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Related: Kaguya-sama: Dropping keigo when narrating?


In Kaguya-sama Chapter 52 / S02E02, there's a character named Moeha Fujiwara (the imouto of a main character Chika Fujiwara) who talks about Kei Shirogane (the imouto of the male protagonist Miyuki Shirogane) to Kaguya Shinomiya (the female protagonist and title character) as follows:

圭ちゃんかわいいよね

ウチのクラスの男子は勿論だけど

女の子からもすっごくモテるんだよ。

In manga:

enter image description here

In anime:

See 0:11 - 0:18 here.

Question 1:

Actually, I didn't fully read up on the differences between onna vs joshi and shounen vs otoko (so far I just think of them as the difference between man vs boy vs male or like naturally vs of course [touzen / tōzen vs mochiron?]), but I believe the analogues / antonyms are as follows:

male female
otoko onna
otokonoko onnanoko
N/A otome
danshi joshi
dansei josei
shounen shoujo

Why is Moeha seemingly using 女の子 as an opposite for 男子?

Question 2:

Btw I notice 'ウチのクラスの' is removed in the anime. Is the only difference 'in class' like Moeha in the anime says Kei is popular with boys (not necessarily limiting to a particular class or even year) ?

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1 Answer 1

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・Answer 1

Both 女の子 and 男の子 have a cute nuance. But both 女子 and 男子 have a little curt nuance.

In Japan (although it may be similar in other countries), adolescent girls tend to despise boys a little. If you want boys and girls to line up in parallel, you should use ”男子 and 女子” or ”男の子 and 女の子”. But, in this case, She wants to make the difference between boys and girls for the reasons I just mentioned. So, using 男子 and 女の子 would be appropriate.

・Answer 2

You are right. However, I guess the reason why the expression is different between manga and anime is not only depends on the meaning, but also depends on the limitation of airtime.

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  • i'm a monolinguist so don't judge me please. is 'nuance' here synonymous to 'connotation'?
    – BCLC
    Commented Jan 4, 2023 at 7:18
  • OMG THANK YOU. Am I allowed to use this as a little evidence that Moeha might be gei for kei? merry christmas happy new year and happy holidays! (Edit to this initial comment which I deleted and am reposting: Moeha in s3 has a crush on Miyuki. So I don't think s2 is about 'despite boys a little'...in the heterosexual / heteronormative way you might be thinking. I'm arguing that Moeha has / had a little crush on Kei, who is said by Kaguya to be have a very similar personality to Miyuki. I wasn't expecting to get evidence from this question. I just asked about the nuances. Then voilà.)
    – BCLC
    Commented Jan 4, 2023 at 7:28
  • There is no problem with "connotation". I'm just studying English, was there something wrong with the use of "nuances"? And, gei means gay? If so, I don't think I can judge in this context. Commented Jan 4, 2023 at 7:36
  • I think technically a "nuance" is more like the difference in "connotation". So a single word can have a connotation, but it takes at least two to have a nuance. But I didn't really notice something was off about it until I read the comments and thought about it, if I'm being honest.
    – towr
    Commented Jan 4, 2023 at 16:49
  • I see, thanks!! Commented Jan 6, 2023 at 3:39

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