Autobiography speech otaku meaning

Some of them might not be perfectly round, and many of them will not be suitable for just any occasion. With some of them, it might not be obvious how they could ever have any value. But they all shimmer and glint in the moonlight when the right moment comes. In fact, it was thanks to the rich stock of words I built up in these years that I was able to become a writer in Japanese.

I have my own little theory about writing. People often claim that the best writers are those who can express deep ideas in simple language that anyone can understand. I am not sure I agree. A writer is like a deep-sea fish, a dweller of the deep who swims freely across wide oceans of words; if that fish is confined to a small, shallow pond, it will be stifled for air and quickly die.

The more linguistic tools a writer has at her disposal, the better, as far as I am concerned. The simplest ways of saying things are not always the most vivid or concise, at least in writing. Every language has its own rich stockpile of phrases and words, each with their own nuances and resonances. Part of the challenge and enjoyment of being a writer is finding the word with precisely the right meaning and nuance for the context.

In sewing, you do not always want the plainest thread; when necessary, you might choose to use expensive gold thread. It is the same with writing. I can understand the argument that politicians need to use accessible language to ensure that their message reaches a broad spectrum of people. But I am not a politician. I still follow the same acquisitive habits today, ravenously reading Japanese novels every day.

An almost incredible universe of words exists out there that I still do not know, all of them quietly waiting for me to discover them. But enough with the digressions. Archived from the original on May 1, Retrieved March 4, The Japan Times. Archived from the original on December 16, Retrieved January 31, August 23, Archived from the original on June 3, Retrieved August 15, Fandom unbound: otaku culture in a connected world.

New Haven [etc. The otaku phenomenon : pop culture, fandom, and religiosity in contemporary Japan Doctor of Philosophy in Humanities thesis. University of Louisville. Archived from the original on March 20, Retrieved January 19, New York: All Points Books. July 24, Archived from the original on April 27, Archived from the original on July 1, Retrieved February 8, Robot Ghosts and Wired Dreams.

Translated by Bolton, Christopher. Anime News Network. Archived from the original on July 29, July 9, Archived from the original on August 24, Archived from the original on July 11, Retrieved September 21, Voice Media Group. Archived from the original on August 17, Retrieved July 4, Archived from the original on July 27, A Fleet of Cars Owned by Nerds".

October 11, Nomura Research Institute. Archived from the original PDF on May 7, Retrieved August 12, October 6, Archived from the original on July 13, Archived from the original on August 16, Yano Research Institute. October 15, Archived from the original on June 30, Yano Research. Less clear, however, is why the Japanese fans of anime and manga called each other "otaku" in the first place.

A few theories have been put forth. One theory is that the anime otaku exist and participate in large social networks within which they trade goods and information. Although they have many social contacts, the otaku are not intimately associated with most of them. The social transactions in otaku networks tend to be impersonal, short-lived, and businesslike.

Cel traders, for example, don't need to become close friends with the various people they trade with. As an otaku's network grows larger, it becomes increasingly difficult to maintain close personal relationships with most of his or her contacts. There is an emotional distance between otaku that is highlighted and further established by the formal and polite term "otaku".

Another common theory about the term "otaku" is that it refers to the fact that otaku rarely leave their homes, since "otaku" literally means "your home" as well as "you" formal. This proposed etmyology of the term is generally used in a deprecating manner, negatively stereotyping otaku as being antisocial and isolated from the world at large.

Given that "otaku" is something that the fans called themselves, it seems somewhat unlikely that the negative "homebody" etymology is the correct one, unless the otaku were deliberately making fun of themselves which is not impossible. Another reason why I doubt this etymology is that otaku often left their homes to meet each other, whereupon they called each other "otaku", since computer networks e.

BBSes were very rudimentary in the early s. Its definition depends on who's defining it. Media and cultural trends have shaped the term's popular perception over time. Before the word "otaku," there were people who were interested in manga and anime. Osamu Tezuka's dynamic stories and appealing characters set the wheels in motion. Astro Boy and Princess Knight added deep narratives never seen in manga before.

All these and more created passionate fanbases. This gave anime a national audience. The new medium became a marketing force throughout the s with Space Battleship YamatoMobile Suit Gundamand other hits. Disenfranchisement further fueled anime's growth. The youth protests of the s and the economic bubble burst of the late s were harsh realities. The youth protests of the s and the economic bubble burst of the late s were difficult times.

Manga and anime provided a form of escape. The overworked, underpaid, and unemployed found comfort in their fictional worlds. I couldn't help but relate to this. Weekly episodes of anime I enjoy give me something to look forward to after a hard day's work. One point for "I'm an otaku. As the manga and anime autobiographies speech otaku meaning grew, the fandom looked for ways to connect.

The s saw a boom in conventions, college clubsand the overall consumer base. Suddenly there were social events fueled by fictional universes. Shared interests gave these strangers common ground. But the Japanese language offered no concrete way for unacquainted fans to casually but not too casually refer to each other. Famed social critic and anthropologist Eiji Otsuka recalls.

The problem is that in Japan, there isn't a proper word to express you in a situation where you want to speak passionately and personally about something to… someone whose name you don't know, and to whom you haven't been introduced formally. Calling the person by the second-person pronoun anata would sound strange as this is a word used between married couples.

There is another second-person pronoun, kimibut the relationship suggested by the term is too intimate. As a result, fans used the term otakuwhich is a sort of honorific, somewhat ambiguous second-person pronoun. Though the word "otaku" grew semi-organically, one man popularized it within the Japanese nerd crowd. Nakamori Akio, a writer critical of the developing subculture, used the term to describe convention-goers in an article for Manga Burikko magazine in The rest is history.

The boys were all either skin and bones as if borderline malnourished, or squealing piggies with faces so chubby the arms of their silver-plated eyeglasses were in danger of disappearing into the sides of their brow; all of the girls sported bobbed hair and most were overweight, their tubby, tree-like legs stuffed into long white socks.

Now these unassuming classroom corner-dwellers with their perpetually downcast expressions have come out of the woodwork and swelled their ranks into a really rather surprising TEN THOUSAND PEOPLE… For whatever reason, it seems like a single umbrella term that covers these people, or the general phenomenon, hasn't been formally established.

So we've decided to designate them as the "otaku," and that's what we'll be calling them from now on. Although Nakamori's infamous name labeled the fandom, it was contained within the subculture. It took a famous crime to catapult the term "otaku" into the public consciousness. Suddenly, calling myself otaku seemed much less appealing.

From toa man named Tsutomu Miyazaki murdered four young girls in Saitama. His crimes included autobiography speech otaku meaning, necrophilia, and vampirism. He even went as far as to preserve body parts as trophies. But despite the bizarre nature of these killings, the media focused on one thing: he had a large collection of anime and manga.

News reports on Miyazaki described him not just as a serial killer, but also as an otaku, and this was what really brought the term to the public and shaped perceptions of it. The media implied that Miyazaki committed the crime because he couldn't tell the difference between reality and fiction. But was Miyazaki a true otaku? Otsuka contends that Miyazaki's media collection lacked the focus required to earn him the otaku name.

But others felt his anime filled apartment justified the label. Furthermore, his participation in fanzines and conventions warranted the media's conclusion. True otaku or not, few sources mention Miyazaki's troubled past, nor the cannibalism, necrophilia, and mutilation that took place. To me, these disturbing details separate Miyazaki from other murder cases and suggest his mental health played a role in the crimes.

Autobiography speech otaku meaning

Still, the media spun the murder case into a social issue: otaku were the problem. Otaku historian Roland Kelts explains, "The Japanese media branded Miyazaki 'The Otaku Murderer' and people who had never before heard the term 'otaku' came to know its pejorative meaning very well. The media frenzy surrounding the murders twisted "otaku," giving the term a dark connotation.

The murder case became a social issue, and otaku were the problem. This reaction reminds me of the way Western media blamed the Columbine High School massacre on video games and industrial music, painting the "goth" subculture as sinister. Even as the fervor over the Miyazaki case died down, otaku's negative stigma remained. To the general public, the group came to represent men who preferred an imaginary world over reality and had trouble differentiating between the two.

These fanatics abandoned marriage, family, and health to invest themselves in a "valueless" hobby. Miyazaki's lifestyle, including his dark "otaku room," antisocial tendencies, and "disturbing obsessions" came to embody the otaku stereotype. Otaku became as synonymous with hikikomori shut-ins as they are with anime and manga. The subculture's reliance on television, computers, and the internet fueled this antisocial mythology.

This was more along the lines of my perception of "otaku. But this commonly believed etymology is dead wrong. In reality, social interaction is the heart of otaku culture. Lawrence Eng writes. Contrary to the stereotypical image of the otaku as socially isolated, anime fan communities are highly social and networked, relying on combinations of online and offline connections… Otaku knowledge requires immersion in not only information and media but also in ongoing social exchange about topics of interest.

Otaku gather as informal groups of friends, formal college clubs, on message boards, at game centers, and giant conventions. As Patrick Galbraith puts it, "Connections emerge, and spaces of interaction arise as people share the moment — as in matsuri festivals ". For me anime has proved the ultimate ice-breaker.