Twelve Kingdoms: Interview with the Translator, Children & Teenagers

Kate: Shadow of the Moon ruthlessly dismantles the worldview of a rather ordinary teenager who wafts through life expecting to be catered to and understood.

Do the Japanese have any patience with "snowflakes"? Or is the whole American obsession with teenagers kind of a bemusing oddity? Does Japanese Twitter ever reach the heights of American Twitter in terms of pure angry self-absorption?

Eugene: Of course, manga and anime focus a lot of attention on the teenage experience, but not typically the kind of attention that sets them at odds with the greater society. Love, Chunibyo & Other Delusions sets up the classic conflict between conformity and being "true to yourself," but makes compelling arguments on both sides and doesn't attempt to universalize the conclusions.

A comparison of old adages makes for an interesting exercise in sociolinguistics. In Japan, the nail that sticks out gets hammered down, while in the west, the squeaky wheel gets the grease. They sound similar but are opposite concepts. As illustrated in Rascal does not Dream of Bunny Girl Senpai, the online culture in Japan wields that hammer just as ruthlessly as elsewhere.

The nail that sticks out gets hammered down and the snowflake gets the blowtorch. For good or ill, this is very much a product of gaman culture. You're supposed to get with the program, try hard, persevere, and fit in. A funny example of this is One Punch Man. The most powerful superhero in the universe gets no respect until he gets with the program (including the paperwork) and fits in.

To be sure, trendy activism is alive and well in Japan, ready to be discovered by western journalists, but is not nearly as influential (if at all) beyond the fringes. NHK World, for example, which caters to western audiences, tends to give the latest and greatest woke issues a degree of attention that suggests a prominence inside Japan that simply does not exist outside of select enclaves.

At the end of his "Why You Should Move to Japan" video, Nobita from Japan cites Japan's reluctance to adopt the woke politics of the west as a reason.

Clownfish TV explores the subject in depth here. 

Kate: I'm sure that someone somewhere has written a massive intellectual treatise on the plethora of children in Japanese manga/anime. From a popular culture perspective, what accounts for it? Why do children show up so much in anime/manga/light novels in adult situations? Or as long-lived children? Like in C.S. Lewis, very little hand holding is expended on these kids. Their youth is part of their attraction, not an excuse for their behavior.

Any thoughts? Are wise-beyond-their-years children a trope in Japanese literature, specific to certain authors, part of the cultural mindset?

Are Westerners the outliers, being squeamish (and more committed to the Victorian ideal of innocent childhood)?

Eugene: The most obvious answer is marketing. The editorial content of the numerous manga periodicals and imprints are designed by publishers to target specific demographics. Because consumers of manga and anime outside Japan tend to be older, they often overlook material aimed at younger audiences.

Several of the most popular and long-running anime on Japanese television are practically unknown in North America. Chibi Maruko-chan (over 1200 episodes to date) is a lighthearted melodrama about a traditional Japanese family in the 1970s. The POV character is a nine-year-old girl, so we see that world through her eyes.

There are a lot of authorized videos on YouTube. They're not localized, but it's worth watching an episode or two just to hear Tarako Isono as Maruko.

Delving more deeply into the social psychology of the matter, helicopter parenting simply hasn't become a thing in Japan. Basically, the kind of hands-off approach that kids enjoyed growing up in the American suburbs fifty years ago remains alive and well.

Elementary school students walk to school. By themselves. This expectation that young children can handle such responsibilities is taken as a given. The video at this link above is from a reality show in which little kids are given fairly complex tasks to accomplish by themselves.

In Non Non Biyori, once school is out, there is barely an adult in sight, also true of the elementary school kids in the more urban Den-noh Coil. At the end of Super Cub, three high school girls ride their scooters all the way to the southern tip of Kyushu. By themselves. And then there is the whole school government thing.

All this means that kids in Japan are not only allowed to do more interesting things, but it is easy to push the boundaries a bit and have them do really interesting things. Frankly, the spelunking expedition at the end of The Phantom Doctor strikes even me as crazy dangerous, but it would have been hugely appealing to Edogawa's readers.

In other words, Japanese not only expect more of (and grant greater latitude to) real children, but fictional children as well. It is the freest time of their lives, after all, and should not be wasted. (The girls in Super Cub go on their adventure during the spring break before their senior year, because that's when the fun pretty much ends.)

Kate: I previously taught a course about working women in America. The impact of biology—the reality of bearing children, giving birth and raising children—greatly influenced women’s work (when, how, what) historically and now.

Ono seems far more aware of the connection between work and childbearing than many Westerners. Many laws in the United States directly address many of these issues, but the reality of childbirth—perhaps as it loses its inherent risks—seems to be admitted with a shrug rather than an appraisal of its impact.

Does that awareness stem from Japanese culture? From its inherent conservatism?

Eugene: There are several long-standing aspects of Japanese culture that do address the inherent problems here in unique ways. First of all, especially among the aristocracy, well into the 20th century, legitimacy was readily conferred upon the offspring of mistresses. The current imperial line descends from one of Emperor Meiji's concubines, not his legal wife (Meiji was the last emperor to have concubines). 

The second is muko-iri marriage, according to which the husband is adopted into the wife's family. This is still relatively common today. "You can't choose your sons but you can choose your sons-in-law." In some cases, sans any children, a family business will adopt a loyal employee to keep the family name alive. The connection between work and childbearing thus becomes a negotiable arrangement.

Japan's current low birth rate and high female employment rate (above the OECD average) suggests that working and childbearing continue to be seen in mutually exclusive terms.Though it should also be pointed out that helicopter parenting is not a thing in Japan, which shifts the burdens of childrearing around. Nobody freaks out about unattended kids out and about in public.

So while contemporary Japanese society has evolved more slowly away from "traditional marriage" as the ideal model for organizing society, the real world is a lot more complicated, and the fictional world has taken full advantage. The working mother and the single mother in melodrama and comedy are ubiquitous at this point, and the single dad has become of late a favored protagonist.

After the Rain features the teenage daughter of a single mom and a divorced dad. The Way of the Househusband is about a stay-at-home dad (who happens to be a former yakuza). No children yet. Speaking of which, Ryuji in Toradora often gets mistaken for a yakuza (like his father), but he's a good kid who looks after his single mom (who works in a nightclub) more than she looks after him.

The responsible kid with the irresponsible single mom (who nonetheless has a heart of gold) is an established trope. Hanasaku Iroha begins with Ohana's mom sending her to her grandmother's country inn while she runs off with her latest boyfriend. In Beyond the Boundary, Akihito would prefer that his mom stay out of his life as she's a demon (not a terrifying demon, a total goofball of a demon).

Of course, you can count on manga and anime to push a concept to its logical extreme, so the preternaturally competent Kotaru in Kotaru Lives Alone is all of five years old.

At least in the fictional realm, raising independent children who can raise themselves is one sort-of solution.