[Thelastguardian]

Originally Posted by Kaoru Chujo

As for seinen and josei, I think they just refer to the target audience: upper teen/young adult guys for seinen, and girls that age for josei.

I wrote a complete classification on AS before. It is gone now thanks to the server crash.

Since I am too lazy to type them all out again. Time to fallback to wikipedia

Spoiler for Kodomo:

Note – Honestly I have never heard of people using Kodomo- but it is on wikipedia, so what the heck.

Kodomo (子供) is a Japanese word that means child. However, to most readers of manga and anime, the word refers to a specific genre intended primarily for children.

Kodomo is noted for its lack of fanservice and other themes and devices which are more appropriate for other audiences; the stories also feature more family- and child-friendly themes and concepts.
Examples of works in the genre include Doraemon, a story about a boy and his cat; and Hamtaro, about a group of hamsters and their owners.

Spoiler for Shonen:

Note - Naruto, Bleach, DBZ- anything that involves competition between hot-blooded males :^)

Shōnen or shounen (少年) is a Japanese word usually translated as "young boy", although it is commonly used to refer to males of up to high-school age as well. The word is composed of the characters meaning "few" and "year[s]". The word can also mean "pure of heart". In English, it usually refers to anime and manga which is primarily intended for boys, although there can be crossover appeal to men and females as well. Some popular examples are Mobile Suit Gundam, Dragon Ball, Shaman King, One Piece, and Naruto.

Shōnen anime and manga is characterized by high-action, often humorous plots featuring male protagonists. The camaraderie between boys or men on sports teams, fighting squads, etc. is often emphasized. Unrealistically attractive female characters are also common (see fanservice), but are not a requirement — Dragon Ball Z for example has only a few remarkable female characters. The art style of shōnen is generally less flowery than that of shōjo, although this varies greatly from artist to artist, and some artists draw both shōnen and shōjo.

In contrast to shōnen, anime and manga for men (university age and up) is called seinen. Despite a number of significant differences, many Western fans don't make a distinction between shōnen and seinen. This is due to the fact that very few seinen manga have been published outside of Japan. On the other hand, many older men in Japan read shōnen magazines because of their ease of reading during commutes to and from work on trains. Consequently shōnen magazines (including Shonen Jump) are the most popular manga magazines in Japan.
Several series have notorious female audiences, who predominantly included them in non-canonical yaoi (and even shota-con) fanwork and dōjinshi.

Also see shōjo — anime and manga intended for girls, josei—anime and manga intended for adult women, and seinen—anime and manga intended for adult men.

Spoiler for Shojo:

Note - look for cute (not handsome, cute) guys doing amazingly romantic stuff that has no function other than good looking.

Shōjo or shoujo (少女 lit. young woman) is, in western usage, a style of anime and manga intended for girls (that may have some crossover appeal to boys as well).

Typically, "pure shōjo" manga revolves around love stories and strong female protagonists; however, some shōjo anime and manga are more plot or action-oriented to attract a wider audience. For instance, a lot of older salarymen were drawn to a manga called Banana Fish for its hard-edged yakuza action (which is more often found in seinen manga). What kept female audiences interested in this work was a gentle relationship between two gay bishōnen lovers amongst all the violence.

Shōjo anime and manga often contain elements of shōnen-ai or even yaoi (sexual relationship between male characters), not to mention shōjo-ai and, recently, yuri (sexual relationship between female characters). The aesthetic of the bishōnen is very prominent. Another very popular genre is magical girl, of which the famous series Sailor Moon is a prime example.
Shōjo should be distinguished from bishōjo (pretty young girls); the latter term refers, somewhat confusingly, to content rather than target market. Shōjo is manga/anime for girls; bishōjo is manga/anime that has pretty girls, usually targeted towards a male audience.

Many shōjo titles are often described as dark and moody, which is sometimes counterintuitive from a Western viewpoint.
See also shōnen, anime and manga intended for boys; josei, anime and manga intended for adult women; and seinen, anime and manga intended for adult men.

Spoiler for Bishojo:

Note - your everyday harem/most hgames

Bishōjo (美少女;literally, "beautiful young girl"), also spelled bishoujo, is a Japanese term used to refer to young and pretty girls, usually below college age.

Bishōjo are seen in almost all genres of anime and manga, ranging from shōjo to mecha, but especially renai games and so-called harem anime. It is sometimes considered the most mild form of fanservice, particularly if older women would be more appropriate characters. A "bishōjo series" is a series directed towards a male audience predominantly featuring such characters, and usually a single token male character, if any. The main draws for this audience are typically the art and the attractive female characters, and the term is sometimes itself perceived negatively as a "genre" solely depending on its marketability of cute characters.

It is distinguished from the similar sounding shōjo demographic by referring to the gender of the characters, not the intended audience. Shōjo is manga/anime for girls; bishōjo is manga/anime about pretty girls, usually targeted towards a male audience.

Spoiler for Bishonen:

Note - sort of rare as they don't get animated very often. Look for fangirls drawing for details ^_^;;

Bishōnen (美少年, also transliterated bishounen; literally, "beautiful boy") is a specific Japanese aesthetic concept of the ideally beautiful young man. The prefix bi (美) specifically refers to feminine beauty, and bijin, literally "beautiful person", is used to refer to a beautiful woman. The bishōnen is typically quite slender and not very muscular, with a tapered chin, stylish hair, and an overall effeminate or androgynous appearance. Occasionally biseinen (literally beautiful young man) is seen as a synonym, but biseinen usually refers to a handsome man older than a bishōnen. The standard distinction is that bishōnen is applied to young men or adolescents, biseinen is applied to men older than about 21 (sources vary this from 19 to 24), and bishota is applied to pre-adolescent beautiful males. Bishōnen is the most popular of the three terms, and has become the generic term for all beautiful boys.

The aesthetic of the bishōnen began as an ideal of a young homosexual lover, likely arising from the effeminate male actors who played female characters in Kabuki theater. It is perpetuated today in anime and manga, especially shōjo (girl) anime, shōnen-ai, and yaoi.

Bishōnen is sometimes also depicted as an anime or manga character that is drawn as if a female, but has male components. This would make it easier for the artist to create a feminine male, rather than drawing a male character regularly.

Examples of Bishōnen drawing styles are included in Castlevania, FAKE, Gravitation, Peach Girl, Loveless, Kingdom Hearts, Final Fantasy, and Sukisho.

Today, Bishonen is very popular among girls in Japan. Reasons for this phenomenon may include the unique male/female relationships found within the genre. Some have theorized that Bishonen provides a non-traditional outlet for gender relations. Moreover, it breaks down stereotypes surrounding effete characters. These are often depicted with very strong martial arts abilities, sports talent, high intelligence, or comedic flare, traits that are usually assigned to the hero/protagonist. Although they were depicted as homosexual in manga, most of them in reality are heterosexual.

Spoiler for Seinen:

Note - A more developed Shounen.

Seinen (Japanese: 青年, not to be confused with "seinen" (成年; adult)) is a subset of anime or manga that is generally targeted at a 18 - 25 year old male audience, but the audience can be much older with some comics aimed at businessmen well into their 40s. Sometimes it is classified as shōjo or shōnen, but it has distinct features, usually classified by a wider variety of art styles (particularly in manga) and more variation in subject matter, ranging from the avant garde to the pornographic. The female equivalent to seinen is josei. The genre is comparable to the English terms and genre "Young Adult" or "Teen".

A common way to tell if a comic is seinen is by looking at whether or not furigana is used over the original kanji text. A lack of furigana would imply that the title is intended for a mature audience. The title of the magazine it was published in is also an important indicator. Usually Japanese manga magazines with the word young in the title (Young Jump for instance) are seinen. Other popular seinen manga magazines include Ultra Jump, Afternoon, and Big Comic. Many of these manga were published in English in the now defunct PULP.

Spoiler for Josei:

Note - Honey and Clover, Paradise Kiss etc. This genre is quite new compared to the others

Josei manga (Japanese: 女性, lit. "woman"), is a genre of manga or anime created mostly by women, for late teenage and adult female audiences. The male equivalent to josei is seinen. In Japanese, the word josei means only "female" and is not directly indicative of sexual matter.

The stories tend to be about everyday experiences of women living in Japan. Though there are some that cover high school, most cover the lives of adult women. The style also tends to be a more restrained, realistic version of shōjo, keeping some of the wispy features and getting rid of the very large sparkly eyes. There are exceptions in the style described above, but what defines josei is some degree of stylistic continuity of comics within this particular demographic (the same is true with different demographics that have different stylistic tendencies).

In addition, unlike shōjo, josei comics can portray realistic romance (as opposed to mostly idealized romance). A subset of josei comics are comics that are aimed at women about homosexual male relationships, much like but not to be confused with yaoi; josei tending to be both more explicit and with more mature storytelling. Josei is also known for a very sexual edge; many of the magazines have some of the raunchiest porn produced in Japan.

Josei is sometimes used within anime or manga, mostly by male characters, to refer to a sexual preference for older women, as contrasted with lolicon.

+ Ero-anime :^)

Why did I went through the trouble of going through all these? Because I really hate it when people mix up the genre. It irritates me to no end.