Post by DarkfireTaimatsu on Mar 6, 2006 23:12:45 GMT -5
This was a research paper I wrote in 11th grade on anime. I consider it to be one of the best things I've ever written, and consequently turned it in as my graduation project. Oh, and I got an A+ on it. I think the final grade was (at least) 100%.
Sean Seiden
English Paper
14/5/04
Anime and manga are not just ‘cartoons’ and ‘comics’. They are an art form, not unlike the works of da Vinci and Michelangelo. They are fantastic literature, conveyed through equally fantastic drawings. And they are fast becoming the most popular things to hit American shores. Immensely sought after in the U.S., anime and manga may be the pinnacle of cool—and perhaps the shining salvation of Japan’s declining economy. Despite the paltry pay of being a manga-ka (anime or manga artist), it is a dream job shared by millions, and the finished products are extremely valuable sales items—not to mention an artistic joy to behold.
Anime and manga have a long history, which is surprising to most people. Many think that anime and manga are a relatively new idea, but in fact, according to an article titled “Anime Nation,” they can trace their roots back to three one-reel cartoons, made in Japan in 1917. However, despite its growing popularity in its home country, Americans don’t get their first taste of anime until the late ‘50s with the release of the television program Astroboy. With its success, the article goes on to say, other anime creations begin to appear on U.S. television, including the fabled Speed Racer. Around this time, the article also says, the stories began to shift their focus from children’s stories to more complex ideas. Then, in 1979, the now-legendary anime artist Hayao Miyazaki releases his first full-length anime film, Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro, which has become one of the anime classics, according to “Anime Nation.” The ‘80s were a boost for manga, with the release of “Barefoot Gen”, the first manga to be translated into English. This is followed by Miyazaki’s Kiki’s Delivery Service, Disney’s first anime video release. Then, in the late ‘90s, says the article, come two items that would blow all previous works away: another Miyazaki film, Princess Mononoke, and the Japanese debut of the amazingly popular Pokémon series. Both become vastly popular in both the States and Japan. It would seem hard to top this, but, as stated in “Anime Nation,” Miyazaki does it again with the 2001 release of Spirited Away, which grossed over $214 million before even being released in the U.S., displacing the previous top-grossing film in Japan (Titanic) by a wide margin. When released in America, “Anime Nation” also said, it becomes the first anime to win an Oscar (along with some 20 other awards world-wide). With such a colourful and successful past, I believe that the future of anime and manga look equally bright.
Thousands, perhaps even tens of thousands, of people aspire to be manga-ka. In both America and Japan, it is the dream job of choice for many young people. What most people don’t realize is that the job does not pay well and has extremely lengthy working hours, as it is written in an article titled “The Hard Realities of Make-Believe.” It also goes on to say that people with ten years of experience are only getting about $20,000 a year—and it’s even worse for those just starting. Often, this is not even enough to live on. They also work very long hours, usually about 12 a day, and also often work on the weekends too. Despite all this, it is a job many are clamouring to get into. However, the problem lies not in finding and hiring new help, but in retaining the workers once they are found. And talent alone is never enough. In the aforementioned article, Masataka Kawai, a teacher at Tokyo’s Nippon Engineering College, said, “Of course students need strong powers of observation and have to be good drawers, but they also need to have passion. To stick out in anime, you can’t just like drawing, you have to love it” (A-6). But that really does not seem to be a problem. After all, like in any art form, it is commonly know that the real joy of anime is not the process or the pay, but in sharing the finished work with others.
And it is the final product that really makes the money. Anime and manga are found all over the world and are extremely popular. People both young and old go after products of their favourite series—older people want items from the older shows, (such as Speed Racer and G-Force), while the young people want the modern anime products (Inuyasha, Yu-Gi-Oh!, and .hack//SIGN come to mind). A quick surf of eBay will show that people will pay hundreds, even thousands, of dollars for DVDs, figurines, manga, animation cels, and vast amounts of other sorts of anime paraphernalia. And, as Japan exports all these products—including the television programs themselves—it is Japan who rakes in billions of dollars from it all. The royalties for exported products from Japan in 2002 alone, says an article called “Japan’s Empire of Cool,” was over $12.5 billion, up 300% from 1992. And, in all that time, overall exports from Japan increased by only 15%. And the reason is simple. Also in the article, Masuzo Furukawa, President of Mandarake (the world’s largest anime and manga department store) said, “If it’s Japanese, the world wants it. Japan is hot” (A1). He couldn’t be more right. Japan’s old empire of industry may be crumbling, but its new cultural empire of cool may be the salvation of its falling economy.
But why is it so popular? That is a more difficult question. According to an article titled “What’s Right with Japan,” 60% of the world’s animated cartoons are Japanese anime. 3 million people, as opposed to only 127,000 in 1997, are now studying Japanese, as it is said in “Japan’s Empire of Cool.” Popular manga titles are selling 50,000 copies of each volume. These figures point out how popular anime and manga have become. But why? The truth is, no one is really quite sure. In an essay that appeared in Foreign Policy magazine last year, titled “Gross National Cool,” Douglas McGray wrote that much of Japan’s success comes from its ability to “accept, synthesise and spin a host of foreign influences into something both global and local”. That just may be it: the ability to combine both Japan and other countries together makes it appealing to all. In the same essay, McGray, commenting on the fact that the character Hello Kitty is supposedly from London, also wrote, “Hello Kitty is Western, so she will sell in Japan. She is Japanese, so she will sell in the West. It is a marketing boomerang that firms like Sanrio, Sony, and Nintendo manage effortlessly. And it is part of the genius behind Japanese cultural strength in the global area”. In my opinion, it is the balance between the two—foreign and Japanese—that makes everything so popular, not just in the U.S., but everywhere anime and manga appear. And that is the key of its success.
Of course, it is not just where it comes from that makes anime and manga so popular. It is also the unrivalled artwork and especially the characters and stories told through that art. One of the most successful manga-ka, Rumiko Takahashi, has written several enormously popular titles, such as Inuyasha and Ranma ½, all of which have been turned into equally successful and popular anime. One of the most popular right now—and a particular favourite of mine—is Inuyasha. The story starts in Feudal Japan, during the Warring States era. A half-demon named Inuyasha attempts to steal a sacred jewel, called the Shikon Notama—the Jewel of Four Souls, in the hopes that it will be able to make him all demon. However, his plan fails when the priestess guarding the Shikon Jewel, Kikyo, uses a magic arrow to bind him to a tree. Kikyo then dies, due to wounds she got in the fight with Inuyasha. Her body is burned along with the Shikon Jewel, so that no evil will again attempt to steal it. The story then skips ahead to present-day Japan, where 15-year-old Kagome Higurashi is about to set off for school. Her family lives at an ancient shrine that has been standing since the Warring States era. Kagome happens by the Dry Well while looking for her cat, and is pulled into it by a giant centipede monster. The well transports Kagome back in time to Feudal Japan, where fifty years have passed since Kikyo’s death. Despite warnings from the current priestess Kaede, Kikyo’s younger sister, Kagome wanders into the Forest of Inuyasha. She happens upon the sleeping Inuyasha, but is attacked by the centipede monster again. Somehow, Kagome awakens Inuyasha, who she then frees from the tree. Inuyasha promptly slays the centipede, but then turns on Kagome—for the long-lost Shikon Jewel had emerged from Kagome’s body during the battle. After halting Inuyasha’s attack with a set of prayer beads (whenever Kagome says ‘Sit!’, Inuyasha falls flat on his face), Kaede reveals that Kagome is the reincarnation of Kikyo and that it is now Kagome’s duty to protect the Sacred Jewel from those who would try to steal it. Unfortunately, the Jewel is accidentally shattered and Inuyasha and Kagome must embark on a quest to collect the shards—for even one shard has the power to increase one’s strength tenfold. As they travel, the two are soon joined by Shippo (an orphaned young fox-demon who enjoys making mischief with his shape-shifting abilities), Miroku (a perverted monk with corrupt morals and a cursed hole in his hand called the Wind Tunnel), and Sango (a demon-slayer, seeking revenge on the demon that slew her family). They cross paths with many evil characters including, but certainly not limited to, Inuyasha’s older brother Sesshomaru (who seeks to own Inuyasha’s magic sword, the Tetsusaiga) and—perhaps the worst of them all—Naraku, the shape-shifter. Naraku, along with his various incarnations, was the one responsible for the curse on Miroku, the slaughter of Sango’s family, and Kikyo’s betrayal of Inuyasha. As they progress in restoring the Sacred Jewel, they learn that Naraku too is seeking the shards. And, due to a spell cast by the witch Urasue, so is a resurrected Kikyo. Who will gather all the shards and restore the Shikon Jewel? Only time—and Rumiko Takahashi’s brilliant art—will tell. With even that brief taste, you can certainly now see how compelling the stories are, and why they sell so well.
Of course, Inuyasha is just one of the 1,600+ titles of anime available on DVD today, as stated in “Anime Nation.” The art is almost always amazing. The stories, too, are often fantastic—despite that sometimes they change the story a bit in the translation. (Naturally, the original dialogue does not always fit when dubbing. Try watching a subbed—subtitled—episode of anime, then watch the same episode dubbed. You’ll see that the text doesn’t exactly match.) And, despite the negative aspects of the job, it is a much sought-after occupation. As I said before, with such a long and colourful past, and with scores of eager youths hoping to be the next Hayao Miyazaki or Rumiko Takahashi, it is pretty certain that anime and manga will continue to tell their tales long into the future.
Sean Seiden
English Paper
14/5/04
Anime and manga are not just ‘cartoons’ and ‘comics’. They are an art form, not unlike the works of da Vinci and Michelangelo. They are fantastic literature, conveyed through equally fantastic drawings. And they are fast becoming the most popular things to hit American shores. Immensely sought after in the U.S., anime and manga may be the pinnacle of cool—and perhaps the shining salvation of Japan’s declining economy. Despite the paltry pay of being a manga-ka (anime or manga artist), it is a dream job shared by millions, and the finished products are extremely valuable sales items—not to mention an artistic joy to behold.
Anime and manga have a long history, which is surprising to most people. Many think that anime and manga are a relatively new idea, but in fact, according to an article titled “Anime Nation,” they can trace their roots back to three one-reel cartoons, made in Japan in 1917. However, despite its growing popularity in its home country, Americans don’t get their first taste of anime until the late ‘50s with the release of the television program Astroboy. With its success, the article goes on to say, other anime creations begin to appear on U.S. television, including the fabled Speed Racer. Around this time, the article also says, the stories began to shift their focus from children’s stories to more complex ideas. Then, in 1979, the now-legendary anime artist Hayao Miyazaki releases his first full-length anime film, Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro, which has become one of the anime classics, according to “Anime Nation.” The ‘80s were a boost for manga, with the release of “Barefoot Gen”, the first manga to be translated into English. This is followed by Miyazaki’s Kiki’s Delivery Service, Disney’s first anime video release. Then, in the late ‘90s, says the article, come two items that would blow all previous works away: another Miyazaki film, Princess Mononoke, and the Japanese debut of the amazingly popular Pokémon series. Both become vastly popular in both the States and Japan. It would seem hard to top this, but, as stated in “Anime Nation,” Miyazaki does it again with the 2001 release of Spirited Away, which grossed over $214 million before even being released in the U.S., displacing the previous top-grossing film in Japan (Titanic) by a wide margin. When released in America, “Anime Nation” also said, it becomes the first anime to win an Oscar (along with some 20 other awards world-wide). With such a colourful and successful past, I believe that the future of anime and manga look equally bright.
Thousands, perhaps even tens of thousands, of people aspire to be manga-ka. In both America and Japan, it is the dream job of choice for many young people. What most people don’t realize is that the job does not pay well and has extremely lengthy working hours, as it is written in an article titled “The Hard Realities of Make-Believe.” It also goes on to say that people with ten years of experience are only getting about $20,000 a year—and it’s even worse for those just starting. Often, this is not even enough to live on. They also work very long hours, usually about 12 a day, and also often work on the weekends too. Despite all this, it is a job many are clamouring to get into. However, the problem lies not in finding and hiring new help, but in retaining the workers once they are found. And talent alone is never enough. In the aforementioned article, Masataka Kawai, a teacher at Tokyo’s Nippon Engineering College, said, “Of course students need strong powers of observation and have to be good drawers, but they also need to have passion. To stick out in anime, you can’t just like drawing, you have to love it” (A-6). But that really does not seem to be a problem. After all, like in any art form, it is commonly know that the real joy of anime is not the process or the pay, but in sharing the finished work with others.
And it is the final product that really makes the money. Anime and manga are found all over the world and are extremely popular. People both young and old go after products of their favourite series—older people want items from the older shows, (such as Speed Racer and G-Force), while the young people want the modern anime products (Inuyasha, Yu-Gi-Oh!, and .hack//SIGN come to mind). A quick surf of eBay will show that people will pay hundreds, even thousands, of dollars for DVDs, figurines, manga, animation cels, and vast amounts of other sorts of anime paraphernalia. And, as Japan exports all these products—including the television programs themselves—it is Japan who rakes in billions of dollars from it all. The royalties for exported products from Japan in 2002 alone, says an article called “Japan’s Empire of Cool,” was over $12.5 billion, up 300% from 1992. And, in all that time, overall exports from Japan increased by only 15%. And the reason is simple. Also in the article, Masuzo Furukawa, President of Mandarake (the world’s largest anime and manga department store) said, “If it’s Japanese, the world wants it. Japan is hot” (A1). He couldn’t be more right. Japan’s old empire of industry may be crumbling, but its new cultural empire of cool may be the salvation of its falling economy.
But why is it so popular? That is a more difficult question. According to an article titled “What’s Right with Japan,” 60% of the world’s animated cartoons are Japanese anime. 3 million people, as opposed to only 127,000 in 1997, are now studying Japanese, as it is said in “Japan’s Empire of Cool.” Popular manga titles are selling 50,000 copies of each volume. These figures point out how popular anime and manga have become. But why? The truth is, no one is really quite sure. In an essay that appeared in Foreign Policy magazine last year, titled “Gross National Cool,” Douglas McGray wrote that much of Japan’s success comes from its ability to “accept, synthesise and spin a host of foreign influences into something both global and local”. That just may be it: the ability to combine both Japan and other countries together makes it appealing to all. In the same essay, McGray, commenting on the fact that the character Hello Kitty is supposedly from London, also wrote, “Hello Kitty is Western, so she will sell in Japan. She is Japanese, so she will sell in the West. It is a marketing boomerang that firms like Sanrio, Sony, and Nintendo manage effortlessly. And it is part of the genius behind Japanese cultural strength in the global area”. In my opinion, it is the balance between the two—foreign and Japanese—that makes everything so popular, not just in the U.S., but everywhere anime and manga appear. And that is the key of its success.
Of course, it is not just where it comes from that makes anime and manga so popular. It is also the unrivalled artwork and especially the characters and stories told through that art. One of the most successful manga-ka, Rumiko Takahashi, has written several enormously popular titles, such as Inuyasha and Ranma ½, all of which have been turned into equally successful and popular anime. One of the most popular right now—and a particular favourite of mine—is Inuyasha. The story starts in Feudal Japan, during the Warring States era. A half-demon named Inuyasha attempts to steal a sacred jewel, called the Shikon Notama—the Jewel of Four Souls, in the hopes that it will be able to make him all demon. However, his plan fails when the priestess guarding the Shikon Jewel, Kikyo, uses a magic arrow to bind him to a tree. Kikyo then dies, due to wounds she got in the fight with Inuyasha. Her body is burned along with the Shikon Jewel, so that no evil will again attempt to steal it. The story then skips ahead to present-day Japan, where 15-year-old Kagome Higurashi is about to set off for school. Her family lives at an ancient shrine that has been standing since the Warring States era. Kagome happens by the Dry Well while looking for her cat, and is pulled into it by a giant centipede monster. The well transports Kagome back in time to Feudal Japan, where fifty years have passed since Kikyo’s death. Despite warnings from the current priestess Kaede, Kikyo’s younger sister, Kagome wanders into the Forest of Inuyasha. She happens upon the sleeping Inuyasha, but is attacked by the centipede monster again. Somehow, Kagome awakens Inuyasha, who she then frees from the tree. Inuyasha promptly slays the centipede, but then turns on Kagome—for the long-lost Shikon Jewel had emerged from Kagome’s body during the battle. After halting Inuyasha’s attack with a set of prayer beads (whenever Kagome says ‘Sit!’, Inuyasha falls flat on his face), Kaede reveals that Kagome is the reincarnation of Kikyo and that it is now Kagome’s duty to protect the Sacred Jewel from those who would try to steal it. Unfortunately, the Jewel is accidentally shattered and Inuyasha and Kagome must embark on a quest to collect the shards—for even one shard has the power to increase one’s strength tenfold. As they travel, the two are soon joined by Shippo (an orphaned young fox-demon who enjoys making mischief with his shape-shifting abilities), Miroku (a perverted monk with corrupt morals and a cursed hole in his hand called the Wind Tunnel), and Sango (a demon-slayer, seeking revenge on the demon that slew her family). They cross paths with many evil characters including, but certainly not limited to, Inuyasha’s older brother Sesshomaru (who seeks to own Inuyasha’s magic sword, the Tetsusaiga) and—perhaps the worst of them all—Naraku, the shape-shifter. Naraku, along with his various incarnations, was the one responsible for the curse on Miroku, the slaughter of Sango’s family, and Kikyo’s betrayal of Inuyasha. As they progress in restoring the Sacred Jewel, they learn that Naraku too is seeking the shards. And, due to a spell cast by the witch Urasue, so is a resurrected Kikyo. Who will gather all the shards and restore the Shikon Jewel? Only time—and Rumiko Takahashi’s brilliant art—will tell. With even that brief taste, you can certainly now see how compelling the stories are, and why they sell so well.
Of course, Inuyasha is just one of the 1,600+ titles of anime available on DVD today, as stated in “Anime Nation.” The art is almost always amazing. The stories, too, are often fantastic—despite that sometimes they change the story a bit in the translation. (Naturally, the original dialogue does not always fit when dubbing. Try watching a subbed—subtitled—episode of anime, then watch the same episode dubbed. You’ll see that the text doesn’t exactly match.) And, despite the negative aspects of the job, it is a much sought-after occupation. As I said before, with such a long and colourful past, and with scores of eager youths hoping to be the next Hayao Miyazaki or Rumiko Takahashi, it is pretty certain that anime and manga will continue to tell their tales long into the future.
Man I wish my school would let me do papers over things that actually interest me.
