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.

A wide-ranging introductory guide for readers making their first steps into the world of manga, this book helps readers explore the full range of Japanese comic styles, forms and traditions from its earliest texts to the internationally popular comics of the 21st century. In an accessible and easy-to-navigate format, the book covers: · The history of Japanese comics, from influences in early visual culture to the global 'Manga Boom' of the 1990s to the present · Case studies of texts reflecting the range of themes, genres, forms and creators, including Osamu Tezuka, Machiko Hasegawa and Katsuhiro Otomo · Key themes and contexts – from gender and sexuality, to history and censorship · Critical approaches to manga, including definitions, biography and reception and global publishing contexts The book includes a bibliography of essential critical writing on manga, discussion questions for classroom use and a glossary of key critical terms.

Contributions by Kristopher Alexander, Amanda K. Allen, Brianna Anderson, Catherine Burwell, Katharine Capshaw, Negin Dahya, Gabriel Duckels, Paige Gray, Gabrielle Atwood Halko, Natasha Hurley, Kenneth B. Kidd, Erica Law-Montes, Derritt Mason, Brandon Murakami, Tehmina Pirzada, Cristina Rhodes, Cristina Rivera, Jakob Rosendal, TreaAndrea M. Russworm, Vivek Shraya, Victoria Ford Smith, Joshua Whitehead, and Shuyin Yu How do we think about children’s and young adult literature? Children’s literature is often defined through audience, so what happens when children are drawn to and claim genres not built expressly “for” them? To what extent do canonical formations tend to overwrite or obscure less visible efforts to create and promote material for the young? These are the driving questions of Alt Kid Lit: What Children's Literature Might Be. Contributors to the volume offer theoretical meditations on the category of children’s and young adult literature as well as case studies of materials that complicate our understanding of such. Chapters attend to a diverse array of subjects including the “non-places” of children’s literature; child mediums; Black theater for children; children’s interpretive drawings; fanfiction; Latinx, Indigenous, and silkpunk speculative fiction; environmental zines; shōnen anime; Jim Henson's The Dark Crystal; South Asian television; and “emergency children’s literature.” The book also features interviews with two experimental writers about genre and alt-publishing and a roundtable conversation on video games and children’s digital engagements. Building on diverse approaches including queer theory and postcolonial studies, Alt Kid Lit shines light on materials, methodologies, and epistemologies that are sometimes underacknowledged in the field of children’s and young adult literature studies.

This collection features examinations of popular culture, including manga, music, film, cosplay, and literature, among other topics. Using interdisciplinary sources and analyses, this collection adds to the global discussion and relevancy of Japanese popular culture. This collection serves to highlight the work of multidisciplinary scholars who offer fresh perspectives of ongoing cross-cultural and cyclical influences that are commonly found between the US and Japan. Notably, this collection considers the relationships that have influenced Japanese popular culture, and how this has, in turn, influenced the Western world.

This book is an upper-level student source book for contemporary approaches to media studies in Asia, which will appeal across a wide range of social sciences and humanities subjects including media and communication studies, Asian studies, cultural studies, sociology and anthropology. Drawing on a wide range of perspectives from media and communications, sociology, cultural studies, anthropology and Asian studies, it provides an empirically rich and stimulating tour of key areas of study. The book combines theoretical perspectives with grounded case studies in one up-to-date and accessible volume, going beyond the standard Euro-American view of the evolving and complex dynamics of the media today.

Key Terms in Comics Studies is a glossary of over 300 terms and critical concepts currently used in the Anglophone academic study of comics, including those from other languages that are currently adopted and used in English. Written by nearly 100 international and contemporary experts from the field, the entries are succinctly defined, exemplified, and referenced. The entries are 250 words or fewer, placed in alphabetical order, and explicitly cross-referenced to others in the book. Key Terms in Comics Studies is an invaluable tool for both students and established researchers alike.

Specifically designed for use in a range of undergraduate and graduate courses, while reaching specialists and general readers, this second edition of Introducing Japanese Popular Culture is a comprehensive textbook offering an up-to-date overview of a wide variety of media forms. It uses particular case studies as a way into examining the broader themes in Japanese culture and provides a thorough analysis of the historical and contemporary trends that have shaped artistic production, as well as politics, society, and economics. As a result, more than being a time capsule of influential trends, this book teaches enduring lessons about how popular culture reflects the societies that produce and consume it. With contributions from an international team of scholars, representing a range of disciplines from history and anthropology to art history and media studies, the book covers: Characters Television Videogames Fan media and technology Music Popular cinema Anime Manga Spectacles and competitions Sites of popular culture Fashion Contemporary art. Written in an accessible style with ample description and analysis, this textbook is essential reading for students of Japanese culture and society, Asian media and popular culture, globalization, and Asian Studies in general. It is a go-to handbook for interested readers and a compendium for scholars.

The title of this book, The Korean Wave: from a Private Commodity to a Public Good, refers to the idea that the Korean Wave has now crossed its nation’s borders and become an international public good. Because the Korean Wave has so far surpassed its national borders to become a subject of global attention, we consider the Korean Wave through the lenses of power, interest, identity, politicization, and the “anti-Korean wave”. “In this context, we are proud to have supported the work that has led to this publication. We congratulate the editors on promoting a unique interdisciplinary perspective on popular culture and international relations, featuring contributions by both humanists and social scientists, and focusing on a hugely signifcant transcultural phenomenon - the Korean Wave - that originated in Asia yet spread across the globe. The questions of identity, interest, and power raised by this publication, based on a series of conferences held on our campus, are as signifcant as they are innovative. I hope you, the reader, will be inspired by this collection to pursue your own inquiries and further develop the study of Korean culture in global context.” - Michel Hockx, Director of Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies, University of Notre Dame

Rethinking Japanese Feminisms offers a broad overview of the great diversity of feminist thought and practice in Japan from the early twentieth century to the present. Drawing on methodologies and approaches from anthropology, cultural studies, gender and sexuality studies, history, literature, media studies, and sociology, each chapter presents the results of research based on some combination of original archival research, careful textual analysis, ethnographic interviews, and participant observation. The volume is organized into sections focused on activism and activists, employment and education, literature and the arts, and boundary crossing. Some chapters shed light on ideas and practices that resonate with feminist thought but find expression through the work of writers, artists, activists, and laborers who have not typically been considered feminist; others revisit specific moments in the history of Japanese feminisms in order to complicate or challenge the dominant scholarly and popular understandings of specific activists, practices, and beliefs. The chapters are contextualized by an introduction that offers historical background on feminisms in Japan, and a forward-looking conclusion that considers what it means to rethink Japanese feminism at this historical juncture. Building on more than four decades of scholarship on feminisms in Japanese and English, as well as decades more on women’s history, Rethinking Japanese Feminisms offers a diverse and multivocal approach to scholarship on Japanese feminisms unmatched by existing publications. Written in language accessible to students and non-experts, it will be at home in the hands of students and scholars, as well as activists and others interested in gender, sexuality, and feminist theory and activism in Japan and in Asia more broadly. An electronic version of this book is freely available thanks to the support of libraries working with Knowledge Unlatched, a collaborative initiative designed to make high-quality books open access for the public good. The open-access version of this book is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), which means that the work may be freely downloaded and shared for non-commercial purposes, provided credit is given to the author. Derivative works and commercial uses require permission from the publisher.

Discussions surrounding inclusivity have grown exponentially in recent years. In today’s world where diversity, equity, and inclusion are the hot topics in all aspects of society, it is more important than ever to define what it means to be an inclusive society, as well as challenges and potential growth. Those with physical and intellectual disabilities, including vision and hearing impairment, Down syndrome, locomotor disability, and more continue to face challenges of accessibility in their daily lives, especially when facing an increasingly digitalized society. It is crucial that research is brought up to date on the latest assistive technologies, educational practices, work assistance, and online support that can be provided to those classified with a disability. The Research Anthology on Physical and Intellectual Disabilities in an Inclusive Society provides a comprehensive guide of a range of topics relating to myriad aspects, difficulties, and opportunities of becoming a more inclusive society toward those with physical or intellectual disabilities. Covering everything from disabilities in education, sports, marriages, and more, it is essential for psychologists, psychiatrists, pediatricians, psychiatric nurses, clinicians, special education teachers, social workers, hospital administrators, mental health specialists, managers, academicians, rehabilitation centers, researchers, and students who wish to learn more about what it means to be an inclusive society and best practices in order to get there.