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I've noticed that most anime, especially in genres like slice of life and
romantic comedies, there is at least one character that plays the role of the
childhood friend (osananajimi). This is often coupled with the unrequited
love, girl next door, or other related
[tropes](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PatientChildhoodLoveInterest?from=Main.Osananajimi).

Of course, childhood friends are in every culture out there, but I'm curious
if Japan has a special reason for this particular occurrence in anime shows.
Also, aside from gender inclination towards the shounen genre, why is it that
most osananajimi are girls whereas in real life, our childhood friends are
typically of the same sex? Is this occurence more prevalent in Japan than in
other cultures?

And feel free to edit (especially the title) and/or comment if this question
is off-topic.


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2014-12-03T15:25:02.657
15452
2014-12-20T09:10:28.323
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question
anime-production tropes
Why is the childhood friend trope commonly seen in anime?


As the comments say, this is a somewhat subjective question. I'll give my own
reason, which I think is a big part of the reason this is common, but perhaps
not the only reason.

Japanese society is more regimented than one might believe just from watching
anime. By middle school age, and even to some degree in primary school,
children are expected to interact with their peers in a relatively
professional way. This is especially true of relationships between students of
opposite sexes. Such requirements aren't held for family or close friends, but
for everyone else one is expected to be polite and not share their true
feelings or say things too directly. This concept of dividing people into an
in-group and an out-group ([内外, _uchi-
soto_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uchi-soto)) is somewhat hard for non-
Japanese people to understand, but is central to interactions between people
in Japanese culture. In fact, you can find plenty of examples of this and of
the related concepts of [_honne_ and
_tatemae_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honne_and_tatemae) in anime if you
look, but if you aren't looking for them specifically it's easy to miss.

It's difficult for a person in the out-group to enter the in-group. While not
impossible, generally this takes time and effort. The groups aren't a simple
dichotomy either; they change depending on the situation. It's especially
difficult for close friendships between members of the opposite sex to form.
One way for this to happen is for the two to enter into a relationship, but
this is obviously not ideal if you want to make a romantic comedy where the
characters aren't already in relationships. Another way is for one person to
act closer to the other than they really are, as a way of testing the
boundaries, but that person is being somewhat rude in doing so and it can
backfire.

The most realistic way for a character to have a close friend is for them to
be long-time friends. Specifically, if their friendship goes back all the way
to childhood, when they didn't have to follow these strict rules, a friendship
could develop without much issue. Having a childhood friend character is one
way to get a character who is already part of the protagonist's in-group. From
a writer's standpoint, this is an attractive proposition, since it gives
someone that the protagonist can have relatively serious conversations with,
but who can also be a potential romantic interest. In (reverse) harem shows,
it's especially attractive to diversify the female (male) cast of romantic
interests.

That said, I think we have been seeing something of a decline in recent years
in this archetype, at least among harem shows. Probably writers have realized
that it's overused and that a generic _osananajimi_ character without any
unique personality traits isn't a very interesting character. Opposite-sex
childhood friends are also far less common in real life than in anime, making
the prevalence of this somewhat unrealistic. 10 years ago, nearly every
harem/romcom show had a character like this, but the proportion seems to have
dropped to less than half of them today. Partly, this can be attributed to
other archetypes increasing in popularity (notably, the little sister/
_imouto_ character, who can be even closer to the protagonist than a childhood
friend). When they do show up in shows today, it's often as a dual archetype
character, e.g. a _tsundere osananajimi_.


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2014-12-20T09:10:28.323
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2014-12-20T09:10:28.323
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