Manga Cultures and the Female Gaze

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Springer Nature, Mar 31, 2020 - Social Science - 173 pages
The female gaze is used by writers and readers to examine narratives from a perspective that sees women as subjects instead of objects, and the application of a female gaze to male-dominated discourses can open new avenues of interpretation. This book explores how female manga artists have encouraged the female gaze within their work and how female readers have challenged the male gaze pervasive in many forms of popular media. Each of the chapters offers a close reading of influential manga and fancomics to illustrate the female gaze as a mode of resistant reading and creative empowerment. By employing a female gaze, professional and amateur creators are able to shape and interpret texts in a manner that emphasizes the role of female characters while challenging and reconfiguring gendered themes and issues.
 

Contents

Chapter 1 Introduction Interrogating the Text from the Wrong Perspective
1
Chapter 2 Short Skirts Superpowers and the Evolution of the Beautiful Fighting Girl
17
Chapter 3 The Maiden and the Witch CLAMPs Subversion of Female Character Tropes
47
Chapter 4 Queering the Media Mix The Female Gaze in Japanese Fancomics
77
Chapter 5 Beautiful War Games Transfiguring Genders in Video Game Fancomics
102
Chapter 6 Link Is Not Silent Queer Disability Positivity in Fan Readings of The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild
125
Chapter 7 The Cultural CrossPollination of Shōjo Manga
146
Index
170
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About the author (2020)

Kathryn Hemmann received a PhD from the University of Pennsylvania and is the author of numerous essays on Japanese fiction, graphic novels, and video games. They also run the blog Contemporary Japanese Literature (japaneselit.net), which features reviews of fiction in translation and posts on gender, society, and popular culture.

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