Genres
Shojo
The manga editorial category aimed at adolescent girls and young adult women, centered on relationships and emotions.
Shojo manga is an editorial category of Japanese comics targeting an audience of adolescent girls and young adult women. The word shojo translates literally as "girl", and the label does not refer to a specific style or a genre but indicates a target demographic, though visual conventions such as non-rigid panel layouts and large, highly detailed eyes are associated with it. Common themes are human relationships and emotions, characters defying traditional gender and sexuality roles, and supernatural or paranormal subjects. The category was formalized in the 1950s and transformed from the 1960s to the 1970s by female artists, including the Year 24 Group.
For prose writers the useful fact is thematic: relationships and interiority lead, plot follows. The counterpart shelves are shonen for adolescent boys and josei for adult women.