6. What is the ‘shōjo’ and how does it often function in anime?
According to Yukari (2012), Shōjo, which literally translates into “young woman” in English, falls under a category of Manga and Anime films that are primarily targeted towards a young female audience, with Tokyopop and VizMedia claiming that the demographic for shōjo manga ranged from girls aged 12 to 17 years old (Takeuchi, K., 2010). Shōjo is often characterized presently by passive personal narratives, the pursuit of romantic relationships and the internalized musings of and about human relationships.
However, Shōjo goes further than this oversimplified classification. Truly beginning in the 1960s, a group of female shōjo manga authors led the “radical diversification” (Aoyama et al., 2010) of the genre through a series of subgenres within manga which included family stories, school stories, science fiction, fantasy, and comedy as a way of studying the many layers of the human psyche. By saturating the works of shōjo manga with human psychology, these authors established patterns of the shōjo genre that would continue to be utilized onward (Yukari & Thorn, 2012).
Within anime, shōjo stories have been quoted to bring readers “a sense of liberation from social norms and restrictions” through the telling of stories which focused upon the personal and interpersonal identity (Takeuchi, K., 2010). Shōjo was able to both address and transcend the conventional and traditional views and ideas of modern society as far as gender identity, representation, sexuality and sense of personal narrative, belonging and empowerment were regarded (2010).
Furthermore, shōjo is a demonstrative genre which explores themes of philosophy, while questions about identity are prevelant within shōjo, so too are core stories about human nature and existence, the struggles of connectivity among the wider communities and how often within shōjo stories which explore the magical girl trope, address the means of saving the world through understanding and compassion (Coates, J., 2018).
References
Aoyama, T., Dollase, H., & Kan, S. (2010). Shōjo manga: Past, present, and future. University of Hawai’i Press.
Coates, J. (2018). Mediating memory: Shōjo and war memory in classical narrative Japanese cinema. The Hakubi Project, Kyoto University.
Takeuchi, K. (2010). The genealogy of Japanese “shōjo manga” studies. University of Hawai’i Press.
Yukari, F., & Thorn, M. (2012). Takahashi Macoto: The origin of shōjo manga style. Mechademia, 7, 24-55. Retrieved October 11, 2020
Pop Genres 2020 