Fan Culture

It is an understatement to say that the fanculture associated with Manga is a bit complicated. There are countless amounts of official clubs that exist inside and outside of high schools, colleges and some unofficial groups of friends that get together to talk about what they like.

It varies from many categories but for the sake of brevity we will cover three aspects: Otaku, Cosplay, and Merchandising.

Otaku

Otaku is a Japanese word for a person that has obsessive interests in manga and anime. The origin of the term otaku is

a social movement that can trace its roots back to 1983, where the term was first coined in a magazine . The term was at first only used to describe a person attending a comic book convention.2 At first it was a word used with pride. People in Japan proudly referred to themselves as Otaku.

While the word Otaku enjoyed immense popularity inthe early 80’s, the positive connotation of the word was all but demolished in the late 80’s. A man by the name of Tsutomu Miyazaki went on a killing spree of little girls, and when the police found Japanese porn and anime in his apartment , he was immediately labeled an otaku. From that point on, an otaku became known as an person who has an unhealthy obsession with manga and anime.

Schodt, Frederick. Dreamland Japan Writings on Modern Manga. Berkley, CA: Stone Bridge Press, 2007. Ryall, Julian. In Tokyo. 26 November 2005. Retrived on Feb. 12, 2010.

http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/criminal_mind/psychology/movies_made_me_kill/11.html

Cosplay

Cosplayers are people who dress up as their favorite anime and manga characters. Cosplayers range from amateur to professional level workmanship. Some cosplayer even rise to the level of internet idols, such as Ruby Rocket.

Merchandising

www.jetro.org/trends/market_info_manga.pdf

Here is a video I found of a typical manga store http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlYYoU0--gk

some apparent facts.(according to google.) the average cost of a manga in japan is 200 yen ($2.20) here its ten dollars.

One Piece is apparently the most popular manga of 2009 according to the info found here: http://www.alafista.com/2010/01/31/most-popular-manga-of-2009-one-piece/

It was reported that 14.72 million volumes of One Piece were sold, Naruto was ranked 2nd with 6.83 million copies and Bleach was ranked 3rd with 6.47 million copies.



*Bibliography and section still under construction