Lost without my linguistics

[branchandroot]

*snaps fingers* That's it! *hearts Athena for making her think*

What I really don't like about so much fic-Yukimura characterization. It's that, in absence of hard information, the vast majority of fandom writes Yukimura like they write Fuji.

And that's totally off.

Fuji is one of the single most elusive characters in tenipuri. I'd put him and Tezuka in the top two slots, though for rather opposite reasons. Tezuka is elusive because he shows so little of himself. Fuji is elusive because he shows so much that's misleading. Fuji always keeps an ace in reserve, or tries to. Fuji stays out of arm's reach, perceptually speaking.

Yukimura never hides what he is.

And where part of Fuji's character development has been for him to become engaged, to learn how to feel involved and act on his own and his team's ambitions, Yukimura has never been un-engaged.

Disengaged, perhaps, but most certainly not by his own will or desire, and he takes a significant personal risk to return to tennis and his team as soon as humanly possible.

To write Yukimura as hidden, in the way that Fuji typically hides himself, really seems to miss a core aspect of his character.

*amused* This started with the thought that Yukimura uses ore, while Fuji uses boku, and why the difference exists.

Comments

[written-in-blue.livejournal.com]

Given the current state of Yukimura and Fuji affairs, this amuses me to no end.

Fuji: *mutters dire things under his breath*

Yagyuu: What was that?

Fuji: ...nothing. *leaves. hastily.*

[branchandroot]

*snickering* We really have to get around to the apology log, so we can also get around to the cluetrout log. I think the boys are starting classes on Monday, aren't they?

[written-in-blue.livejournal.com]

You speak great truths, on all counts. Apology log tonight?

[branchandroot]

*nods* Sounds like a plan. I pulled weeds today, so sitting still for a while sounds very good.

[ver2frog.livejournal.com]

This started with the thought that Yukimura uses ore, while Fuji uses boku, and why the difference exists.
do you mind if I ask for more on this? Sounds interesting.
:D

[branchandroot]

Surely. *thinks* I don't know how familiar you are with Japanese words for I/you, and the various implications of them. Ore is the "I" that's very macho-man. It's really kind of ridiculous and unrealistic to have 15 year olds using it, but every shounen show in existence does it. Boku is the "I" that a real 15 year old /would/ use, and in shounen it's pretty much only used by the characters who are extremely polite/sweet/self-effacing... also by the characters who are terrifyingly polite while they kick total ass.

In context, ore is the self-reference that gives notice the boy using it is competition, is in the game, is looking to kick everyone else's butt. Boku, used by anyone other than, say, Kachiro, is... something close to duplicitous. It is, textually, the marker of someone who is not a contender, not in the fight, not a threat. For someone who /is/ a threat to use it means that either he's invincibly young-boy (like Aoi and Kachiro, each in his own way) or else that he's making a kind of joke, using it sardonically (like Fuji and Mizuki).

So, for Yukimura to use ore is... straightforward. He's not mixing his signals. And for Fuji to use boku is, in Fuji's case, both a token of his uninvolvement with the heart of competition and also a mark that he's the kind of person who typically conceals what he is and what he's doing.

... you know, I should just stop even pretending I'm going to write the second eighty pages on Women in Melville and admit that I'm really invested in popular culture. *sighs*

[written-in-blue.livejournal.com]

... you know, I should just stop even pretending I'm going to write the second eighty pages on Women in Melville and admit that I'm really invested in popular culture. *sighs*

...we could study together. *grin*

[lady-readwolf.livejournal.com]

I've started thinking of "ore" as more of a social standing pronoun, as in used by one who is overly confident of himself or his leadership role in the group. This is simply based off some of my observations in my kids classes.

Takaki, who's 8 and the oldest in my Thursday group, always used Ore unchallengingly until Kento, also 8, showed up and proved to be better at English. They both used 'ore'. In my Tuesday class, Kazuki, 7, uses 'ore' in dialogue with his younger brother and with Masaki, who was 9 and used 'boku'.

I've also noticed this theme throughout the elementary schools and into the junior high schools. The boys who are more 'leaders of the pack' use 'ore' almost constantly, even, sometimes, in dialogue with their teachers.

[branchandroot]

Oo, interesting! *wry* Doesn't make it any less weird that /all/ shounen characters use it, but it does add a layer to the significance.

[ver2frog.livejournal.com]

hehe- thanks for that. I don't remember much from Japanese class back in high school (besides feeling really old that it was such a long time ago)
:D

[fromastudio]

...to be honest, I wanted to reply to this earlier, but was too worried to, because people have accused me of writing a Fujiesque Yukimura. And while the two feel very different to me in my head, I do riff on a lot of the whole Fuji-Yukimura thing that has been ongoing. But it borrows from 'fanon' Fuji - that assorted mix of manipulativeness and smile - rather than the way I actually write Fuji (which I'd like to think is closer to canon).

That's why I don't tend to object to a Fujiesque Yukimura, per se. Which is not to mean that I'm fond of much of the SanaYuki fic crossing fandom at the moment; I've been repeatedly telling myself that abusing newbie fic is graceless and adolescent.

how can people write perfectly good, excellent fic in other fandoms and then come over to Tenipuri and show no sign of actually understanding the characters

(and dude, if that post in any way encompassed my Yukimura, please, tell me. It's not as if this particular muse isn't already embedded so deeply in my skull that he'll come out that easily. But it's when they're stuck in your head that you stop seeing their flaws.)

[branchandroot]

Oh, no, hon, trust me, when I'm pointing fingers I point them loud and clear. *wry*

*thinks* I think it's possible that your Yukimura from that first (first?) fic, where Kevin meets him, did have a bit of that hidden-ness. But not your later Yukimuras. In fact, your Yukimura and Fuji in dresses fic really nailed the similarities and differences between them, I thought.

And it's certainly true that Yukimura in the manga has been building in direction I think none of us really anticipated much--that lethal sharpness that's right out in the open.

It isn't, I think, that Yukimura shows all his cards, or gives away his plans. It's just that his sharpness is always present, always on display, where one of Fuji's most basic and primary characteristics is to hide his sharpness until he has some overriding reason to show it.

Someday I may be able to write a story for them that deals with the difference in how they use their smiles. I don't quite have it yet, though.

(So totally with you on the SanaYuki. My god, don't these people actually /watch the show/?)

[fromastudio]

*thinks* I keep going back to the thought I had in that 20 facts Tezuka thing: Fuji's smile is a defence; Yukimura's smile is an offense, a weapon. I haven't thought much beyond that, though.

Those Rikkai Q&A extras in vol 26 and 27; I keep wondering how seriously to take them - the little jabs that Yukimura makes there do strike me as Fujiesque.

(the Kevin one wasn't the first one; the first one was Roads, which was completely Seiichi of the gardening and the gentle smile and every sweet thing we believed he was before the advent of 269.

fanon-Yukimura versions tend to map to four prototypes in my head. In ascending degrees of danger: gentle smile!Seiichi, generally popular during the first stage of Rikkai fandom, see tongari, morphaileffect; manipulative-Fuji!Yukimura - sources debatable, but I'd say pengiesama reminds me of it; finally, captainlike!Yukimura - helga_b's work?

The fourth is post-269 Yukimura, or Yukimura-with-blades, who isn't in circulation much outside of canon. He's actually a variation on the third Yukimura, although I can't really explain how I'm differentiating - Yukimura in the anime is sharp in a certain way, and Yukimura in the manga is sharp in a different way. In any case, the difficulty (for me) is in getting the #1 aspect, to line up with the rest - you do that a lot better than I do.

(I think they might have watched anime!Sanada. Although really, it doesn't excuse the Yukimura characterisation.)

[branchandroot]

I do kind of wonder whether the prevailing idea of Yukimura as feminine/girly/effeminate will persist once people have assmiliated the fourth type. I wouldn't think they were very compatible, but I've seen fandom do more egregiously awful things.

You know, curiously enough, the one I've been coming to think of as most manipulative in the fanon-Fuji manner is Sanada. He's so calm and watchful when he isn't actually playing, and then so (I think) calculatedly and flamboyantly arrogant and loud when he's on. The contrast says deliberate manipulation of his opponenets, to me, rathere the same way Fuji's head games of late-power-revelation do.

I rather despair of ever seeing /that/ Sanada in fic, though. *sighs*

And yes. I know what you mean about the anime versus manga Yukimuras, though I don't know that I can express it any better. I think... perhaps the anime Yukimura's ferocity is inwardly focused. The bridge scene is all about his inner struggle. Where manga Yukimura's is outwardly focused, toward interaction with his team.

*goes to ponder this some more*