The contemporary Comic Market: A study of subculture

The fan cultures surrounding manga and anime in Japan, associated with ‘otaku’, continue to draw popular and academic interest around the world. This article focuses on the Comic Market (also known as Comiket or Comike), one of the largest fan gatherings in the world. The Comic Market brings together 35,000 artists selling self-published work, mostly manga books featuring characters from established series, which are purchased by the over half-a-million people that attend the event. This article, based on fieldwork conducted in the summer of 2004, argues that the Comic Market provides a space of self-affirmation, which keeps fans participating in the event even when it is physically exhausting and costs them money to do so. In contrast to approaches that imagine communities of fans communicating with one another about shared interests, this article argues that, at the Comic Market, it is not communicating with others that allows one to limit encounters with difference and affirm one’s self as a participant. Through a study of Comic Market participants, we can examine the state of self and communication in contemporary Japan and beyond.