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I saw a comment online that stated _The Legend of Korra_ is not anime. I kinda
know the argument in that "anime" refers to only Japanese animation, but is
that so? The style of this anime, the humour, and everything about it seems
extremely anime. I understand that it was written by Americans and animated in
Korea.

Is _The Legend of Korra_ seriously not considered anime because of this?

Am I going to have to categorize this into an alternate genre type, so that I
can add _Archer_ and _Futurama_? Is there a genre type for these types of
animations like with "shoujo", "shounen", "seinen", and "josei"?


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terminology
Is The Legend of Korra anime?


The motivation for deciding that it is not anime is that it is a Western
Animation. Despite the fact that the styles borrow from one another, anime is
often considered simply "Eastern Animation". While there is a lot of "I know
it if I see it" characteristics which make the Avatar series more anime-like
than Futurama, it it still considered Western in origin.


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The "genre" that I have typically heard these type of shows being referred to
as "American Anime" or "Western Anime" to refer to the borrowed style, however
I've only seen these terms used "unofficially". The term anime these days is
most commonly used to define works originating from Japan, and [even some
dictionaries](http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/anime) define it as
such.

Let's take a look at some other notable titles:

  * [RWBY](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RWBY) coins itself as "an American animated web series". Even though it is licensed in Japan, most still won't consider it "anime" in the traditional sense, although [judging by this article](http://www.crunchyroll.com/anime-news/2013/07/12/feature-inside-rooster-teeths-rwby) some people really want to view it as such.

  * [Halo Legends](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo_Legends) considers itself "anime" as the actual animation studios were based in Japan, and they were given a wide degree of freedom in terms of story.

  * [The Animatrix](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Animatrix) dubs itself "animated short films". Although the majority of the films within the anthology originated from Japanese studios, the collection as a whole originates from several different countries.

In this regard we can deduce that strictly speaking, Legend of Korra isn't
considered anime solely for the reason that it wasn't produced or even
animated in Japan. However this doesn't mean that the definition will evolve
to refer to the overall art style if other countries start producing these
types of works.


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Any animation that is not made by a Japanese production company is not anime,
according to the English definition of the term.

To Japanese people in Japanese, the Japanese words 「アニメーション」 and 「アニメ」(
_animeeshon_ , shortened to _anime_ ) are used to describe any animation,
whether made in Japan or made in other countries, such as Disney.

It is important to distinguish between the Japanese word used by Japanese in
Japan to describe all animation from all countries, as compared to the English
word which is distinct from that in meaning. The English word only refers to
animation that is made by a Japanese production company. It includes many
series which were almost entirely animated in Korea by Koreans, but done so
for a Japanese production company. Look in the credits list at the end of many
anime TV series and you will see many Korea names; since the company is
Japanese, it counts as anime, even if the animating work was largely
accomplished by non-Japanese people. If the exact same Korean animators
created an animated series produced by a Korean company, it would not be anime
according to the English definition of the word.

Korean comics are called _manhwa_. There are a handful of American publishers
that might market a graphic novel to you as "manga made in America," but that
is actually an oxymoron. The English word "manga" only refers to comics
produced by Japanese publishing companies. Japanese people do not usually use
the Japanese word 「漫画」 ( _manga_ ) to refer to comics from other countries;
instead they say 「コミックス」 ( _komikkusu_ ). Again, you could be a non-Japanese
living in Japan and having your comic published in a Japanese manga magazine,
and it would be real manga, because of the company, regardless of your own
ethnicity. But if you are ethnically-Japanese publishing your comic outside of
Japan, it is not manga.

Another important thing to keep in mind is that neither the English word nor
the Japanese word contain anything related to art style. This is also true of
words such as _shounen, shoujo, seinen, josei_ , and so on: within each, there
is a wide variety of art styles. For example, compare the art style of _Kaitou
St. Tail_ to _NANA,_ to _Kiko-chan Smile,_ to _Ace wo Nerae,_ to _Zetsuai
1989_. They are all _shoujo_ , but they do not look alike, and there are
respective _shounen_ series that look more like one of them than the other.

_Shounen, shoujo, seinen,_ and _josei_ are words that can only be used to
refer to sub-genres within Japanese comics and animation; they cannot be
applied to animation produced in America or any other countries. Rather than
genres proper, they are simply technical groupings of marketing targets: was
this series targeted at young adult women, or not? You can promptly tell which
type it is by which area of the Japanese bookstore the manga is in.

According to [Energetic Heartbeats](http://shoujo.tripod.com/intro.html),

> What is Shoujo?  
>  Shoujo (girls') is not a genre itself - it's the marketing strategy. Shoujo
> simply means that the title was originally marketed to a female audience in
> Japan. Nothing more than that. Shoujo includes its own genres that cannot be
> found in their original form within the shounen world, including mahou
> shoujo, shounen ai, yaoi, yuri, and others.  
>  Shoujo is not limited to only anime and manga. The word is also used for
> audio dramas and novels. . . . Pretty much any film genre you can think of
> has been represented in shoujo.
>
> What is Not Shoujo?  
>  Shoujo is NOT a type of art style, nor a type of story element. It is not
> even neccessarily work by a specific creator. For example, the beloved team
> CLAMP is responsible for outstanding examples of shoujo manga and anime, but
> has also created shounen manga. What's the difference between the shounen
> manga and the shoujo manga? The shounen series was serialized in a manga
> magazine aimed at male readers.


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