Kodomo

Kodomo manga (kodomo-muke manga, literally "directed at children") is the editorial category of Japanese comics and animation aimed at pre-adolescent children, completing the medium's demographic map alongside shonen, shojo, seinen and josei. Its works are usually moralistic, often educating children about staying on the right path in life, and each chapter typically stands alone as a complete story, a shape that suits young readers arriving at any issue. Doraemon and Osamu Tezuka's Astro Boy anchor the shelf, carried by magazines such as CoroCoro Comic, and the category ties into video game and toy franchises with some of the industry's greatest commercial success.

For prose writers the label repeats the lesson of the manga demographics: it names the reader, not the content, and its moral, educational register is the contract that comes with the youngest audience of the five.