Are anime characters caucasian or japanese

try googling Do anime characters look caucasian and you'd be surprised how many hits you get. Some people consider it a serious enough issue that they write formal academic papers on it

how about you? Do you think that they look japanese or caucasian?

it's a bit fast. Just pause it from time to time so you can read the subtitles

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I'm not arguing that the characters are definitely japanese and definitely not white as most characters are ambigious enough to be interpreted as any race

It may seem like i'm overanalyzing anime but this is actually a response to those who are overanalyzing anime.

like these people:
http://www.asiafinest.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=181650
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080722054903AACVpOd
http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/genmessage.php?board=928790&topic=47581011
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080226011142AAKJiky

Here's an academic paper analyzing the japanese people's self image based on anime
http://www.focusanthro.org/archive/2007-2008/saunders07-08.pdf

Here's an article on newsweek "Is japan becoming less Japanese"
http://www.meiwasuisan.com/yt/bin/img/sougou/12377354020024.jpg


Basically some people think that the japanese have a warped self image and they base this conclusion on the fact that anime characters look caucasian to them.

In this video, i argue that the characters may not necessarily look white to everybody and so any conclusion based on the fact that they look caucasian is poorly grounded.

also, I said that asians are good at cosplay but i never said that white people are bad at cosplay.
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Update may 18 2009:
I wont be answering any more questions as Ive gotten a lot already and most of them are the same. So heres a generic reply to the most common questions Ive been getting:

Anime characters aren't anatomically accurate. If youd try to measure the difference the eye sizes of different races, the difference wouldnt usually be greater than a millimeter. You cant expect these measurements to be accurately reflected in anime, even the more realistic ones.

The only way you can definitively make a character look like a specific race is by exaggerating stereotypical features. These exaggerations are more common in mangga and in older, less politically correct anime. david rice of neogami neuro had very stereotypical features in the mangga which were toned down a little bit in the anime.
http://nougamineuro.wikia.com/wiki/David_Rice

If they do need to exaggerate features its usually the nose and the facial shape. I never suggested that small eyes are a stereotypical trait of whites to the Japanese animators. My point was that large eyes arent a stereotypical trait of whites for the Japanese animators. When whites are represented in anime they either have smaller eyes or eyes that are the same size. They never make the eyes stereotypically bigger than other races when they draw whites.

Heres an interesting article on how and when stereotypes are used by the japanese.
http://www.matt-thorn.com/mangagaku/faceoftheother.html

The point of the video is not to prove absolutely that anime characters are Japanese or east asian. As I said before, they usually look ambiguous enough to be interpreted as any race. And there are anime that are set in Europe where the characters are mostly white. The point is to disprove the argument that most anime characters are drawn to look Caucasian (even those that arent supposed to be Caucasian) and that the Japanese have a secret desire to be white because of this.

The premise itself is flawed so any conclusion you derive from it is poorly grounded. There is no reason to assume that they were intentionally drawn to look Caucasian. Racial characteristics aside, most of them live in japan, have Japanese names, Japanese hairstyles, japanse fashion etc. if you ask the average japanese person why most anime characters look caucasian, theyd give you a baffled look because the characters dont look Caucasian to them at all.

This video doesnt advocate racism. Its actually against racism. Ignore the asian supremacist comments, especially from proudasianguy. Im not on their side and I mark them down whenever I can. Im not attacking whites or any other race in this video. Im attacking whites who have a Eurocentric view of the world, who think that everyone wants to look white. If you dont have such a view of the world then you have no reason to be offended.
BTW the song is namida mokou by stereopony

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[BigOChunk]

If Japanese animators knew caucasians would use anime to promote white supremecy, they definitely would not have shared anime with the western world. They share their art with you out of benevolence and you guys assume the Japanese people idolize caucasians for their features and hate their own features. How egotistic can you white people get? Only the animator has the right to decide which race the character belong to cause it's their creation, everybody elses opinion mean nothing.

[MrJavinos]

still anime is pretty awesome with or without a racial profile +

[kiintaro26]

@rakiema1 Yeah you're right.

But Russia takes up a large part of the Asian continent as well.

Look on the map.

[rakiema1]

@kiintaro26 what part is that? siberia? but india is in south asia , peope there are dark and have european features, evevn bigger eyes and eyelashes. Also people of iran, irak, afghanistan, so i want to say that nog only white people has those big eyes, nose etc but also other asians.

[kiintaro26]

@rakiema1 Isn't a little part of Russia located in Asia as well?

[rakiema1]

hindus of india are also dark and are asian with very very big eyes and small faces and long nose. u can say european features with nice dark brown skin !

[JohnnyBlazeRider1]

@MrWarriorofchaos True, if your familiar with marvel and dc comics many superheroes characters especially the males have been drawn with squinty looking eyes. Superman being one good example. 

[Manabu942]

@MrWarriorofchaos Good point.

[MrWarriorofchaos]

@RaptorsRpro Oh yea btw even in American comic books and cartoons they have asian characters that don't have squinty eyes, but on the other hand superman and captain marvel have squinty eyes and they aren't asian.

[TheAmericanidiot9]

There is obvious beauty in both races, and actually, in all, but from my gaming experience I look at the names

Wantanabe Takheshi= Caucasian

Susan Phillips = Asian

[TheNancyKNguyen]

Whats the song that you play ?

[MatameVideos]

I'm latino, and I've never had problem with japanese animation design but with coloration. If you look for more serious anime and manga, those oriented for more adult audiences, the drawing become so complex and realistic, that there's no need for unnatural eye and hair coloration, still characters have big almond eyes and round faces with sharp jaws. eg. Perfect Blue by Satoshi Kon or Ikigami by Motoro Mase

[SuperSaiyen312]

@freesz100 Yea, I know what you mean.

But watch this /watch?v=-OlVvFJtp4c

And remember it's not limited to yellow, green, purple, pink, and blue hair.

It's normal for the Japanese youth to dye their hair. You'll see it a lot if you go to Tokyo.

But yea I see what you mean. It's weird.

[freesz100]

@SuperSaiyen312 but its kinda weird to say a blue eye blond hair character with a japanese name is japanese.cause i cant picture that,example: naruto izumaki he may have spiky hair and fox whiskers but he still have blue eyes and blonde hair,its hard to picture him as japanese.a lot of asians say hes japanese,im like O.o its better to say hes not white or asian but he looks more white to me with these features and dont forget his pink skin tone that mostly white people have.

[NautilusAegis]

@NautilusAegis

Great video with a lot of reason in it though! I agree that it's extremely ignorant for anybody to think that an Asian would idolize Caucasians because of their looks. It's completely up to the animators on what they want their characters to look like. In my opinion, anime characters are a race of their own. Where pink hair, blue hair, and pointy hair is completely normal. Now go watch your respective shows and enjoy! lol.

[SuperSaiyen312]

@freesz100 Sometimes it depends on their names, clothing, etc.

Because it just depends on the artist's style. It's a cartoon so it's hard to tell

But you can tell if they're Caucasian or Japanese by their names.

[NautilusAegis]

On the comparison between "Caucasian" and Japanese facial structures:

A- The "Caucasian" looked more Latino than white. (Not that it matters really lol.)

B- The pictures were taken from two different angles. So you really can't compare the examples.

Point B pretty much makes the comparisons quite one-sided, especially if you look at which profile the people in the pictures are standing in. Some of the Caucasians could easily have similar facial structure if the photo was a full front shot.

[Yoshi17th]

@freesz100

I see what you're saying now :) I wonder then if we can consider such shows to be outliers, just a convenient way for them to still draw characters that appeal to japanese people (and hence, look "japanese"), or if the main reason behind most people drawing anime the way it is is to simply make them look good, vs making them look japanese. But again looking good for one culture can be considered "japanese" since it is according to their preferred taste.

[freesz100]

@Yoshi17th i was talking about the video,she said white people are drawn in a style different from japanese people,but what i notice in anime they drawn them in the same style as they would of drawn a japanese character.example fullmetal alchemist,its drawn with the same style as any anime ,which they didnt draw them with square faces and such and big noses blah blah.they dont draw them to diferentiate from other anime characters but just different style,they draw the adults different though.

[MatameVideos]

The conclusion would be: Anime characters are drawn to represent east asian people. Ok,that's true, but it doesn't mean non japanese people can't cosplay as anime characters, in the same way Asian people cosplays as american characters. Just look to asian cosplay of western comics.

[rparl]

I liked this, but I had trouble following it, as I could either watch the pix OR read the text. I tried to do both but wasn't entirely successful. (sigh)

[akiracard]

south korean... realllyy withe :o

[StellaBellaOla]

0:45, just to clarify, those people are squinting because they have lights in their faces, they're having pictures taken of them.

Probably not the best examples of your point.

[Scykei]

@Mustafacc0 You can pause the video any time you want. :S