Friday, July 10, 2009

Miyazaki's Heroine Archetype



Sure, there are differences between them, but they're all charming, compassionate, resourceful, just, and brave; despite finding themselves in untenably strange or dangerous situations. Extremely positive female role models. I had this thought the other day, though--Hayao Miyazaki has two sons, but if he had a daughter, would she be, like, perpetually bummed; unable to live up to these impossible standards?

As a parent who sometimes makes stuff, I worry about these things.

4 comments:

Galspanic said...

I'm glad you worry about this too. Nice drawring.

odori said...

My guess is the hypothetical daughters would be inspired, not intimidated, by the strong girl characters.

Heeero said...

Just putting it out there...but does it seem that Master Miyazaki kind of makes his female characters more masculine and his male characters a bit more feminine? (I'm really not sure, but I'm on a BSG overdose right now and this seems to have a parallel)

Galspanic said...

Interesting. i would definitely say there's a certain hrmmm balancing (for lack of a better word) in Miyazaki's archetypes. The roles are still defined, but the males do tend to be less aggressive, whereas the women are more aggressive. Most of the time, the true aggressors in his stories are female.
Good catch, Heeero!