SOAS Research Online

Abstract

From innocent virgins to figures of pure evil, from idols to anime characters, the girl proliferates as a moving image across Japanese popular media. Girls are both victim and survivor, threat and saviour, sexual objects and sexualized subjects, figments of the male imagination and self-defining creators of their own cultures of girlhood. This chapter will focus on how girls have been represented in live-action cinema even though images of the girl extend far beyond film, permeating screens and billboards, from endless anime visuals to virtual YouTubers to characters in “dating-sim” games. These depictions usually reflect not the lived experiences of actual girls but rather youthful femininity as an image that transcends actual girlhood itself (Yoda 2017). The representation of girlhood is therefore intimately and inexorably intertwined with the cultural and historical moment in which is created, circulated, and debated.