Anime and manga fandom traces back to at least the 1970s when fans of the series
Space Battleship Yamato banded together to get it back on the air after it stopped airing on Japanese
television. In Japan, anime and manga are referred to collectively as the content industry: anime, video games, manga, and other related
Merchandising are different types of media focused around the same content.
English-language fan communities The fan community in the English-speaking world began in the 1970s and steadily grew. According to Japanophile
Fred Patten, the very first fan club devoted to Japanese animation was the Cartoon/Fantasy Organization, which began in Los Angeles in 1977. Its growth was characterized by waves, which
Gilles Poitras, Bruce Lewis, and Cathy Sterling describe as distinct 'generations,' often sparked by a singular influential work. In the Philippines,
GMA-7 began airing
Voltes V in 1978. It was the first exposure of Filipinos to Japanese animation.
Voltes V soon became very popular between children all around the Philippines which led to the sudden popularity of other anime series related to the
Super Robot genre in the Philippines. It was soon banned in 1979 by then president
Ferdinand Marcos, four episodes before the end of the series, along with the other anime series airing at the time, supposedly for its violence and warlike themes. This, however, did not hinder the Filipinos' growing love of anime, leading to the large popularity of anime and manga throughout the Philippines. Poitras identifies the first generation as the "Astro Boy Generation". Despite being the first and most popular animated Japanese television series,
Astro Boy did not create many hardcore fans, but it exposed viewers to the medium and increased their receptivity towards it later on. The "Early Fans" or "Old Timers" generation that consumed titles like
Speed Racer,
Eighth Man, and
Battle of the Planets as staples. These fans were much more aware that what they were consuming was Japanese and took the initiative to search for more. The "Yamato" or "Star Blazers" generation originating from the series
Space Battleship Yamato that originally aired in 1979–80. Poitras states that this generation was so loyal because
Star Blazer's strong narration required viewers to never miss an episode. The Poitras dubs the next generation the "Robotech Generation", after the 1985 television series
Robotech, is the earliest major generation in the USA and is distinguished by fans clearly recognizing anime as a Japanese product with significant differences from American animation. Fans from this generation and the Yamato Generation were to make up the significant portion of organized fandom throughout the 1980s. The film
Akira, which played in art theaters in December 1989, produced a cult following that Poitras names the "Akira Generation".
Akira inspired some to move on to other works but stalled many becoming an isolated work in their eyes, overshadowing the creative context of anime and manga it represented. Before anime began to be licensed in the U.S., fans who wanted to get a hold of anime would leak copies of anime movies and subtitle them, thus marking the start of
fansubs. By 1994, anime had become more common in the U.S., and had begun being translated into English and shown on television, most commonly series such as
Pokémon and
Astro Boy. According to an early American anime
cosplayer Karen Schnaubelt, Japanese anime were "incredibly difficult to come by" with "nothing available except broadcast TV until"
VHS videotapes became commonly available in the late 1970s, allowing fans to import anime shows from Japan; she noted that a friend "would record the episodes" and then "a group of us would gather at his apartment and watch a marathon of the episodes". Some experts, such as Susan Napier, a Professor of Japanese Language and Literature, say that
Akira marked the first milestone. Due to the
localization process, many people who grew up watching anime did so not realizing that it originated in Japan. After the success of
Power Rangers (which first aired in 1993), U.S. television companies began broadcasting
Sailor Moon and
Dragon Ball Z in 1995 and 1996 respectively. However, due to the relative failure of the latter two (both shows brought success when aired at a later time on
Cartoon Network), anime did not seem like it would become mainstream. Particularly Italy imported the most anime outside of Japan. Like in the Philippines, the
Super Robot Genre became very popular with series such as
UFO Robot Grendizer and
Mazinger Z. However, many more genres got added to the mix, with space opera such as
Captain Harlock, shojo shows like
Candy Candy and
Rose of Versailles, sports like
Captain Tsubasa and more. Germany however largely rejected Anime other than western literature adaptations of
Nippon Animation, with
Speed Racer and
Captain Future proving to be problematic. It was only during the rise of cable television during the '90s that Japanese series such as
Queen Millennia, and
Rose of Versailles went on air. A strong affinity for unique Japanese productions was developed among a generation of German children during this period. In
Central and Eastern Europe, the Polish fandom was one of the first and largest fandoms to develop. The beginning of the anime and manga fandom in Poland can be traced to the 1990s, a few years after the
fall of communism in Eastern Europe.
Asian fan communities Malaysia Studies of fan behavior focused more on big fan activities or conventions in the past and transitioned toward from fan communities to individual fans. There are four conventions in urban areas of Malaysia: Kota Kinabalu, Sabah; Kuching, Sarawak; Sunway, Petaling Jaya, Selangor and Kuala Lumpur. They are held four times annually between December 2012 and August 2013. According to the survey, there are about 585 people who regularly attend these conventions. Half of the respondents were aged 18–22 as of 2013 with equal numbers of both genders. More than half of the respondents were student and all respondents were consumers of Japanese media. Although those four conventions did not officially announce that their event is mainly Japanese popular culture, majority of people were fans of Japanese popular culture. Their main purpose in attending these conventions is to meet new and old friends, to have fun, and to cosplay. They regularly attend these conventions to keep their fan communities active.
Latin American fan communities Mexico Japanese television shows began to be distributed in Latin America in the 1970s which included anime and was marketed as children's television. In the decades following, Japanese population culture saw a rise in popularity in Mexico. His importance stems from both his character and his story, which resonates with fans of the anime despite Goku not being Mexican himself. and the countless amounts of
fan art that tie Goku with Mexican culture. Many Mexican otaku's fan-made works have influence and/or are heavily inspired by the anime style. == Demographics ==