So I learned something very interesting today – a chica on the Anime North Facebook Forum posted the differences in words that are used in the circle of homosexual; based anime and manga!
I have never heard these definitions before so I knew right away that I had to share them!
Yaoi: Male/Male SMUT. This is the stuff you usually find in fan work and on DeviantART and Tumblr.
Shounen-ai: This used to be the term referring to mangas that focus on less hardcore gay mangas (so the ones with no sex and the like). HOWEVER I have since been informed that this word is now used to describe a fetish for underage boys in Japan (YUCK!)
BL: The term that people should be using. BL , short for boy love, is a male/male romance aimed at primarily female readers. Like all other romances they can have a mixture of themes such as horror, comedy or mystery.
The ones of a more hardcore nature, aka more sex, are called hard BL.
Slash: This term is used to describe when people put two characters together PURELY for the sake of Fan Fiction, fanart and any other fan works.
Gei-comi: Now this one I knew NOTHING about. Gei-comi is a genre of Japanese comics featuring gay men and written for gay men. Also, interestingly enough, the men in these comics tend to be more muscular, hairy, overweight, or any other term used to describe a real average joe.
Fujoshi: Literally translating to ‘rotten girl’ this a ajoking term that many Japanese girls use to describe themselves if they like BL or any other style of manga.
So there we go!
I learned something and so did you! EVERYONE WINS!
Technikitty: The Life and Times of a Canadian Nerd 