'aesthete' or 'aesthetic'), and June ( ジュネ, ). Several terms were used for the new genre, including shōnen-ai ( 少年愛, lit. The genre originated in the 1970s as a subgenre of shōjo manga, or comics for girls. While ' yaoi' is commonly used in the west as an umbrella term for Japanese-influenced media with male-male relationships, 'boys' love' and 'BL' are the generic terms for this kind of media in Japan and much of Asia. Yaoi spans a wide range of media, including manga, anime, drama CDs, novels, video games, television series, films, and fan works. It is typically created by women for women and is thus distinct from bara (gay manga), a genre of homoerotic media marketed to gay men, though yaoi does also attract a gay male audience and can be produced by gay male creators. Yaoi ( / ˈ j aʊ i/ YOW-ee Japanese: やおい ), also known as boys' love ( ボーイズ ラブ, bōizu rabu) and its abbreviation BL ( ビーエル, bīeru), is a genre of fictional media originating in Japan that features homoerotic relationships between male characters. The svelte, semi- androgynous physical features of the characters are typical of bishōnen (literally 'beautiful boys') common in yaoi media. For the Chinese male-male romance fiction genre, see Danmei.Īn example of yaoi-inspired artwork.
