#time fiddler

Enjoy Your Delicious Moments

Poster Paint on Pizza Box Cardboard -- edited in Photoshop, 2018

Chapter 3 - Page 30-34 - End of chapter

CH1: 1-9 / 10-19 / 20-29 / 30-39 / 40-45

Katey Sidestory: 1-5 / 6-10

CH2: 1-9 / 10-19 / 20-26 / 27-36

Chapter 3 - Page 1

CH1: 1-9 / 10-19 / 20-29 / 30-39 / 40-45

Katey Sidestory: 1-5 / 6-10

CH2: 1-9 / 10-19 / 20-26 / 27-36

Just saw this in my @timefiddler feed. 

...so, I used to have a similar impression of the word until I spoke with more people on the subject who are queer persons and who love the genre. I’d associated it largely with porn that’s tagged as such, and less so the larger, broader body of work that would be categorized as yuri, let alone the history of the word (and yes, there’s a history).

It was up until very recently that I had honestly stuck with “Girls Love” as the the logical step with how pervasively ubiquitous the “BL” genre was on comic sites like Tapastic (Tapas) or Webtoons. My intent with the use of GL was to signal that “there hasn’t been any sex yet.” In my head, yuri was more like Yaoi in its equivalence and connotation. 

I’d gone back and forth with a friend who’s a big yuri fan on the genre name itself and its categorization, but it wasn’t until I’d read some of Erica Friedman’s writings on the subject specifically that I changed my mind:

“[History] Why we call it Yuri”

“On Defining Yuri”

Full disclosure, Erica is a professional acquaintance of mine.

The historical nature of the genre and name, as presented by Friedman, argues the value and importance of maintaining the use of Yuri as a genre name. Due to the nature of the Japanese manga market and its own history, the term has more or less come to represent all works of fiction that are related to female x female relationships that are intimate, romantic, or physical, regardless of the gaze it falls under. Its in fact reinforced by that gaze that provides the collective framing device for the genre. The origin of the term is the most fascinating part (from “On Defining Yuri”):

[2.5] The year 1971 also saw the creation of Japan's first commercial gay magazine, Barazoku. The editor, Ito Bungaku, included a page for lesbians, which gave information on how to get in touch with lesbian organizations. In an editorial, he named gay men barazoku (rose tribe) and lesbians yurizoku (lily tribe). Yuri is the Japanese word for "lily," and so the lily flower became the de facto symbol for lesbian-themed media (note 3).

But we’re not in Japan, and we’re not in the 1970′s. So, let’s head straight forward to today, right now, and in the west. She has a rather nice summary on that as well:

5. Yuri overseas

[5.1] Once yuri leaves Japan, the term stops needing definition at all. Audiences that compose yuri fandom have adopted yuri as a term that means any narrative of love (romantic, sexual, intimate or not) between women. European anthologies of comics about lesbian romance have tagged themselves as yuri without need for further explanation (see, for instance, the Kickstarter Web site at Indiegogo for "Freya Sequential Love Stories" 2015).

[5.2] The concept of yuri has spread from Japan to overseas and from overseas fandom to non-Japanese creators who want to express their own lesbian narratives. While commercial publishers have stuck with more broadly appealing nonidentity narrative, there are leaks driven by internal pressure. Morishima Akiko's work in Comic Yuri Hime, Takashima Hiromi's work in Pure Yuri Anthology Hirari, Takemiya Jin's work for Hakusensha, and Nakamura Kiyo's autobiographical manga, all have forgotten to shy away from explicitly lesbian discussion.

[5.3] Yuri in 2016 is a genre created from mutually exclusive desires and different needs. Manga creators tell stories based in manga culture tropes rooted in 20th century lesbian community and life; commercial publishers sell to nonlesbian audiences; researchers seek to codify from a distance; and fans want stories of their own fantasies and realities. New waves of lesbian identity, with new storytellers, shape and reshape the genre as culture shifts. Yuri is constantly in flux.

I personally don’t think there’s anything wrong with GL or Girls Love, and will continue to use that alongside other qualifiers. In some markets it doesn’t make sense to use Yuri, such as the South Korean-based Webtoons, and general global markets as a whole that don’t have Japanese manga and anime as an inception point for bodies of work that would otherwise be defined specifically as Yuri.