Contributing writer for The Artifice.
Junior Contributor I
Femininity and Empowerment Across Manga DemographicsShounen manga and shoujo manga have both been perceived as opposite ends of the spectrum, with shounen being seen as 'for boys' and shoujo being seen as 'for girls'. Analyse how both demographics explore femininity and female empowerment, and how the stereotypes of both demographics can affect the way women are written or interpreted by the audience. How are women often portrayed in shounen manga? How does this compare with shoujo? Where are the similarities, and to what extent are these similarities cultural? Is it fair to expect a shounen manga to emphasize female characters when the target audience is supposedly largely male? And are our stereotyped perceptions on these demographics even true anymore? Manga like Naruto, FMA, Sailor Moon and Akatsuki no Yona touch on these questions and may be good considerations |
Love in Masashi Kishimoto’s Naruto | |
I love the character dynamics of Eyeshield 21, but thought that their development was sometimes a little shallow. This is an interesting perspective that has me reconsidering 😁 | Eyeshield 21: The Treatment of Opposing Teams |
I really like the part of this article that questioned what it meant to stay true to an original work when adapting it. I don’t mind changes to the plot, as long as I feel the writers understood the story and their changes were informed by that understanding. But yeah, adapting a piece of work to a different medium must be super frustrating, especially knowing how fans tend to react 😑 | Interpreting Live-Action Adaptations of Anime |
I really like this article’s emphasis on parental/familial love in Naruto, which I’d argue was its strongest feature. Romantic love in Naruto is often too one-sided with sexist undertones in my opinion, but I still appreciate a positive outlook on something that’s often derided by the manga’s critics.