What’s The Difference Between Shounen-ai and Yaoi?

Shounen-ai is one term used to describe male/male romantic fiction. From its start as a translation of a historical custom to a shoujo manga sub-genre that significantly deals with love between males and finally the term for a milder version of Boys’ Love (hereafter, BL), shounen-ai has evolved many times. Here, we will explore the evolution of the word “shounen-ai” throughout time.

The historical connotation of shounen-ai remained in the word when it became the term a subgenre of shoujo manga in the 1970s. But the meaning of shounen-ai became more vague and varied. At that time, it could have been understood as “love between boys,” “someone who loves a boy,” “a boy who loves someone,” or all three at the same time.
The exportation of the term “shounen-ai” term to the English fan community along with the word “yaoi” in the 2000s complicated things further, and it came to describe male/male romance fiction with less sexual content.

In Japan, the term “shounen-ai” is rarely used anymore since BL took the throne in the 2000s. Shoujo manga from the 2000s with shounen-ai narratives were still regularly called shounen-ai manga, but it was not one of the official terms anymore. Even JUNE, a word born in the same era as shounen-ai, which is currently used to describe male/male romance doujinshi, is more prevalent than shounen-ai.

Meanwhile, shounen-ai outside Japan is usually used to describe male/male romance fiction with less sexual content as the opposite of yaoi, another Japanese term that was thought by the English-speaking audience as the more erotic one.

The English community usually does not take the manga target audience (, shoujo manga, BL manga) into consideration as Japan does, and tends to use shounen-ai and yaoi depending on the amount of sexual content. However, with more discussion going on, it seems like many fans decided to rework their definition of shounen-ai so we might witness a new interesting result… soon.

Yaoi, also known by the wasei-eigo construction boys' love and its abbreviation BL, is a genre of fictional media originating in Japan that features homoerotic relationships between male characters.[a] It is typically created by women for women and is distinct from homoerotic media marketed to gay men, but it does also attract a male audience and can be produced by male creators. It spans a wide range of media, including manga, anime, drama CDs, novels, video games, television series, films, and fan works. "Boys' love" and "BL" are the generic terms for this kind of media in Japan and much of Asia; though the terms are used by some fans and commentators in the West, yaoi remains more generally prevalent in English.

The genre originated in the 1970s as a subgenre of shōjo manga, or comics for girls. Several terms were used for the new genre, including shōnen-ai, tanbi, and June. The term yaoi emerged in the late 1970s and early 1980s in the context of dōjinshi culture as a portmanteau of yama nashi, ochi nashi, imi nashi, where it was used in a self-deprecating manner to refer to amateur fan works that focused on sex to the exclusion of plot and character development, and that often parodied mainstream manga and anime by depicting male characters from popular series in sexual scenarios. "Boys' love" was later adopted by Japanese publications in the 1990s as an umbrella term for male-male romance media marketed to women.

Concepts and themes associated with yaoi include androgynous men known as bishōnen; diminished female characters; narratives that emphasize homosociality and de-emphasize socio-cultural homophobia; and depictions of rape. A defining characteristic of yaoi is the practice of pairing characters in relationships according to the roles of seme, the sexual top or active pursuer, and uke, the sexual bottom or passive pursued. Yaoi has a robust global presence, having spread since the 1990s through international licensing and distribution, as well as through unlicensed circulation of works by yaoi fans online. Yaoi works, culture, and fandom have been studied and discussed by scholars and journalists worldwide.
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AnimePedia Episode 08

Animepedia is our new series where you can learn basic things that an anime fan should know. Basically, the series is for newcomers. In this series, you'll find basic words, terms, or some basic facts. Or why a certain thing is popular among anime watchers.
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