On Tue, 26 Aug 1997, Mark Page wrote:

We all know what we mean when we say anime.  What we don't mean are
cartoons whose flavour is western.  American, British or whatever.  You can
argue semantics about who worked on what....  And that there are things we
consider to be anime that are based on classic European novels etc etc
etc....  But to argue that just because of this and just because of that
that the boundaries of what is anime and what is not is blurred is purely
mischievous.  It is like saying because we are fans of anime and series
like Crayon Shin-chan then we should also like American equivalents like
The Simpsons and accept that as anime as well, when we know bloody well
that The Simpsons is NOT anime, regardless of whether it has Japanese
artists or whatever working on it.

Correct; I merely used the examples I did to illustrate the point that
the argument made that 'anything animated in Japan is anime, anything not
animated in Japan is not' is too general of a statement.

In short, despite efforts to erase the boundaries of nationality, they will
remain.  I'm not a fan of anime because I find it complimentary to the muck
served up on local television here in Australia, be it American, English or
Australian, I'm a fan because I find it an ALTERNATIVE.  To argue for its
subsumption into some common international community is to argue for its
dissolution....

The argument isn't for a subsumption into a common international
community; the discussion started as an attempt to classify -what- exactly
the 'flavor' you refer to consists of.  There is as much difference
between 'Saber Marionettes' and 'Grave of the Fireflies' as between
'Escaflowne' and your average Disney film, and yet both SM and GotF are
anime.

The other argument made is that for something to have that flavor does not
require it to be made in Japan.  (There are some American comics which I
would certainly consider to be manga.  I don't necessarily -like- all of
them, but that's beside the point. ^_-  I don't care for every single
Japanese manga I've been shown, either...)

Additionally, if to have this 'flavor', something is required to be made
in Japan, then by definition, all fanfiction written by members of this
list who live outside Japan is questionable in 'flavor', and all original
work by said members has no anime 'flavor' whatsoever, by this argument.

I don't disagree with your argument that it's attractive as an
alternative, I just disagree with the argument made earlier that all
anime/manga 'flavored' works must be made by Japanese, in Japan.

Just my $0.05 (this was a longer post than lately) + state sales tax.

As a side note, there was a very interesting (and EXTREMELY long, hence
why I will not post it here) post on the Hayao Miyazaki mailing list by
Marc Hairston, roughly connected to this topic, earlier today.  Anyone
interested in reading it, drop me a --private-- note and I'll forward it
to you.  I suspect replies to the list of 'I want a copy' will a) make
Tybalt annoyed, and b) I'll probably skip over 'em anyway. ^_^;

----[Loki]-----------------------------------------------------------------
Jeremy Blackman / Anime fan/fanfic author, Game Designer/Engineer
loki@maison-otaku.net (personal mail) / Maison Otaku Productions founder
loki@thekeep.org      (mailing lists) / Fanfic author / anime
jeremy@lith.com       (work)          / Monolith Productions