Gender and Gender relation in manga and anime

Gender and Gender relation in manga and anime.

expected to spend most of their waking hours at work, or on business-related to entertainment outings. He feels he must shoulder the entire burden of financially supporting the household, and for this, he needs to sacrifice himself to his job. Children sometimes grow up without knowing their fathers, and sometimes the mother will admit she prefers not having her husband around, because he gets in the way. A recent trend has more and more women putting off marriage or even not marrying at all.

Of course, not all is this bad! There are brilliant and capable women in various professions, from government to science; and there are men who are wonderful fathers, loved by their children and wives. One person has reported that there is very little open discrimination left in many professional fields.

So much for the background on Japanese gender relations. Yes, much of it sounds fairly dismal. But how are gender relations depicted in the manga and anime?

Historical and Modern Attitudes.

Historically, like almost every culture on the planet, Japan has tended toward idealizing male dominance and female submissiveness. However, women have not been invisible, especially in Japan's early years. Some of Japan's greatest literary figures were women, such as the novelist Lady Murasaki, who lived about a thousand years ago. Some of Japan's earliest rulers were empresses. However, when Japan became war-oriented and feudal, women quickly became second-class citizens. Most women were treated as they have been treated throughout history: as merchandise, or servants, and as heir-producing machines. This is not to say men were free from societal chains; men in Japan are expected to conform to societal expectations, too, and males were expected to devote themselves to their tasks with great diligence and hard work.

Unlike in the West, however, some women, not just men, were trained as samurai and ninja, and they fought with the long, halberd-like naginata. Supposedly, for a woman to touch a sword was a dishonor to the sword; conversely, it was (up until recently) considered disgraceful for a man to use a naginata, a "woman's weapon." Women samurai were not given the "honorable" and less pleasant way of committing suicide by cutting open the abdomen; they were given, instead, the "easy" way out --- cutting their own throats.

Still, that some women were trained for combat at all is an insight into the Japanese attitude toward women. Women, though second-class, are important assets to a family. Like any culture, most men and women come to care for each other, and a man heard deprecating women at the pub might be willing to risk his life for his wife. And that is one of the characteristic quirks of Japanese culture.

The macho ideal of a strong, cool male fits the Japanese ideal very closely. At home, some Japanese men tend to order their wives about. They have a tendency to speak gruffly, and use the wife's first name. "Kyoko, the tea!" or "Mayuko, please get me more coffee." Wives, meanwhile, are generally expected to refer to their husbands with the polite form of "you," or "anata," and they are expected to use more polite phrases and to obey their husbands. An interesting exception to this, however, are many families with children. Some parents take to calling each other as "Mama" or "Papa" (or "okaasan" and "otousan"); hence, not only do the children refer to their mother as "mama" or "okaasan," but so does the father (and vice versa). "Let's ask mama when she gets home," the husband might say. "Papa, is this your wallet?" the wife might say. This is extended further once the parents become grandparents, and they start calling each other "grandfather" or "grandmother," just as the newest generation does.

At work, though, it is reported that women are the last to be hired and the first to be fired. Many college-educated women simply aren't hired, even if they're qualified. There is still an expectation that a married woman will quit her job to stay at home. Sexual harassment, though technically illegal, is apparently common at the workplace, and both men and women are expected to regard it as normal.

In society in general, naked women are plastered here and there --- from subways to the TV set (yes, even prime time TV). As one American family in Japan put it, "At first the kids would stare at the TV set [because of the prevalence of female nudity], but after a while, they got used to it." Pornographic bookstores are pretty common, and business men are frequently seen reading pornographic books openly, in public. Much of the recent pornography, reports a friend, is based on sadistic themes.

As I've said of men before, often they are expected to spend most of their waking hours at work, or on business-related entertainment outings. He feels he must shoulder the entire burden of financially supporting the household, and for this, he needs to sacrifice himself to his job. Children sometimes grow up without knowing their fathers, and sometimes the mother will admit she prefers not having her husband around, because he gets in the way. A recent trend has more and more women putting off marriage or even not marrying at all.

Of course, not all is this bad! There are brilliant and capable women in various professions, from government to science; and there are men who are wonderful fathers, loved by their children and wives. One person has reported that there is very little open discrimination left in many professional fields.

So much for the background on Japanese gender relations. Yes, much of it sounds fairly dismal. But how are gender relations depicted in the manga and anime?