. The point is to sell a product, and not to defend a because-I-say-so style of defining demographics.

A similar reason explains why US manga publishers -- Viz, TokyoPop, DelRey, Dark Horse, and so on -- don't use demographic labels. No one in the US knows what they mean outside of a few otaku and various manga/anime insiders. The result is that in the US manga is displayed, organized, and listed (e.g., in ICv2, Protoculture, or Library Journal) by title and author.

I just checked the J-List, jpqueen, and Mandarake websites to see if they list manga by demographic labels (the kind you would click on to get a longer list). The answer is no. Listings are by title and author and by the hot-selling labels hentai, YAOI, and doujinshi. The website for jpqueen includes shoujo and shounen (nothing else) as labels in a sidebar among others, but their major listing is by author and title. I also searched the three websites using "seinen" as the search term. J-List gave only 1 hit = Flashbang, a hentai manga published by Icarus and Seinen Comics. For jpqueen, I got 10 items, all doujinshi, hentai doujinshi, or YAOI, and all with the word "seinen" in the title. Mandarake gave 5 items, all also with "seinen" in the title. So these websites do title searches, not searches that display a large list of manga all previously catalogued under an overarching and primary demographic label like "seinen." I'm not saying that bookstores in Japan don't shelve manga by demographics (e.g., redisu and seinen) but these websites do not do so, and US practice appears not to use demographic labels either.

In my opinion, that's understandable. If you look up Azumanga Daioh on Wiki, you'll find that the manga demographic is given as seinen. That would shelve Azumanga Daioh next to that other great slice-of-life manga about teenage girls growing up in high school, Fist of the North Star -- which Wiki also lists as shounen and seinen. Maybe the Mandarake bookstores in Tokyo shelve Azumanga Daioh together with Fist of the North Star because both are seinen according to Wikipedia's definitions, but you can't search the Mandarake website using the demographic label "seinen." So, as I said, I'm dubious about the usefulness of the demographic labels assigned to manga on Wikipedia. And I'm also open to people who can come up with references that say these demographics are the industry-standard in manga bookstores in Japan.

Timothy Perper (talk) 17:32, 19 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Websites don't generally use the demographic because it isn't as convenient as just having a title and author search. People get impatient if they have to browse through online stores rather than being able to search for what they want. I suspect the main reason for bookstores in Japan doing it is partially tradition, and partially because it's easier for people to find similar manga by looking in the surrounding volumes shelved next to the one they are looking at. I don't know. All I do know is that this is how manga has been sorted for well over 20 years, and the system doesn't seem to be changing for regular brick-and-mortar stores.


 * Regarding a readership wider than the target demographic, while it may play a very small part in the decisions of publishers (editors don't generally have a say in it), it likely doesn't affect things too much in the long run. When Sailor Moon was first released, it was targeted at a shoujo audience. While I know plenty of non-shoujo who read and enjoyed it, the vast majority of those reading it and buying related merchandise were shoujo. Yes, there will always be those anomalous readers who enjoy manga from another demographic than that into which they fall, but they are almost without exception in the minority when compared to the overall readership.


 * As for website sorting, I don't think that should have anything to do with this discussion as it's largely irrelevant to demographic. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:35, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * After checking on Fist of the North Star, the reaon for it being listed as both is because one series was published in a shounen anthology, and several others were published in seinen anthologies. So your example is not useful for comparison. Fist of the North Star is shounen, while it's sequels (and prequel) are seinen. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:38, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Time for a reference, and to shift this discussion.


 * "Seinen manga is the older equivalent of shōnen manga. Seinen manga is more mature both in visual content and in addressing topics of interest to adult men, including tales of married life, work life, sex comedies, and morally ambiguous war and crime stories. Seinen titles are for young men out of their teens, going into college, and beyond. These titles started appearing in the late 1960s as gekiga manga, or dramatic manga, and continue to focus on stories of action, honor, outsiders, and violence (Gravett, 2004). Common genres include action, mystery, suspense, and historical drama. These stories often revolve around icons of masculinity including samurai, yakuza (Japanese organized crime syndicates), assassins, spies, and snipers. Seinen manga also include many of the humorous and raunchy manga aimed at businessmen, from office comedies to manga focused entirely on pachinko, a kind of upright pinball machine that is the stress reliever of choice for many businessmen. Seinen manga titles include the landmark Golgo 13, Lupin III, Akira, and the epic samurai classic Lone Wolf and Cub. Given the age range at which these titles are aimed, they are more likely to include sexual and violent content on par with an R-rated film." (Brenner, 2007, pp. 33-34; reference below; Gravett 2004 is reference #7 in the main entry; italics original.)


 * Brenner's criteria are firmly and clearly linked to content and style, and not to the putative origin of the manga in certain magazines. Note that she offers explicit criteria -- not impressions about demographics or bookstores -- that allow a reader to answer the question, "Is this title seinen or not?" She lists several other well known examples, including Shirow's Ghost in the Shell and Shin Takahashi's Saikano.


 * Note also that by Brenner's criteria, Fist of the North Star certainly deserves to be called seinen manga, no matter where it was published. Its publication in a shōnen or seinen magazine makes no difference -- it could be dojinshi. The point is that it fits the explicit criteria Brenner describes for seinen. By the same token, neither Rozen Maiden nor Azumanga Daioh meet these criteria.


 * This discussion is not about the seemingly trivial issue of what to call a given manga. It's about how we describe manga when we write about it for Wikipedia and other places. It is also about evidence -- Wiki-verifiability, if you like -- and understanding that certain generalities are in place in the US manga market. Since we're writing for the English-language Wikipedia, those generalities need our respectful attention. We can disregard them -- we can disregard anything we don't like -- but then the results won't make much sense, just as calling Azumanga Daioh seinen makes no sense in content, drawing style, characters, and plot.


 * Nihonjoe, are you letting yourself get caught in a problem of your own making? If you want to call Azumanga Daioh seinen manga, you're free to do so -- you can call it anything you like. But if you're going to claim that your labels are more accurate than Brenner's -- and she is a hotshot in this area; for example, she's on the 2007 Eisner Award Nomination Committee -- then you'll have to display the sources, in print or from reliable websources, to document your position. Otherwise, it's simply opinion -- which I respect, but, as I said before, I can't use when I write something about manga.


 * So the question here is about How we understand and interpret manga. One view, my own, is that we need a good deal of knowledge and reading, not only of manga, but of people who have published extensively about the subject. The other view -- the otaku view -- is that one's opinion doesn't need any special knowledge, and that intuition, guesswork, and personal preferences are more than the equal of work by experts. At the moment, the manga entry is split down the middle between these camps, with some parts depending on heavy citations and references, and other parts depending only on the writer's opinions and feelings. I myself prefer the first view, no matter how much I respect your opinions (which I in fact do). But Wiki and other writing needs sources and citations, not just opinions.


 * Brenner, Robin E. 2007 Understanding Manga and Anime. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited/Greenwood.


 * Timothy Perper (talk) 12:48, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

More from TP. Something is not quite right here. Let me explain.

1. Here's the Wiki entry definition of seinen: "Seinen (青年?) is a subset of manga that is generally targeted at an 18–30 year old male audience, but the audience can be much older with some comics aimed at businessmen well into their 40s" (first sentence).

OK, that's pretty clear, and it corresponds very closely to Brenner's definition. [Note added later by TP: "seinen" can be written with different kanji; see note at bottom.]

2. Here's what the MIT anime website says about Azumanga Daioh

"Azumanga Daioh is a quirky shoujo comedy based on a popular 4-panel comic strip about middle-school life among a group of friends and three of their teachers (two of whom are not particularly good role models)."

http://72.14.205.104/search?q=cache:y2t6LsVd9zgJ:web.mit.edu/anime/www/Showings/Azumanga_Daioh.shtml+Azumanga+Daioh&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=19&gl=us

http://web.mit.edu/anime/www/Showings/Azumanga_Daioh.shtml

(The second link didn't work right all the time, so you may have to use the previous link.)

3. The advfilms website for Azumanga Daioh DVD says that it's rated 13+.

http://www.advfilms.com/buy/anime/comedy/azumanga-daioh/volume-1-entrance-/product.aspx?ProductId=18819&CategoryId=0

(click on Details when you get there.)

4. Hmm? Someone is saying, "No, no, no! The last two are for the ANIME, not the manga!!!" So I looked at the four volumes of the AzuDai manga I have from ADV. On the back covers, they all have ratings = "T 13+". "T" means "teen" but "13+" doesn't mean "18 to 30" year old.

5. So, it looks like by definition Azumanga Daioh isn't seinen, at least according to how Wikipedia defines "seinen." That conclusion means believing that the publisher's age ratings are authoritative, which I'm willing to accept.

The point is NOT that "This belongs on the Azumanga Daioh page, not here!!" It belongs here because the point is that when we write about manga and anime, we need secure references and sources, not guesswork or impressions. That conclusion holds, in my opinion, for the entire manga article, as well as for all the manga-related entries on Wikipedia.

Timothy Perper (talk) 17:01, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The Japanese publishers (which is what the demographic line in the infobox is for) do not "age rate" the manga, but rather target the manga at a specific age group. Outside of blatantly adult manga, there is no real ratings system in Japan for manga. All the demographic is for is to say who the original target market was. Period. It is not stating that no one outside that demographic reads the manga, and no one (other than you) seems to be taking it that way.


 * Forgive me for interjecting a comment here, but what are you talking about? Some ways up, I brought up cross-over readership, suggesting that it's important. Is that what you mean? If it is, then I'm saying the exact opposite of what you seem to be hearing me say. Timothy Perper (talk) 10:35, 21 November 2007 (UTC)


 * It is not stating that the content is not acceptable (or acceptable) for any particular demographic. It is merely a marketing tool, and one which interests many people. That's why it is included in the infobox and mentioned in the intro of most manga articles here. The most common reason for it not being mentioned is due to confusion about which demographic a particular magazine falls into (e.g., Comptiq).


 * As for the MIT anime page, they are just wrong. They are making the same mistake many, many people make by assuming that a manga/anime series which features a set of young girls as the main characters is automatically shoujo, which is completely untrue. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:37, 21 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I'm kinda just jumping in without knowing what you guy's are talking about, but can't we just include all genres with a ref? If Azumanga Daio is classified as Seinen by an author and Shoujo by their publisher, we should include both, backed by an inline citation.  That's more informative than choosing just one, and is more WP:NPOV.  The reader can then decide for themselves.  I'm probably missing something since I haven't been following this page much lately. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 05:21, 21 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The publisher isn't (and hasn't ever) classified it as shoujo (either here or in Japan). It was published in a seinen magazine in Japan, and therefore falls in the seinen demographic (regardless of actual readership). The only ones classifying it as shoujo are less-informed anime clubs and individuals. I'm not saying they are dumb (as they likely aren't dumb, especially those attending MIT), but that they do not have the correct (or all the) information and have therefore made an uninformed conclusion. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 06:54, 21 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Slow down, slow down... The MIT folks aren't wrong -- they're stating an opinion and a judgment that you disagree with. But the real point isn't MIT -- it's the age ratings. The Wiki entry for seinen defines it by age -- see the quote above, or the entry itself. Brenner's book (see above) also defines "seinen" partly by age. The word itself means "adult age; majority" (as in no longer being a minor), and that's from Breen's EJDic. Roughly, it means "young adult." That is age-graded, and corresponds to many aspects of Japanese culture in which age is significant socially and culturally.


 * In US marketing, manga is age-rated. Since I am discussing US marketing, seinen corresponds to "OT" = "older teen" or to "M" = "mature" (meaning over 18). The reason for this system in the US is concern by publishers and public about sexual content. The US publisher Eros Comix used 成年 as part of their logo for their Mangerotica line (the kanji mean seinen). In that context, the term means "sexually explicit." In other contexts, it means other things, but they all refer to reading material suitable to a young adult, not a young teenager. These definitions of "seinen" aren't up for grabs -- they've become quite standard in the US (as Brenner's book shows). These usages simply do not reflect or represent the demographic of the original Japanese publication. Maybe they should, but they don't.


 * This gets me back to Nihonjoe's misunderstanding of what I said above, where I inserted a comment. For US publishers, cross-over readership is very important, because in US marketing, manga are not generally gender-coded. The major exception is the use by Viz -- which is owned by Shueisha and Shogakukan -- of the terms shojo and shonen for some of their manga (and of of course the Viz Shojo Beat magazine -- no macrons in these, BTW). The current issue of ICv2 has some comments about this; cross-over readership is not trivial in the US.


 * In turn that leads back to Azumanga Daioh. By US marketing standards, if AzuDai really is seinen, that means it very likely has sex in it, and explicit sex into the bargain (like Eros Comix paperback book Hot Tails, by Toshiki Yui, which has the seinen kanji on the cover, and is seriously X-rated material). But AzuDai doesn't have any sex in it at all. Instead, it's about relationships among the girls, their lives and friendships, hopes and futures. Yes, it is quite shōjo manga-esque. But seinen it is not, not in US marketing terms. Instead, as the ADV rating for the manga and the DVD put it clearly, AzuDai is "T 13+".


 * So if you want, by all means include the original Japanese demographic, if you have reliable sources for it. But I agree with Peregrine Fisher -- a lot more information is needed by a US audience about such things. Personally, I'd like to see the US publisher's age rating included in the infobox, because that's where the stuff is being sold -- right here in the US. Calling AzuDai seinen suggests that it's porn or soft porn, which is seriously amiss. (The same holds for Rozen Maiden.) In fact, I think the US publisher's age rating would be much more valuable than the Japanese demographic, which I suspect interests only serious otaku but few other people.


 * Timothy Perper (talk) 10:35, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

From TP: Maybe I wasn't clear about something -- I included the MIT quote to show that knowledgeable people in the US do differ in their judgments about what a manga "is" -- shōjo, shōnen, seinen, and so on. Thus, for Nihonjoe, AzuDai "is" seinen because it was published originally in a Japanese seinen magazine; for the MIT folks, it "is" shoujo because of its content and focus on relationships among the girls. Next, Brenner's (2007) criteria for shōjo include "three or more" of the following: "teen girls dealing with teen concerns" (yes for AzuDai); "bishōnen young men" (no for AzuDai); "focus on relationships" (yes); heroine traits that include kindness (yes), determination (yes), empathy (yes) and a "girl-next-door" beauty (yes); and elaborate and detailed outfits (no). (Brenner, 2007, op cit., page 34.) So a case can be made for saying that AzuDai is shōjo manga, but -- as I have been insisting -- only when we explicitly describe the criteria we're using and give a source for the criteria. I hope that's clearer. Timothy Perper (talk) 13:23, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

A request concerning netiquette, added later. If you want to join in, that's great -- but may I ask if commentators would not insert comments into the text but include them at the end as a single, coherent section? The effect of inserting comments -- and I'm sometimes guilty of it too -- is to interupt the flow of discussion, and when they reach several indents deep, it becomes impossible to follow. Thanks. Timothy Perper (talk) 21:31, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Also added later. 青年 = "seinen" is one way to write the word; Breen gives "youth, young man" for these kanji. Another is 成年 = "seinen", for which Breen gives "adult, majority," and which Eros Comix uses in their logo. The meanings overlap and both refer to young adult men, defined as 18-30 years old. Given that there are two kanji for the word, it's not suprising that most US readers and publishers don't bother making subtle distinctions among the words, and clump them all together to give the definition that Brenner discusses. Timothy Perper (talk) 09:31, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * They are not two kanji for the word, but rather two different words. 成年 is used in the manga industry only to designate pornographic manga. 青年 is used only to designate the manga targeting the late teens, twenties, and early thirties male demographic. They are two completely different words with completely different meanings which happen to be pronounced the same. It's like "read" (to read or peruse written or printed matter) and "reed" (the straight stalk of any of various tall grasses, esp. of the genera Phragmites and Arundo, growing in marshy places). They are pronounced the same, but not written the same. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 18:31, 25 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes, they're different. That was my point. But both refer to manga aimed at young men, rather than one being something done with books (read) and the other referring to plants or musical instruments (reed). As far as I can tell, no distinction is made for manga between the two meanings of "seinen" in US usage (e.g. Brenner's book). More below. Timothy Perper (talk) 21:24, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

Summing it up
I'm hoping this will help clear up some confusion.

1. The "demographic" line in the infobox is for inclusion of the demographic target of the publisher in Japan. That is why we keep bringing up which magazine the manga was originally published in as that indicates exactly which demographic applies (except in a very small number of cases where the target demographic is mixed, such as with the magazine Comptiq--though that might be better listed as "otaku" for the target demographic).

2. Cross-over readership is irrelevant to the contents of the demographic field of the infobox.

3. Yes, cross-over readership is likely important in the States, but it (again) is irrelevant to the contents of the demographic field in the inforbox.

4. The opinions of the the MIT anime club, you, me, or anyone else are irrelevant in regard to the demographic field of the infobox.

Hopefully, that is concise and clear enough to finish this discussion as further discussion will not change what the demographic field is (and has been) being used for since it was introduced. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 18:43, 25 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes it clarifies some things, but still doesn't address some crucial questions. The meaning of "demographic" in the infobox is not mandated by law, and it can change. Maybe it should; maybe it shouldn't, but either way it isn't set in stone. Personally -- it's nothing more than a personal preference -- I would like to see more information included in the infoboxes that describe manga, in particular, the US publisher's age ratings. The reason is that we are writing for a general US audience, not for a much smaller audience of highly educated Japanophiles (as if Wikipedia were a specialist listserve).


 * A somewhat more basic point is that meanings change when, in recent years, manga and anime have both become more familiar and popular in the US. It might be nice if US usage and meanings exactly represented Japanese usage and meanings, but that hasn't happened -- there has been divergence and differentiation. Examples include the definition of seinen and debates about whether OEL manga is "real" manga or not. Brenner's criteria for shōjo and for seinen manga reflect these changes.


 * Nihonjoe, let me ask you -- do you really think that we should ignore those changes when we write about manga for Wikipedia or elsewhere? Or is it more helpful to our readers to say that word X means one thing (or set of things) in Japan, but in the US has come to mean something else? Which is more helpful -- to have the infobox give "Original Japanese demographic" plus "US Publisher Age Rating" or to give only one (the first) and not mention the second? (BTW, the history section of the Manga article includes a number of references that discuss these kinds of transnational shift in cultural and aesthetic meaning.)


 * These shifts are one reason I've been stressing AzuDai. Originally, it was published in Japan in a seinen magazine, but by the time it came here, the Brenner criteria (and the MIT people) see it not as seinen at all, but as shōjo -- or as the MIT website put it, "quirky shoujo." This isn't a case where THEY are wrong, and WE are right (whoever They and We might be), but of understanding transnational shifts in meaning. The existence of those shifts isn't up for grabs -- they have been occurring for some time and won't stop. The question is whether or not we have to pay any attention to these changes.


 * Thus -- and more generally -- who are we serving when we write for Wikipedia? My own answer is that we're writing for a general English-speaking/reading audience, not an audience of specialist Japanophiles, but for a much wider variety of people. They need, and, in my opinion, deserve, more information than a specialist audience might find necessary. And I believe that some of that information includes recognizing that demographic labels are not the same here in the US and in Japan (AzuDai and Rozen Maiden again both being examples). So let me ask you, Nihonjoe -- do you disagree?

Timothy Perper (talk) 21:24, 25 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't know about Nihonjoe, but I do disagree, at least in some sense. I think you are doing our English-speaking readers a disservice, Mr. Perper, by trying to flummox them, making words like "shoujo" and "shounen" more relativist than they need to be. Certainly, one could argue that a series like Azumanga Daioh was originally seinen in Japan and now can be seen as "shoujo" in the U.S., but frankly, that over complicates that matter, something which I feel is the exact opposite of your goal. After all, you yourself have noted that this is an article about Japanese manga--as such, shouldn't it first and foremost be about Japanese demographic classifications, not American ones?
 * Moreover, folks at MIT and elsewhere are not referring to what Azumanga Daioh is in the U.S. only--they are referring to what it also is in Japan. So, in this case, they are just wrong. Indeed, some of the most awful mistakes concerning manga I have found in, believe it or not, The New York Times. This Article spells "shoujo" as "shojo," among other things. (and they aren't doing it on purpose, like Viz.) Just because a source is regarded as scholarly does not mean that it is necessarily right, as Wikipedia itself has pointed out by those who compare it with Brittanica and find similar numbers of mistakes. And in the case of Manga, a topic that is currently defined popularly more than it is by scholars, I think this is even more so true.
 * Of course, that begs the question, "would it then be popularity which defines a manga's sorting into demographic, as Mr. Perper has originally suggested?"--but because there is already a easily verifiable, industry-standard way of doing so in Japan (the magazine from which the series came/the audience for which the publisher intended it) it seems silly to argue about the numbers of any group of people reading it. Besides, classifying manga in this way is highly ungangly anyhow; do we count international fans, or only those in Japan? What if the demographic changes, and a show that was read by young girls is now read by their grown-up equivalents? Does the demographic change then? It remains simpler, in my opinion, to simply continue categorizing the series under the demographic which the advertisers/publishers originally intended it to have, regardless of what happens afterwards. (of course, the demographic can switch between incarnations, as in the case of Wedding Peach, whose television series was aimed at young girls--but when it was realized the show was more popular with older men who liked the seiyuu playing the three main characters, an OAV was made aimed at them, switching the series to seinen...Fist of the North Star was a previously mentioned example, and Cutey Honey vs. Cutey Honey Flash also comes to mind.)
 * Mr. Perper, you have made a lot of good contributions to this article. But I find it a little alarming how much you have monopolized the talk page and it makes me wonder how much you have likewise monopolized the article. It might be worth sitting back from the article for a month or two and seeing what other people have to contribute. There might be some excellent fresh perspectives, different from either yours or mine, on the article.--Sailor Titan (talk) 00:33, 26 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your comments, Sailor Titan. I agree that Wikipedia needs to reflect Japanese usage, but feel that it must also reflect US usage. Differences in opinion about AzuDai are a case in point. They aren't ignorance vs. truth; they reflect different cultural interests. In the US, publishers are quite concerned with sexual content, and US age ratings reflect that concern. I don't think we should ignore that. Yes, the Japanese demographic should be retained, but we need more than that.


 * Yes, other people have contributions to make to this article -- for an example, see the comment immediately below this thread. By all means, make changes in the article! I'm certaintly not going to object. But there hasn't been much activity in that direction, and that was true before I made some changes back in September. No one monopolizes anything on Wiki because you and everyone else are free to post comments, edit the article, and just plain not read what I say. So by all means make changes in the article!


 * TokyoPop also spells "shōjo" without the macron as "shojo." See http://www.tokyopop.com/ShojoYourMojo/tp_article/891637.html as an example. Writers of English often leave off accents and diacritics in foreign languages.


 * Timothy Perper (talk) 04:16, 26 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The main audience for the English Wikipedia is the English-speaking world, not just the States. This includes Canada, the UK, Ireland, Australia, South Africa, parts of Southeast Asia, various islands in the South Pacific, and so on.


 * As for including more information in the infobox, feel free to propose that at the appropriate WikiProject. However, that's not what this discussion was about.


 * Please also keep in mind that we are talking only about the manga demographic. An anime based on a particular manga doesn't always follow suit, and is almost always much harder to nail down when it comes to target demographic as it is almost always significantly broadened. But that's for another discussion. This one is only about the manga target demographic in Japan. ··· 日本穣 ? · Talk to Nihonjoe 07:50, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes, we're discussing manga demographics, not anime. It's a very good point to say that the English-language Wikipedia has a wide readership. Now this is something I don't really know -- how many other nations have extensive sales of English-translations of manga NOT first published by US-based publishers (TokyoPop, Viz, Dark Horse, and so on)? Most of the (non-US) translated-into-English manga I see are on French, British, or Canadian websites, and those are the US editions. And those editions do give US-based age-ratings. I've also noticed, but unsystematically, that manga translated into French (Asuka, Pika Editions) do not have any age-ratings (and don't give the original Japanese demographic either).

It occurred to me that a useful article for Wikipedia might deal with these issues -- original demographics, age-ratings, and so on. I don't know enough to write it, but maybe you do, Nihonjoe? I tend to look on the bright side: our discussion here has raised some significant issues. I'm sorry that Sailor Titan thinks I'm flummoxing people -- that is NOT my intention! Maybe a Wiki article on this issue would help de-flummox things.

I also agree that (unless you disagree) that this discussion has reached if not an end, then a pause. One take-home for me is that we need to clearly distinguish Japanese and American demographics and definitions of target audiences and age-suitability. These differences are, I think, part of various transnational shifts in cultural backdrop and language that are awakened when manga is translated, adopted, and adapted outside of Japan. My sense is that US demographics (and their closely related age-ratings) center on concerns for sexual explicitness. I do know that there's considerable concern among librarians -- manga has become very popular in US public libraries -- about shelving and limiting patron access to prevent legal minors from getting hold of sexually explicit M 18+ manga.

Thanks for discussing all this with me, Nihonjoe!

Timothy Perper (talk) 13:56, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

New section on Manga Publications
Way to go, KyuuA4! The article is tighter and better organized with your changes. Will you perhaps -- I hope -- be able to update some of the content as well? If I can help, please let me know. Timothy Perper (talk) 21:31, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Considering consolidating International influence into the publications section. Doing so reduces the "Japan only" POV. Somehow, this section needs to describe the entire system as a whole. KyuuA4 (talk) 22:31, 29 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Sounds like a good idea. The opening sentence -- the one that defines the article as dealing only with Japanese manga -- can be changed easily enough. Then, as you suggest, you can unify the publications section. I especially like the idea of dealing with manga as a system of international exchanges of culture, art, goods, and trade. We the US see mostly the transpacific part of this system, but manga is very popular throughout Southeast Asia. Timothy Perper 13:55, 30 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Hmmm... I see I wasn't too clear just now. I'm not recommending for or against changing the topic of the article -- the opening sentence. I'm saying instead that we could or might widen the scope a bit if we decide to. Or not, if we decide not to. I guess I'd like to hear more from KyuuA4 what he thinks about it. Timothy Perper 00:29, 1 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Just an attempt to tone down the Japan-only POV by looking at manga as a global product. Once that's done, then futher examination of manga as a Japanese product.  Basically, focus on how manga is made and distributed -- then worry about "who" makes it.  Reading a response here, it seems that attitudes towards OEL managed to tone down a bit. KyuuA4 07:27, 2 December 2007 (UTC)