How do you like your Shounen Jump heroine?

Do you love her dressed in a pristine school uniform, where her smiling face (and possibly panties or if your lucky, cleavage) grace every panel? Do you like her making bentou for the hero, sharing laughs right before he enters the greatest of his greatest battles? Or do you love her strong, the type who would smack the hero when he is wrong and is generally unforgiving to anyone who insults her short skirt but is soft to the hero who basically ignores her D-size bra? If she has one.

For years, legions of Jump readers, particularly women from the Western frame of thought¹, would write a post or two complaining why women in a particular Shounen Jump manga is often misrepresented. An interesting  rant came by my timeline today, a disheartened Katekyo Hitman Reborn! fan who cannot forgive Akira Amano for making cooks out her heroines. In her blog, she pines about why the female characters in Reborn have been ill-presented, nothing but dolls whose only purpose in the story was to make the boys look better.

Yeah. Right.

Seriously, this magazine was not meant for you

There are two key things that “Jump feminists” must remember when it comes to tackling feminism in Shounen Jump. First, the magazine is published in Japan, drawn by Japanese mangakas,  edited and published by Japanese publishers, and sold to Japanese people. Second, the magazine’s target market are Japanese boys ages 10 to 15. These two factors play a great role in building and creating the stories that are published in the magazine.

The least of the magazine’s concerns is a 10-yr. old Japanese boys going feminist, suddenly complaining that Kyoko is only capable of making an onigiri.  I doubt 10 year olds think this way. I doubt Japanese boys, or even men would actually hate her for that.

A lot of great points about differences in culture and perspectives has been pointed here.

To wrap it up, the magazine was built for a different set of people, with cultures and practices much different than ours. The Western feminist concept does not exactly apply to them. For them, being a woman has an entirely different meaning. Hence, you cannot force the Western concept of what makes a woman unto a working theory that’s already been established and deeply ingrained in Japanese culture.

Japan loves their women pure

Perhaps I will segue here differently from Kae, looking closer to the cultural side of Japan’s feminism on why authors tend to draw their girls like Kyoko and why we would probably be reading more of them in the future.

One of the most interesting readings I crossed was Mikiso Hane’s study² on how men, after World War II, preferred their women pure. In history, Japanese women were often portrayed as ghosts or sly creatures or crazy ladies who are out to teach men a lesson or two about humanity. The war has taught Japanese men the comfort of a woman’s doting support. The purity and the innocence of loyal servitude.

Women also appreciate this fact, despite Japan’s transition into a modern cosmopolitan country. They understand that their role as women is to help build and raise a healthy family. In fact, this is an accepted reality among women in Japan. Even if they’re career women, they also have to play the role of housewives. One of the most loved comics that’s still running in Japan, Sazae-san, presents a loving wife who has found comfort in taking care of her family. Sazae’s image is one of many that has become an institution in Japanese society. So much so that women dream to be like her once they start having families. I can go on talking about the women’s double burden, but for sure, Sazae’s image is something that men and women both revere. The image of a domesticated woman is highly appreciated in Japanese society.

And this was a facet of Japanese feminism that has been highly translated in manga. From Captain Tsubasa, all the way to Reborn, and even in mangas outside of Shounen Jump, the ideal Japanese girl would be someone who has this doting innocence, the sunshine in the hero’s life.

Her bento skills may make her appear very domestic, but these are the traits that the hero respects so much that he would have an unshakeable determination ( e.g., Tsuna’s Dying Will) to protect it, may it be driven by his affections or his stomach.

But really, do their images and what they represent matter?

I would like to believe that it is not what the heroine in Jump does that really matters. They can be strong tsunderes or they can be quiet girls. They can be important or unimportant to the story. I’d like to think that no matter how small or big their role is in the story, their existence is key in teaching boys how to relate, respect, and treat the girls around them. And I think this is what is primarily in the heads of the mangakas and the editors as they shape and build these women. Maybe there are higher things, but at the core, it all boils to this, for the intended audience of Shounen Jump. They’re actually there to make men out of the boys.

Boys who read this magazine are at a fragile age where they start to realize the stark differences between men and women. In my opinion, Jump does a great job in showing the strangely complex world of women (as much as they show us what a boy’s world is like too). On one end you have the strong and independent women like Hana, Nami and Sakura. On the other end you have Kyoko and Orihime, fragile girls who appears innocent at first but learns to understand their roles in the grand scheme of things and offers as much help that they can give, to the best of their abilities. I believe, characters in Jump titles are built to represent personalities in Japanese reality. This is pretty much a fact for any story, I think. But for those who think these are fragments of fiction, then let me share that yes, strangely, in my experience at least, I have met Japanese girls who are as polite as Kyoko, and some who are as sinister as Nami.

They exist not because the authors thinks their weakness makes the boys look better. That is a lame assumption. Looking back at tons of stories in Jump, their existence are integral to the growth of the hero and his relationships with other people. Even if they’re just a side character, they offer a lesson or two for the hero to learn from.

No really, they’re cool girls

You see, Jump Heroines, weak as most appear, are really great girls. I’ve explained above why they’re admirable to the Japanese. I’ve also shown why they exist in such a shounen magazine.

So do not diss these girls just because they make onigiris than join the boys in a big fight against phantom knights and giant robots. The girls represent so much more than just eye candy for the boys. Really, without them, we won’t have heroes to admire every time we open Shounen Jump.

1. Oh yes! Orientalism plays a key part here!
2. Found in Eastern Phoenix: Japan since 1945

1980 to 1984 marked great development and diversity in Jump. The second part of the WSJ Illustrated Guide would probably tell you more about the growth of the magazine and the rise of its future mangaka superstars.

On our end, this period is monumental. Why? It is in this period that a bond was established between the fans of Shounen-Ai and Shounen Jump. As the authors of shounen-ai experimented with more mature themes and story lines, their fans started to starve for the genre. Unlike today wherein you have tons of mangakas for BL, there were only a select number of authors who tried to write shounen-ai. Later on, their fascination for boy stories led them on a quest to find other tales that exhibited the same potential as those that have been written by shounen-ai mangakas.

Their search ended with a tale of a young boy named Oozora Tsubasa and his journey to achieve his goal of representing becoming a world class football (soccer, for Americans) player.

1980-1984: The Captain Tsubasa Fantasy

I cannot remember when and where, but I do know for a fact that the first yaoi doujinshi published was that of Captain Tsubasa’s. And I wouldn’t wonder why. It had elements, such as friendship and rivalry, to match those found in shounen-ai mangas. To look closer into its ‘shounen-ai’ potential, let’s look into the setting and the characters of Captain Tsubasa.

Captain Tsubasa’s story begins when Oozara Tsubasa moves to a new town and joins the local soccer team. In here he met great friends who eventually pushed themselves to the limit in order to become great football players someday. It was a tough dream, but they knew that with Tsubasa around, they can pretty much do anything. As they played in the national tournament, they met other great players for the Japanese team. Eventually these guys became Tsubasa’s team mates for the National team.

Just by looking at my summary, Tsubasa’s story is no different than any other sports-based story out there. However, the strong ties and chemistry between some players as well as the tension between rivals drove the fangirls insane. Might I add that their youthful innocence was an extra factor to the story. Misaki saying things such as “I’ll always be by your side, Tsubasa” totally set their hearts a flutter. In the 1960s, these lines wouldn’t have meant nothing. But by the 80′s, with the influence of shounen-ai, these lines were gold.

Of the lot, the most obvious was Tsubasa’s relationship and his on-field partner Misaki. To many fans, they are as good as a married couple. And when they had to part ways, they still kept their friendship and often thought of each other when they’re on the field. If Tsubasa was here, I could have done this. If Misaki was here, I could have done this. This deep-rooted partnership became jailbait for many fujoshis. When I first caught Captain Tsubasa on the telly, I can’t help but admire the relationship between these two kids. Both were completely dedicated to the sport and both know knew very well that they would need each other’s talent to fulfill their dreams of becoming great players. As some fangirls put it, their love is so true.

Another interesting pair from Tsubasa became the starting ground for one talented mangaka. For her, she saw romance between a dedicated striker and his ever-faithful goalie. The strong ties between Meiwa’s Kojiro Hyuga and their goalie Ken Wakashimazu only proved their sexual attraction towards each other. Hyuga was a ruffian and Ken was the guy who kept him on a leash. Her SM experiments between these two characters took off and eventually became the base of her own shounen-ai tale, Bronze. The mangaka is Minami Ozaki, a true fujoshi who made Takuto and Koji icons of yaoi.

I had a shot in reading some of her Tsubasa doujins and they were bleeping hot¹. Since it was an old doujin, most of the dialogue were handwritten with Ozaki’s scratchy handwriting which is greatly compensated by her wonderful art. If you have read Bronze, you may immediately think that this was a Bronze doujin, but then you’ll realize that on some scenes that showed the rest of the Japanese football team. Only then you’ll realize that it’s a different story altogether.²

Anyway, the Tsubasa fandom remains as one of the strongest fandoms in Japan. There are still a lot of circles tackling Captain Tsubasa today. I have a feeling that as long Tsubasa is aiming to get that World Cup, we’ll still be seeing Tsubasa doujins being created.

For the next installment, we’ll look into the internationally popular Zodiacs, another big name mangaka(s) creating doujins for a big name Jump Title, and may I add dance poses too? The age of heroes sparks more creativity for the dear fujoshis so better watch out! :3³

1. thanks Rotch! XD
2. Yes, her handwriting can be that difficult that I can’t for squat read the kanjis at all! TAT;;
3. Disclaimer: I don’t own the doujin images in this website. Got it from http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Ginza/1365/main.htm :: Du Zhan Yu