Anime/manga club idea and supply request

[telophase]

This request is from puppleball, a friend of mine who is a teacher at a middle school in Garlands (part of the Dallas metroplex):

I can't post to livejournal right now (plus you have a larger friends list than I do) since the school blocks it. Would you mind posting up a request for me? Several students have approached me about starting an anime/manga club. I'm trying to get them to tell me what they want to do exactly, the goals of the club, and while they are being a bit dodgy, one of the main goals is just being able to get together and draw manga. Could you post a request for book/material donations for me? The how to draw manga books or anything that might be useful to these kids. The club will be either a before or after school club opened to any student (6-8 grade). I'm also in search of things to do with the kids during this time. Structured tasks to help them with thier drawing, added with anime viewing. The viewings I need recommendations for. Remember kid appropriate 11-14 year olds. People can email me at my puppleball [at] comcast [dot] net address (using my school address will catch things in the filter) and mail anything up to the school:

Sam Houston MS
Attn: Shirley Soto
Science Department
2232 Sussex Dr
Garland TX 75041

Comments

[rayechu.livejournal.com]

This is what I emailed to the teacher- but I am also posting it here for any additional thoughts. I maybe be way out there then what everyone else is thinking and just not know it :p

First off I would like to say thank you for even considering an anime/manga club in your school. I would have killed to have one during my junior high years but there probably wasn’t really enough demand for it then.

For book/material requests-
*There are a LOT of “How to draw manga” books out there- many of them are not age appropriate (as in they focus a lot on slutty girls in little clothing) and not worth the paper they are printed on. Before investing in any of the books please check the local libraries. We have a relatively small library and it carries a few such books.

For tasks-
*What about entering Tokyopop’s “Rising Stars of Manga” contest? The project would definitely take a while and be good as a long-term goal.
*What about creating simple things like calendars, buttons/pins, or posters?

Viewing recommendations-
* I would advise against playing anime series. A movie is more condensed and if someone is bored with the selection, it will be different by the next week.
* For movies I would suggest anything by Miyazaki as well as older things like “A dog of Flander’s”, Catnapped, or The Last Unicorn (yes I consider it an anime).
*If possible play “Dragon Half”, as it is one of the funniest dubs in existence, and the comedy more fun with more people.

Age “appropriate”-
You may run in to some problems here.
*In general anime/manga fans tend to be the smart/nerdy kids and a bit more mature about things then their peers. This wouldn’t really seem like a big deal but there are a few “issues” in manga that steps on some toes, mainly nudity and cussing. Most manga have a scene with a nude person, many don’t go into detail, but others do. There is a beauty in nudity that other cultures accept much more readily then our own, and trying to block every series that has nudity might be a bit hard, and might cut out a lot of good series. Inuyasha, Fruits Basket, Sailor Moon, and many other anime marketed towards the 3-5 year olds on Saturday morning television include nudity in their manga counterparts. The same goes for cussing/cursing- The use of vocabulary is more precise in manga, and because there is less talking then in American comic books, if a character would be more believable saying damn! As opposed to darn, they will print damn.
*Many of the “ratings” on the manga and anime books are a bit off as well. “Card Captor Sakura” gets an All ages rating, while “Tokyo Mew Mew” gets a rating of 10+, As a fan of both series I can safely say that I would give either of them to a 6-7 year old to read. “Fruits Basket” rates 13+ and I believe they are cutting out a large chunk of audience that could benefit FROM reading fruits basket. Simply because a book deals with an issue like harassment (not sexual) or abuse, does not mean it should be hidden away and deemed “inappropriate”.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

:D Yeah, she's with you on the 'inappropriate' issue, but she's handicapped by school guidelines and potentially panicked parents, and I think she's - certainly at this point in time - trying to give the kids something fun to do instead of make a political/moral stand over cultural practices.

She's familiar with the anime milieu - she's a staff head at A-Kon - although I don't think she watches much of the more recent series (past 3-4 years) and is more familiar with the more adult-oriented ones than the preteen and teen ones.

You've got some good ideas with the movies there, I think - you're right they'd probably do better with movies to start with thans eries, at elast until the club gets established.

Thank you! XD

[rayechu.livejournal.com]

Ah. I skimmed through the LJ but didn't see anything anime-related.
I am sure she would be able to send home a permission slip type thing saying there might be brief nudity or something? Heck as long as they aren't reading Battle Royale or watching Perfect Blue you should pretty much be okay.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Not for 11-13-year-olds. Teens can do that for stuff like Romeo and Juliet, but middle-school kids, especially in Dallas, which is a rather conservative area, and for something that isn't Shakespeare?

Not to mention it would exclude any kid whose parents don't want them to see it, and I think the idea is to have it open for any kid who wants to come.