Though they claim the name Animosity, members of the MSU Anime/Manga Club seem to be full of anything but, at least for the anime world.
“That name dates from before I was really in the club,” Paul Corrigan said. “The joke was that we were supposed to be a militant anime club.”
But as it turns out, the only thing the group is militant about is promoting anime - Japanese animation - and mangas - Japanese comics - Corrigan said.
Corrigan, an economics graduate student and club adviser, has been a member of Animosity since fall 1998, when the group first moved to campus.
Animosity meets at 7 p.m. every Wednesday, usually in 1279 Anthony Hall.
“We show Japanese animations, the occasional film, then of course in between the showing we discuss what we saw,” Corrigan said of the group’s meetings, which draw around 40 people each week. “We discuss anime in general and basically compare our anime merchandise. Some people will draw fan art.”
Fan art - or combined as fanart - is drawings based on anime characters.
Popular examples of anime include “Pokémon,” “Dragonball Z” and “Sailor Moon.”
English freshman and club member Josh Bennett said he has been interested in anime and manga since he was in the 10th grade and has aspirations to move into the business.
“I’m hoping to move to Japan to draw my own series,” he said.
But group members also make fan subs, which is when an untranslated Japanese animation is translated and dubbed in English and then distributed for others to enjoy.
“(Fan subbing) is a lot of fun - a labor of love,” said Ann McHenry, who fan subs with other Animosity members. “Everybody knows something that somebody else doesn’t and it’s interesting to argue over what a line should be.”
McHenry, a Japanese senior, said she started watching anime a few years ago to improve her mastery of Japanese, but was soon drawn into the world of anime by its plots and characters.
But unlike most American cartoons, anime is not just for children.
“You get adult story lines. You get war, death, romance - things that don’t come up in Disney cartoons,” journalism junior and Animosity member Kim Strampel said.
“I think that we have ‘The Simpsons’ and ‘King of the Hill’ and those kind of things, but I don’t think most (Americans) think of cartoons as being for anybody but little kids.”
And while McHenry does watch anime for kids, such as Pokémon, Strampel hopes people realize anime is much more diverse than that.
“Most of the good stuff lies somewhere in the middle between the X-rated, really adult stuff, and the little kid stuff,” she said.
To find out more about Animosity, visit its Web site at www.animosity.org.
