Shoujo, Shounen, Hentai … oh my!

Big round eyes. Tear/sweat drops on foreheads. Mecha. Magical girls. Talking Animals. Shoujo. Shounen, Hentai, Yaoi, Shoujo Ai, Shounen Ai.

What does it all mean?

Darned if we know.

Ask a group of anime fans to explain any or all of this, and you will get as many explanations, if not more, than the number of people you ask. It's sort of like Macs vs. PCs. It's quasi-political/religious in nature.

In a nutshell, some of the definitions are:

• Shoujo (Girl Anime), anime and manga that are aimed at a female audience, from about 10 to college age. More focused on love than blowing stuff up.
• Shounen (Boy Anime), anime and manga that are aimed at about the same age level as shoujo. Mostly focused on fighting and giant robots.
• Hentai (Adult theme/you better be over 18 Anime), adult manga and anime, usually involving a lot of nudity, sex and abuse of characters. Not much plot and lots of tentacles, including:
  • Yaoi, anime and manga that are focused on male/male romance,
  • Yuri, anime and manga focused on romantic relationships with other women, and
  • their various sub-cultures and followings — usually fan oriented/written coupling characters romantically in situations the original series never thought of or intended. Enemies, who slowly fall for each other, etc. In western traditions this is known as "slash," in the anime culture "fanfic."

Anime covers a broad spectrum of themes and issues. From comedy to romance. Hard SF to D & D Fantasy. Heroic self sacrifice. Tragic love to … well, you get the idea. And, of course, waiting in the wings is the ever-present, what can we do for a buck, merchandising — "The kids will really love this … we hope!"

At Noreascon 4, we hope to present several of these themes and conventions within the genre, and screen examples of what's new and what's classic, while carefully avoiding a few.

We plan on showing complete series as well as the standard potpourri of anime theatre.

We're aiming for a cross spectrum of

• "Must-see"s for the neo-fan;
• Series that have been out for a while and never got the attention that they should have, and
• Old favorites for the serious fan, which will probably spark fanatical debate (we did warn you that it was pseudo political/ religious).

If you've got suggestions or requests, we'd be happy to hear about them at anime@noreascon.org, but we'll warn you that we've got lots of strong opinions of our own. (Ready for some of that fanatical debate?)