Well, I looked and it is listed as josei at MangaUpdates, so I guess it is josei. It certainly does fit the bill with the mature themes of the story... perhaps we should move the Nana discussion thread over here, then. :s
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Well, I looked and it is listed as josei at MangaUpdates, so I guess it is josei. It certainly does fit the bill with the mature themes of the story... perhaps we should move the Nana discussion thread over here, then. :s
Maybe... I was never a fan of moving threads too much, especially if it has a lot of traffic, but it's up to you mods.
It was already here xD
*googles*
NANA is published in Cookie, that's a shoujo magazine. Besides it has Furigana. They list it as the best sold shoujo magazine in 2003 in Japan as well, there it also got the Shogakukan Manga Award in the categorie shoujo (well, they don't have a Josei categorie but Seinen) :sweat
*close google*
But the content is mature, that's true. I have the same problem with Yoshihara Yuki's manga. All about older woman, but released in a shoujo magazine and also marked as shoujo everywhere. But personally I would categorize them as Josei, same with NANA.
Then I guess it's partly a person opinion. I mean, if you were a parent, would you let your 12 year old read Nana? Probably not. But maybe your 16 year old.
Publishers will label things whatever they feel. Whether its what they can get away with or what they think will help it sell the best. Maybe they think Nana will sell better labeled as Shoujo than Josei?
Yeah, that's why we also have to differ between Shoujo and mature Shoujo. Just because something is a Girls Manga does not mean, that it's aimed to all ages, e.g. Eden no Hana and Confidential Confessions, which are clearly mature Shoujo covering serious topics.Quote:
Originally Posted by SilvaShado
On the other hand, you can't label them Josei just because the topic is serious. There're also light-hearted Josei outside. The age of the protagonist is a good indicator, but not always.
so basically how does one differentiate shoujo and josei? From where they are published? :o
Hi Azurel,
You can try reading this threads : What is Shoujo? and What is Josei?
To get a better idea, you can also try reading a Josei manga e.g. Nana, recommended here and a shoujo series e.g. Parfait Tic, to compare. Even for me, I took a while to be able to tell the difference.
Josei mangas are usually published in Japan, and we have licenced english ones by VizMedia, Tokyopop etc.
By the way, have you read any shoujo series before? if you need some recommendations, let us know. ;)
Well, actually, I already do know Josei are for older female audience and has a rather mature content while Shoujo are for female audience, usually younger, about young love etc. But sometimes, it's hard to differentiate mangas which are on the boundaries of both. I've read plenty of short shoujo mangas which I believed some were actually josei when I think about it. So where exactly do you draw the line?
Hi Azurel!
Whether it is josei or shoujo can be determined by :
- Content (The substance and the issues involved. E.g. female independence, working life issues- conflicts with collegues, relationship issues which goes beyond the normal pairing and breaking up, choices make in life - relocation, divorce, affairs etc. Sometimes, the younger audience may not fully grasp what the story is saying. Hence, a josei manga sometimes is quite thought-provoking.)
- Characters Involved (They are mainly in their 20s, single working girls etc.)
- Drama (Sometimes, it has realistic settings. e.g. low class working girl, low salary, and josei does not mean explicit love scenes, they are able to convey the story well, without going into that)
Btw, u made me curious, which short shoujo series are you reading that you thought are josei? Cos maybe you are right? We can also add them in the List too. :)
Those are good guidelines. Good distinctions between Josei and Shoujo.
If there's still titles that blur the line for you, could go either way, you have to decide who the manga is for. If its to recommend to someone younger, you might want to call it Josei, just to be on the safe side. If its for someone older, I think it'd be tougher because some of the stuff I've read that's labeled for older audiences hasn't been very mature. So that's a call that could be made based more on content.
Most of what I read or watch fit more into shoujo, shounen and light BL. The anime I watched which I felt josei is xxxHolic, where Yoko's clients are josei (including Yoko herself) and they hope Yoko can help to grant their wishes or solve their problems. It's classified as seinen here, but there is no male-oriented violence in this anime that is commom in seinen.
It is hard to classify anime/manga into shoujo, shounen, etc. Sometimes BL wonders into seinen in some websites.
Moved here, since sounds like josei discussion ^^ ~Nami
hmmm, well I've never tried xxxholic. haha. Maybe I'll give it a shot then. thanks.
yah im pretty sure xxxholic should be considered josei and not seinnen... the readership for that series is predominantly female anyway... plus why would they have all those "male bonding moments" in a seinnen manga?
not to say I (yeah, i'm a guy) don't like xxxholic or think it's too girly or watever, but i do like both josei and seinnen mangas and i think it should be considered josei.
But yah, as previously mentioned, Honey and Clover is possibly my favourite animation (I've got some shonen mangas i like more lol) of all time, and I'm pretty sure it's considered Josei.
That is actually not correct. I thought so too at first, but the Japanese are a little weird with this.Quote:
Originally Posted by Nami
Josei, Shoujo, Shounen and Seinen are demographic genres. They aren't descriptive genres like Comedy, Romance, Fantasy or Drama and as such not content-related. Whether a manga is classified as Josei or Shoujo is decided by the magazine it gets published in. XxxHolic is simply a Seinen because it is published in a Seinen magazine. That's all.
There was a little fuss a while ago about a very bloody and violant Shounen (which was clearly adult material) and people tried - because of the content - to classify it as Seinen. In fact, it was published in a Shounen magazine and as such classified by the Japanese. If they want to change the demographic genre, they simply change magazines, like they did with Bastard!! - from Shounen to Seinen.
But besides that, there are a few descriptive subgenres. So is Magical Girlfriend (Mahou Kanojo) a typical Shounen/Seinen subgenre that gets easily confused with Shoujo/Josei since the whole story seems to be "girlie" at first sight (e.g. Chobits, Ah! My Goddess, 3x3 Eyes, Elfen Lied, ...). Also there are a lot of Seinen fitting more to the female audience (e.g. Bitter Virgin, which deals with a pretty serious - female - topic, Blood Alone and Emma).
We're usually right about the content, simple because a Seinen is usually violant action, a Shounen is usually a hero-adventure, a Shoujo is usually first love romance and a Josei is usually about the daily troubles of an older woman. So the discussion only gets problematic when a manga does not fit into these stereotypes. But that's exactly what it is: stereotypes - it is not a true indicator for the genre.