The Desire and Disgust of Sweets: Consuming Femininities through Shōjo Manga

This article examine images of sweets—cakes, cookies, and parfaits—in texts by artists Hagio Moto (b. 1949) and Yoshinaga Fumi (b. 1971) in order to trace an unremarkable history of shōjo manga. My analysis suggests that feminist scholars of Japanese girls' culture have largely avoided emphasizing conventional femininities circulated through many shōjo manga; instead, they focus on a narrative concerning the subversive qualities of the genre due to its rejection of gender and sexual norms. Describing representations of sweetness in terms of desire and disgust, I reflect upon possibilities for feminist perspectives that simultaneously allow for both pleasure and critique with the everyday consumption of shōjo manga.