All is not black and white in manga

• The manga becomes inclusive, thanks to the laws for a better integration of people with disabilities in Japanese society.

• Since 2000, several albums have tackled disability.

  The best known remain "Perfect World", "A Silent Voice" or "Real".

• However, the genre only tackles the subject in the background.

  Most disabled characters are still too often secondary characters.

Since the beginning of the 2000s, several manga have given pride of place to disability: “I think it's linked to legislative reforms for better integration of people with disabilities into Japanese society.

Pop culture follows the evolution of laws, ”notes Anne-Lise Mithout, specialist in disability issues in Japan and lecturer at Paris-Diderot University.

In recent years, efforts have also been made in terms of inclusion, in particular with the education of children with disabilities in regular classes.

The presence of disabled main characters in manga is therefore "fairly recent".

From "Knights of the Zodiac" to "Real"

Among the manga that have marked the genre, the best known is surely "Perfect World". Launched in 2016 by Akata editions, its success was such that a film was born in 2018. The story is that of a young woman who finds her childhood love again forced to move in a wheelchair. Another manga is illustrated in the field: 

 which deals with the school bullying of a deaf girl. We also note Real,

or

.

In other books, we find "characters who lose their sight like Mammoth in

, Shiryu in

or the main hero of

 ", lists Arnaud Lapote, the creator of Geneworld.net, a site dedicated to cartoon credits, and Manga Center, an online bookstore.

Buddhist heritage

Still, “there aren't a lot of manga that deals with disability as the main topic. Most of the characters with disabilities in manga are either secondary characters or characters that highlight romance or exceptional physical ability, ”he observes. An observation shared by Anne-Lise Mithout: “In

for example, we talk about disability, but the deaf girl appears to be doubly passive because of her gender and her disability to promote a male hero. "

To understand the relationship that manga culture has with disability, you have to look at your country of origin: Japan. “People with disabilities are marginalized in Japanese society. In the Buddhist religion, disability is retribution for a bad deed done in a previous life. Today, if belief is less present, this idea has not completely disappeared, ”analyzes the sociologist. According to her, mental disability is still stigmatized since "the people who are victims are sometimes seen as carrying a bad gene that should not be disseminated in the rest of society".

But mentalities are changing.

For the founder of Manga Center, “if children, teens and even adults are used to meeting people with disabilities in their favorite manga, they are also used to seeing the same thing in the real world.

The manga therefore contributes, in a certain way, its stone to the edifice.

"

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• Inclusion

• Manga

• Culture

• Handicap

• Japan

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