Nudity

Nudity is not too unusual in some anime and manga, even on TV shows and in manga for children. This is a result of a different culture’s views on naked bodies. Often nudity is used for comic effect and the characters involved might feel highly embarrassed. Or a character may simply be taking a bath as in the delightful children’s anime classic My Neighbor Totoro when the father and his young daughters take a bath together.

Seijuu

The Japanese term for dubber. In Japan, seijuus are as popular as any celebrity in other field. Their voices are highly valued as an anime can be popular just because it was dubbed by certain seijuus. A seijjuu can even record an original soundtrack and hold concert.

Osamu Tezuka

The Godfather of manga and anime. Starting as a medical student, he published his comic Me Chan’s Diary in 1946 and in a year, he became the biggest selling manga artist inJapan. Astro boy is one of the animes that is based on his manga. Ozamu died in 1989 because of stomach cancer.

Anime

Anime is from the word “animated” and used by the fans to distinguish the Japanese version from other animated movies. So, Sailormoon, Doraemon, Captain Tsubasa, Crayon Shin-chan are anime while Simpson, Scooby Doo, Tom and Jerry are not.

-Chan

A suffix meaning “darling” or “little” as a term of affection, usually used for little animals, cute persons, or romantic partners, later used in anime to describe a ‘squashed’ version of charas with enlarged heads and child style bodies.

CB

Child Body – a term used to show a drawing of a chara in a ‘squashed’ form. This style is also called SD OR Super Deformed. For short its called CB (Chee Bee).

Bishoujo/Bishounen

A term used referring to beautiful women/men; also used in manga world to show the reader’s preference or the artist’s drawing style. They can be either Shoujo (girl stories where the characters have long legs and big Bambi eyes) or Shounen

Bambi

Yes, Bambi is not an anime, but this is where the big eyes come from. Osamu Tezuka, pioneer of Japan’s anime and manga, was very much inspired by Bambi’s eyes, so he decided to draw his characters with big eyes, which later became a national style. Lately the style has evolved in to the trend that you see in today’s anime. But not every anime today uses such eyes, it depends on the artist’s preference.

Cosplay

Derived from costume play, cosplay is a way of anime fans to express their love for their favorite anime character. Usually they will dress up exactly like their favorite character. Today cosplay is dressing up not only like a favorite anime character but also like a character from comic books and computer/video games. There are regular gatherings of Cosplayers, locally and internationally all over the world,

Model Kits

Do you know Gundam? It’s very famous in japan. Everyone in Japan has Gundam. Gundam is an example of model kit.

Animation Cell

An animation cell was actually a frame of an anime. This animation cell, every single frame of an anime, was hand painted! Wow!

Resin Kits

Bigger figurines of anime/game characters made of gypsum. These statues are usually rare items. So, they’re pretty expensive.

Gasapon

Small anime/figurines made of  plastic or rubber. Gasapon usually consists of a set of many small figurines.

Art Books

These books contain anime and manga characters. You can find the making of those characters in these books.

J-Pop

This is short for Japanese pop records. They usually come in CDs and VCDs for you guys who like watching the video clips.

Manga

They collect these Japanese comic books, because often anime characters are based on manga, or vice versar. Japanese people love manga because they can see their fave characters anytime they want; they don’t have to wait for the specific anime to be aired. Manga is one of the many ways to get to know the characters better.

You can find manga almost anywhere, not only in bookstores, but also at newsstands. Manga usually comes in volumes.