Boku no Opinion on Fandom Perception of Japanese Language

    A while ago, I saw a post from the recently-established Kodansha Manga Academy that got a little under my nerves.

    (I actually saw it on Instagram—which seems to be the more popular platform for Kodansha Manga Academy—but these tweets embed better.)

    It really bothers me—not just this post specifically, but the general trend of putting Japanese words on a pedestal. Of course, I’m not mad about the overall concept of loanwords, but rather specifically the way that more hardcore (English-speaking) fans of anime and manga often treat Japanese words, particularly in comparison to corresponding English terms. I’m sure many readers have seen this pithy joke phrase pop up whenever someone says something a bit strange about Japanese culture:

    Murder is actually really frowned in Japan. It goes against the traditional concept of 生きる, which means “to live.”

    Of course, there’s nothing wrong with liking Japanese culture, or even liking facets of its language (I certainly know that I do), but my issue with comes with the culture that’s sprung up around it. A nice video talking about this—specifically through the lens of the term “nakama”—was made by the translator Sarah Moon, which you can check out below:

    I don’t have an issue with a “shinigami” here and there (especially if it’s relevant in context to specifically use a Japanese term), but let’s not forgo the term “(Grim) Reaper”—it also sounds cool as hell! I’ve always been a fan of “psychopomp,” too, but I’ll admit that the meaning is slightly different.

    Anyways, back to Kodansha Manga Academy. I think it’s pretty obvious that I think the use of “henshusha” like this is ridiculous—especially coming from an actual Japanese company. Ask any Japanese speaker what “henshusha” means, and they’ll tell you it means “editor.”

    What really gets me is the “think of a HENSHUSHA like a sports coach” line. If you look up the keyword “editor” along with “like a sports coach,” you get more than a full page of Google results of people saying the exact same thing about the regular ol’ English term “editor.” Nothing is particularly special about the term “henshusha!”

    I’m sure one could have an in-depth analysis of the ways that choices like these enable orientalist ways of thought, but this is unfortunately not exactly the place for that; I just want to complain about the fallout of it. Maybe someday I’ll write something more comprehensive about it
 but that is not now.

    Anyways, since Genshiken still rules a lot of my life (even if I’ve been slacking on my project about it), I’m going to use it as a source to help show that “henshusha” isn’t some sort of special term. Luckily, we have a line that mentions editors in the very first volume—specifically, this one character who is clearly depicted to be bossy and unlikable is talking about his role in a manga club. Let’s take a look at the official English translation as written by David Ury: “Nahh, I’m sort of like an editor. I just kind of critique everyone else’s work” (pg. 136). What is this line as it was originally written in Japanese by Kio Shimoku, you may ask? “いやあäżșăŻç·šé›†è€…ăżăŸă„ăȘäș‹ă—おるから / みんăȘにはづょっず掳しいäș‹èš€ăŁăĄă‚ƒăŁăŠăŸă‚ŠïŒŸâ€ (different book, but still pg. 136).

    Those of you know know some Japanese might notice that it has “線集者” in here, and that’s (you guessed it) “henshusha.” I don’t think a Japanese person would write a scenario where a guy who compares himself to a “henshusha” is shown to be disliked by the people he’s working with
 if the term “henshusha” was really some sort of special, unique term devoid of all of the horrible issues that “editors” are plagued with.

    Anyways, for fun, I translated the line myself; this doesn’t really have any impact on this article, but I just wanted to put it in.

    HARAGUCHI: “Nope, I just do editor-type stuff. So being the one to tell everyone the harsh stuff—things like that, you know?”

    I don’t think it’s gonna make the cut to talk about this line when I (hopefully) get around to analyzing the chapter it’s in, so I just wanted to put a bit of Genshiken in here.

    Anyways, I see people in the Instagram comments lapping it up. Weirdly enough, I see a few people abbreviating it down to just “henshu,” which just means “editing.” I only find this notable because English speakers have the weirdest history of messing up person-related terms from Japanese. It’s always bothered me that most English-speaking fans say “doujin” to refer to fan content. “Doujin” is the guy—you’re actually talking about “doujin’s monster.”

    Joking aside, “doujinshi” is the term for the fan comics that people make. It’s short for “doujin zasshi” (roughly “fan magazine,” as I mentioned in Rebuild of Genshiken 001), and that “-shi” is what makes it a magazine—or comic, rather. It took me a while to finally realize this, but I believe the tendency to refer to the fan comics as “doujin” may have come from the fact that “erodoujin” is the abbreviation for “erotic doujinshi,” even in Japanese. So, if a lot of the English-speaking fandom is approaching Japanese media from the pornographic angle, “doujin” is simply a way to refer to “doujinshi”
 but it really isn’t!

    (Getting off on a tangent here, but on this note, English speakers have invented the term “doujinka,” modeled after “mangaka.” The actual Japanese term is “搌äșșäœœćź¶,” or “doujin sakka.” A “doujinka” would be someone who creates human beings.)

    For a historical example of English speakers messing up a person-related Japanese term, we have “rickshaw.” Yes—if you didn’t know, this word came from Japanese. It’s derived from “äșșćŠ›è»Š,” or “jinrikisha.” You might be able to notice the similarity between the words with the romanization written out there, though you may also notice that the “jin” part has totally disappeared. This is really funny to me, because “jin” means “person.” Whether it’s “jinrikisha,” “doujinshi,” or “henshusha,” English speakers have a supernatural tendency to mess it whether or not it’s got the “person” element of the term down correctly.

    (Linguistically, “rickshaw” is really funny, because “jinrikisha” means “human-powered car”
 or really carriage, I guess. Anyways, without the “jin,” it just kind of becomes “power car.”)

    Anyways
 where was I? Oh, yeah.

    So, a lot of people blindly treat Japanese terms as though they’re in a special category of their own. I don’t think this is necessarily news to many people, but the “henshusha” thing really got under my skin. I’m gonna air out one more grievance about this top to cap off this article.

    I have no issue with people using “manga” and “anime” as loanwords to refer to Japanese comics and cartoons, but it starts to get annoying when people prefer them conceptually over the general English terms. Maybe this is a bit too harsh to say, but I think the only way you can become a “mangaka” and “make manga” is if you learn Japanese and start making comics in Japanese—and maybe you’d even have to go do it in the Japanese industry, too.

    I don’t think it’s necessarily that people are embarrassed of being American (or whatever nationality), but so many cultures have a rich history of comics—I want people to celebrate their own! And perhaps if you don’t like the history, then maybe you can make something more to redefine it. Either way, you can still make comics heavily inspired by manga—both visually and storytelling-wise—but they’re comics, or whatever the equivalent term is in the language you’re making them in (don’t even get me started on the term JRPG).

    I don’t think there are fumettisti or bĂ©dĂ©istes who call themselves “mangaka,” and Americans (or English speakers in general) shouldn’t be any different. I guess the one issue is that there isn’t a really solid English term for someone who makes comics
 it used to be “cartoonist,” but that’s kind of fallen by the wayside.

    Anyways, I conveniently happened to help out with making this little video for April Fools’ Day.

    That’s all for now. Hopefully I’ll be able to write more sooner rather than later. I’ve been busy, and then I got really sick, and then I’ve still been busy.