Science Fair Project Encyclopedia
Kemono
Kemono (Japanese 獣 or けもの "beast") is a genre of Japanese art and character design that prominently features animal-like fictional characters in human-like settings and situations. It bears many resemblances to the furry scene, but with many differences in background and aesthetic appeal. That is to say, kemono is as unique as Japan itself. Kemono is used widely in drawing, painting, manga, anime, and video game designs, many of which are popular in the rest of the world.
Human-like animal characters in the kemono genre are frequently called Jūjin (Japanese 獣人 or じゅうじん "beast-person"). Their unique design differs from artist to artist, but in general they combine popular character design with animal traits deemed cute and endearing. However, most kemono character designs retain a fundamentally human character and personality, seldom acting like the real animals after which they are designed. As such, kemono are usually shown living the way normal humans live in the same setting: speaking normal language, wearing normal clothes, eating normal food, living in normal homes, in ways that actually blurs their distinction between ordinary humans.
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Kemono in popular entertainment
The kemono style of character design is prominent in Japanese arts, particularly in video games. Following is a list of popular Japanese-based publications featuring or including kemono characters:
Anime and manga
- Dragon Ball series
- Phoenix (Hi no Tori) series
- Kuchi-inu
- Ku Clan
- InuYasha
- animal-like demons
- Samurai Pizza Cats (Kyatto Ninden Teyandē)
- The Cat Returns
Video games
- Breath of Fire series
- random population distribution
- Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross
- demi-humans of Medina, Marbule, Guldove
- Reptite race
- Frog
- Lynx
- Darkstalkers series
- John Talbain (a.k.a. Gallon)
- Felicia
- Final Fantasy series
- Final Fantasy I
- dragons of the Cardia Islands
- Final Fantasy IV
- Mithril Town
- Final Fantasy V
- wolves of Quelb
- Final Fantasy VI
- Lone Wolf
- Final Fantasy IX
- rats of Burmecia
- random population distribution
- Final Fantasy X
- wolf-like Ronso tribe
- Final Fantasy Tactics Advance
- lizard-like Bangaa
- rabbit-like Viera
- Final Fantasy I
- Legend of Zelda series
- Ganon
- humanoid monster races
- Metroid series
- Chozo race
- Mega Man X (Rock Man X) series
- humanoid animal robots
- SaGa series
- Final Fantasy Legend subseries
- monsters
- random population distribution
- Final Fantasy Legend subseries
- Seiken Densetsu series
- Seiken Densetsu 3
- Beast Kingdom
- Legend of Mana
- random population distribution
- Sword of Mana
- Niccolo
- Seiken Densetsu 3
- Shining series
- occasional characters
- Sonic the Hedgehog series
- Star Fox series
- Super Mario Bros. series
- Koopa race
- Wild ARMs series
- Elw race
- Xenogears
- demi-humans of Kislev
- Chu-Chu race
Kemono on the Internet
Just as with the furry scene, many amateur kemono artists maintain homepages and websites that showcase presentations of their artwork to the general public. These artists are predominantly male (although there are a few female artists), and draw predominantly male and masculine illustrations. Sometimes these depictions idealize the masculine or muscular physique, in fashions reminiscent of male modeling. Occasional female characters can be seen, but they are usually completely human in appearance, or have only marginal kemono features such as kemono ears.
Unlike in the Internet furry scene, pornography is actually rare and quite discreet in the Internet kemono scene. It does occasionally exist, but is usually not readily mentioned, advertised, or linked to from websites. However, as with much of Japanese popular entertainment, there exists an adequate supply of themes which many foreign audiences may perceive as adult in connotation. But the general tendency to avoid or hide pornographic content has actually made the Internet kemono scene attractive to animal character appreciators (including furry art fans) who also disdain pornography.
Kemono artists tend to be very protective of their copyrights, and usually forbid use of their media without permission. As webmasters, many (but not all) kemono artists also prefer to grant permission before allowing other website to link to their own. Most kemono websites offer a banner graphic for convenient visual linking, usually 200×40 pixels in size. Sometimes, the act of "mutual linking", where two websites each link to each other's website, is celebrated as a symbol of friendship between two webmasters.
Though based on very different cultural ideals, kemono and furry on the Internet can occasionally overlap, both geographically and in influence. Some kemono artists (such as Kazuma) appeal to both at the same time, attracting website visitors from all the world's shores. Kemono itself is not limited exclusively to Japan either — largely through anime, manga and video games, kemono has had an increasing influence in anthropomorphic arts outside of Japan. In addition to Japan, the biggest centers of kemono popularity tend to be among ethnic Japanese, the international otaku community, and in places more heavily influenced by Japanese popular culture such as former possession Taiwan and heavily Japanese-settled Hawai‘i.
See also: oyaji
External links
(This is a brief list of well-distinguished kemono websites on the Internet. These websites are all link-free or have been irrevocably permitted to be linked to by their webmasters. Most of the sites are written only in Japanese, and some may contain themes perceived as mildly adult in nature.)
- 獣コミュニティ・FANG en (Kemono Community FANG)
- Popular and distinguished artists:
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