AniFem Round-Up
Disability and Power Through the Cyborg in One Punch Man
For those who might be new to disability studies, this is an accessible explanation using Genos’ arc as an example.
The Trauma of Velvet Crowe: Finding myself in Tales of Berseria
A very personal piece about abuse, unaddressed trauma, and holding on.
What’s your weird midnight snack?
In honor of CITY the Animation.
Beyond AniFem
Hinako Shimizu’s arc in Silent Hill f is shaped by the Japanese women’s rights movement of the 1960s and depicts ‘how she musters the courage to combat’ repression she encounters (PC Gamer, Elie Gould)
This focus on young women’s anxieties is a nice return to the franchise’s earliest games.
Hinako’s trauma-loaded backstory is largely in line with your average Silent Hill protagonist. Without a massive deposit of unresolved trauma or issues, the game would be too short and there’d be no iconic monsters to hide from.
But Silent Hill f does switch Hinako’s story up a bit by turning back the clock. “The reason why we arrived at the 1960s is because this is an era that represents female repression in Japanese society,” Okamoto says. “The 1960s were a time when this type of repression was prevalent, but it is also one of the hallmark eras in Japanese history for women’s rights movements.”
What makes her story all the more interesting isn’t simply what Hinako has experienced in her life up until this moment, but her fears of what is to come, and her uncertain place in a world that is undergoing some huge societal changes.
Land of the Lustrous Manga Wins Sense of Gender Award (Anime News Network, Rafael Antonio Pineda)
The series is, indeed, stuffed to the ears with Gender.
Similar to the Otherwise Award in the United States, the Sense of Gender Awards honor science fiction or fantasy that expanded or explored our understanding of gender in the preceding calendar year. The first of the awards were given out for works published in 2001.
Kodansha accepted the award on Ichikawa’s behalf during Sunday’s ceremony and presented a message of gratitude for the honor from the manga creator. Despite the story revolving around future beings without reproduction or gender, Ichikawa noted trying to instill both a sense of continuity with the ancient being known as “humans,” and the unique social nature developed by these future beings.
The association announced the winners of the Sense of Gender Awards at the 63rd Japan Science Fiction Convention (Nihon SF Taikai or Japan SF Con, nicknamed Kama-Con this year). The attendees of the same convention awarded Land of the Lustrous with the Best Comic award, Miya Kazuki‘s Ascendance of a Bookworm with the Best Japanese Long Story award, and manga creator Kia Asamiya with the Best Artist award.
Some previous winners of the Sense of Gender Awards include The Birth of Kitaro: The Mystery of GeGeGe, Raven of the Inner Palace, An Older Guy’s VR First Love, and The Promised Neverland. The association also awarded Fumi Yoshinaga‘s Ōoku manga with a Sense of Gender Hall of Fame award in 2022 and Fumiyo Kouno‘s In This Corner of the World manga and anime film adaptation with the “Transcending Time Award” in 2017. Moto Hagio recevied a Lifetime Achievement Award in tribute to her Nanohana manga and her body of work as a whole in 2013. In 2012, the association awarded Puella Magi Madoka Magica with one of two Sisterhood Awards, and Guin Saga creator Kaoru Kurimoto/Azusa Nakajima received a posthumous Distinguished Service Award in 2009.
Fear of a Black Japan: A “Hometown” Program With Africa Sparks Racist Protests (Unseen Japan, Jay Allen)
The announcement was functionally like declaring “sister cities,” but it resulted in right-wing protests.
The goal of the program is to strengthen the relationships between these municipalities and the designated countries by promoting cultural exchange and fostering mutual understanding.
Unfortunately, multiple news sources in Africa got this detail wrong. Several reported that the Japanese government had opened up a “special visa” for highly skilled workers, making it easier for people from these countries to immigrate to Japan.
In fact, this announcement doesn’t include any changes to Japan’s immigration policy. Any such change would have required a vote in Japan’s National Diet.
The JICA has issued statements in multiple languages, reiterating that this designation is purely symbolic and cultural. It’s urged local African media to issue corrections. Many, it seems, have already done so.
However, that hasn’t stopped the far right in Japan from raising a stink. Right-wing social media accounts latched onto the African reporting to stoke fears of an “African invasion” of Japan. And on August 28th, 150-some people gathered outside JICA headquarters in Tokyo’s Chiyoda City to protest.
The Legal and ‘Soft’ Censorship Affecting Manga in America (Anime News Network, Reuben Baron)
The panel was held at this year’s Anime NYC.
Daniel Cruz, from the free expression advocacy group PEN America (the organization presenting the panel), focused on the legal side of censorship and steps being taken to combat it. Varun Gupta, CEO and Editor-in-Chief of Manga Mavericks, and Kristiina Korpus, an editor for Abrams Books‘ Kana line, came at the subject from a different angle: the “soft censorship” decisions publishers have to make to protect themselves and their IP from getting into the legal trouble of “hard censorship.” Hannah Lee from the Japan Society moderated the discussion, balancing multiple topics over the course of an hour.
For a clear example of “soft censorship,” Korpus pointed to the cover-ups of body parts you might see in hentai — “blurring, lightsabers, little black boxes.” This censorship often comes directly from the original author; when a title in Seven Seas‘ Mature-rated Steamship line displays a black box instead of full nudity, it’s because the artist didn’t include anything to fill that space. Gupta had a different example of soft censorship on a title he worked on: replacing lyrics from Nirvana’s “Heart-Shaped Box” to avoid potential copyright issues (this would have been the time to make a JoJo reference, but no one did).
Neither Korpus nor Gupta wants to have to make content changes to manga, and when they have to, Gupta said changes must be made “in respect to the original publisher and mangaka’s intention.” The larger chilling effect of book-banning is that it makes publishers more likely to have second thoughts about publishing certain books at all. As a smaller publisher, Manga Mavericks chooses to avoid licensing certain types of more explicit content. Korpus emphasized how publishers are assessing risk when some books might be unsellable in entire states, saying, “publishers doing LGBTQIA+ work and even things that are politically sensitive, they’re still publishing these things knowing they can be taken out of the lexicon.” Cruz emphasized the toll this can take on authors: “Authors stop writing the content that’s getting censored.”
VIDEO: Symposium on gender with Moto Hagio.
VIDEO: Animator Dormitory is working to create support structures for new animators.
VIDEO: Interview with anime composer Kevin Penkin.
VIDEO: Podcast discussion of anime’s influence on streetwear.
VIDEO: Series that are often mistaken for shoujo but aren’t.
SKEET: Frieren’s Director on the tastes of western aniem fans.
Frieren's Director has some thoughts on Western Anime Fans. What do you think?
— Anime News Network (@animenewsnetwork.com) August 28, 2025 at 12:04 PM
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AniFem Community
Staying up late to watch anime on TV was kind of cool, actually.
Maybe not so weird, but I am definitely a night cheese person.
— Director Chimera (@directorchimera.bsky.social) September 1, 2025 at 10:46 PM
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Antacids. Thanks, GERD! 🫠 That said, my gremlinest daytime snack was tortilla chip fragments/crumbs + salsa eaten with a spoon
— S.E. Robertson / C.A. Moss (@feelingsandmagic.bsky.social) September 2, 2025 at 8:38 AM
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