Japanese Webkinz Drawings!

Japanese Webkinz Drawings at Amazon

Image boards have become a usual web pastime in recent years. If you’ve been to places like 4chan, 7chan, and the like, you’ve seen a distinguishable culture that mixes illustrated and photographic art from both Western and Japanese culture. After you browse these places for awhile, it starts to become apparent that Japanese and English are mixed together so much, you need a foot in each culture to comprehend what’s going on.

So here’s a guide to the most mutual Japanese words you’ll find in the world of effigy boards. Keep in mind that these places are populated for the most part by anime, manga, and video game fans, so most of the terms have to do with this culture.

anime – Japanese animation. All animated cartoons originating in Japan.

baka – A fool, or art representing foolishness. Disney’s reputation Goofy would be considered baka.

bancho – A delinquent or rebellious boy.

bara – A gay man, or art likeable to or depicting gay men.

bishojo – A pretty young woman, older than adolescence but younger than university age.

bukkake – A fetish for messy sex, and art depicting this fetish.

burikko – An adult pretending to be a child. Features in art depicting age-play.

-chan – A suffix meaning “relating to;” also a Japanese honorific.

chibi – A short, little person or a very young child. Also a specific anime/manga drawing style, making a reputation appear dwarfish or distorted. Western cartoon elves might be considered chibi.

cosplay – The action of dressing up as a favored reputation from anime/mange. Frequently done at comic book conventions and other fan events.

desu – A short Japanese word that links a noun and verb, in a literal sense translated as “it is.” Image boards have taken this as a meme, often times repeating “desu desu desu,” for respective reasons, including to tease the newbies or stubbornly persist in an argument.

doujinshi – Self-published work. The equivalent of desktop self-publishing for manga.

ecchi – The generic term for sexual material.

futanari – Hermaphrodites, or art depicting hermaphrodites. Half-male-half-female.

gaiden – Side or supplemental material. In effigy boards, gaiden would be a great deal of four-panel cartoons of manga characters, depicting events that don’t count in the manga itself. A side-story or spin-off.

guro – Very gross pornography depicting uttermost injuries, mutilation, or death. The manga equivalent of “snuff porn.”

hentai – Erotic bondage manga. Most (erotic|sexual pleasure|sexually arousing Japanese illustrative material falls into this category.

hikikomori – An otaku taken to the next level: a loner and outsider whose only interest is anime/manga fandom. The equivalent of a Western “basement geek,” only proposing a neurotic, unhealthful degree of both obsession and isolation.

itasha – The subculture of embellishing a vehicle with decals of manga/anime characters.

josei – A manga genre likeable to adult women. The equivalent of Western soap-operas.

kaitou – A mysterious. elusive thief. Also somebody with phantom-like aspects. A stealthy person who lives in the shadows. The equivalent of Western rogue or hobbit.

katana – A Japanese sword. About 99% of the time when you see ninjas and samurai with swords, they’re shown wielding katanas.

kawaii – Meeting the Japanese ordinary for “cute.”

kawaiiko – A cute child.

kei – Originally a sculpture style employed to depict Buddha. As opposed to the more intimate (to the West) imagination of Buddha as a jolly, laughing fellow, Japanese Buddhas are slim and serious.

lolicon – A slang term shared amid Japanese and Western culture, for the preference for child-like depictions of women.

manga – Japanese comic books. All graphic, printed media of a cartoon nature originating in Japan.

mangaka – A manga creator. Japanese for “cartoonist.”

manzai – A style of humor involving a comedic duo of one “straight man” and one “funny man.” In Western culture, Abbot and Costello would be considered manzai.

mecha – Anime or manga involving large, armored, warrior robots, commonly piloted by a humane inside.

meganekko – The attraction to girls who wear glasses. Anime or manga depicting “geeky” girls.

miko – A female temple attendant. The equivalent to a Western nun.

moe – A slang term for a fan of anime or manga, or the attraction to anime and manga characters.

neko – A kitten or a cat, peculiarly when shown as being cute. Also applies to describe a woman in a cat costume, or half-human-half-cats.

oekaki – Scribbling and doodling. Amateur art by fans.

ojou – A high-class or wealthy woman.

omorashi – A fetish for urination. The equivalent of Western “water sports.”

oni – A demon or evil spirit.

oranyan – A male who is by turns aggressive and aloof, and sweet and charming.

otaku – A very strong fan of manga, anime, or video games. More severe than moe, not as severe as hikikomori.

pokemon – The most famous anime/ manga/ video game franchise in Japan.

sakura – A cherry blossom. A very mutual artistic theme in Japan.

seinen – A manga genre likeable to adult men. The male equivalent of josei.

sensei – A teacher or master.

sentai – Japanese superheros. Also refers to military heros; in the West, Hercules and G.I. Joe would both fall beneath the category of sentai.

shibari – Japanese bondage, involving rope bondage raised to an intricate and specialized art form.

shinigami – A Japanese angel of death, in mythology. The equivalent of the Western “grim reaper,” though shinigami are a whole class of entities and not just one.

shojo – A manga genre likeable to young women and girls. The younger equivalent of josei.

shonen – A manga genre likeable to young men and boys. Usually action and adventure stories.

shotacon – The Japanese version of “boy’s love,” the depiction of young boys in an (erotic|sexual pleasure|sexually arousing context. The male version of lolicon.

sukeban – A delinquent or rebellious girl.

tan – A suffix meaning a reputation used as a mascot for a product. For instance, characters applied to represent dissimilar computer operating systems are “OS-tans.”

tsundere – A female who is by turns aggressive and aloof, and sweet and charming.

yakuza – Japanese gangs and gangsters. Organized crime. The equivalent of Western Mafia.

yandere – A psychotic stalker. A genre of Japanese manga/anime depicting shy, quiet humans who become smitten to the point of obsession with someone, in the end turning violent and abusive, perhaps even murderous.

yaoi – Japanese manga/anime depicting male homosexuals but intended for females. In the West, if you made fiction specially for “fag hags,” it would be called yaoi.

yuri – A lesbian, or art likeable to or depicting gay women.