About

Yaoi (also know as shōnen-ai or Boy's Love) is a genre of manga and anime marked by erotic relationships between male characters. Consumers of the fiction are believed to be predominately female. Some examples of yaoi manga/anime are Dramatical Murder, Gakuen Heaven and Sekai Ichi Hastukoi.

History

Yaoi first started out in 70s Japan. Female authors of shōjo manga magazines started publishing relationships between young boys. In the late 70s to early 80s, dōjinshi of popular yaoi anime/manga were sexually parodied. The precursors of yaoi are often thought to be Kaze to Ki no Uta by Keiko Takemiya, or the shōnen ai mono stories by Kaoru Kurimoto^[1].

Fast forward to the 90s, when the Internet was invented. The term "Boy's Love" was coined, and now yaoi could be spread across the world, via Web. As that happened, more fans spawned and the fan base slowly grew from Japan, to America. As big sites like 4chan, DeviantArt, and reddit were born in the early 2000s, becoming one of the most popular anime genres to this day.

Bara

Bara (Men's Love) is a genre of adult manga focusing on men. It's usually made for a gay audience and is written by men, unlike yaoi which is primarily written by women. Unlike yaoi, this genre depicts more masculine looking men, like men with big biceps or multiple "packs" (i.e Six packs). It also does not generally have the 'seme' and 'uke' relationships which are associated with yaoi.

Reception

Yaoi manga/anime has gained many different views. For example, some people in the LGBT community argue that yaoi artists depict homosexuals wrong. Others just think of it as a form of "female fetishism" or "porn for women". However, the fanbase usually ignores these claims and continues on with their hobby.

As for the positive reception, yaoi has received an above average fanbase. There has been multiple fan art as seen down here.

Fandom

There has also been multiple fanclubs, fanfiction, any thing with fan- in it for that matter.

4chan /y/ Board

Since the fandom's spread, many websites have grown accustomed to the yaoi fanbase. Back when 4chan was just anime, yaoi was one of the first boards. Explicit pictures are usually posted on the board containing hentai yaoi.

Yaoi on Reddit

Reddit also has its own subreddit dedicated to yaoi called /r/yaoi. Unlike 4chan, not all of it is explicit^[3].

DeviantArt

The Yaoi fanbase holds a very strong presence in DeviantArt. Search results for the term 'yaoi' yields a massive 882,084 results^[2].

Common Pairings

Fans of yaoi usually will ship different characters on different types of media. I'll use Television shows as an example. Here's a small list of any anime, cartoon, and live action show pairings that some fangirls may ship.

Anime:
Eren x Levi- Attack on Titan
Goku x Vegeta- Dragon Ball Z
Naruto x Sasuke- Naruto
Basically everyone-Free!

Cartoon:
Kyle x Cartman- South Park
Spongebob x Squidward- SpongeBob Squarepants

Live Action:
Dean x Castiel- Supernatural
Kirk x Spock- Star Trek
Daryl x Rick- The Walking Dead

Related Memes

Shipping

This is essential to the yaoi fanbase. Taken from relation*shipping*, this term means pairing together. This isn't used by just the yaoi fanbase, though.

Yaoi Hands

Yaoi Hands also known as “Yaoi hand syndrome”, is a term for aggrandized hands that can be found in Yaoi. It is a type of Quality that is prevalent in the genre.

Yaranaika

Yaranaika (Japanese: やらないか?) or “Shall we do it?” is a popular catchphrase / internet meme that stems from the opening dialogue in Kuso Miso Technique, a Geikomi manga drawn by Yamakawa Junichi.

Search Interest

External References