Origins of Anime: Classical Texts, Modern Manga, Anime, and Tales

Catalog description

Modern anime and manga authors and artists captivate audiences with rich stories and stylized art. This course investigates the origins of these stories by engaging premodern Japanese texts (in English language translation) and modern literary theory. Throughout the semester we will pay particular attention to commonalties among these literatures and narrative genres, as well as the extent they differ due to temporal/socio/religio/political concerns. Western and Asian literary theories, especially those concerning topics of translation, replacement, negotiation with classics, and gender and sexuality will also be extensively explored. We will interpret the historic human endeavor of story telling within the contexts of time and space and through a critical self-awareness of our own positions in the modern world. Students will prepare individual research projects and be responsible for finding and presenting primary sources and secondary research. The instructor will provide background information on political, cultural, and religious history as well as present on details of literary theory. The aim is to encourage students to critically analyze the modern perception of past events. Every topic will be addressed in three phases. First, the students will discover historical events, literature, and people through reading primary sources in English translation. In a second phase, we will see how these stories are depicted in movies, animation, or manga. Finally, students will perform research to explore the differences between the premodern sources and their modern adaptation and determine how we can use such a comparison to critically analyze the way modern storytellers recreate the past. Class sessions will combine lectures, discussion, and audio- visual materials. Offered as JAPN 315 and WLIT 315 . Counts as a CAS Global & Cultural Diversity course. Counts as a Communication Intensive course. Counts as a Understanding Global Perspectives course.