Hopefully,this thread is created in the right section.

One thing I like about animecharacterdatabase is that we can search the race or ethnicity of certain anime characters. However,there is something that I've been wondering about that is should characters from fantasy setting receive the same ethnicity tag in our world.

For example,characters from Hentai Game Kurenai no Namida and Ling Yao from FMA. We all know they have Chinese names and they are from fictional country that are culturally Chinese,but should they really be consider as Chinese? Chinese, German,Japanese,British are all our world invention so if there are characters from fictional world, does it make sense to tag them using our ethnicity?

I can understand if characters like Li Xingke from Code Geass is tag Chinese since Code Geass setting took place in our world where China,Europe and Japan exist(at least in the sense of geographic).

I hope I don't confuse people and you guys get what I mean.

-EDIT-

Btw,Yuu Kanda from Dgrayman is Japanese right? How come I see Chinese tag there?

http://www.animecharactersdatabase.com/character.php?id=12868

[ Edited Feb 22, 2015 ]

Hi Kiseijuu, you've got a good question there. As I don't see an answer in the tag guide, we'll have to wait to hear Li's opinion on this type of tag.


Should all characters in China's waring states anime also be tagged as chinese ?
- Kingdom ( more fictional )
- The Twelve Kingdoms ( more fantasy )
- Yona of the Dawn

I don't know if we are using this purely based on appearance, or if how they are described in the series factors in, or if the series itself is a deciding factor.

Kagura from Gintama would be an interesting case as well ....



Hair? Chinese
Clothes? Chinese
Accent? Chinese
Actually Chinese? No.
Is the series pure fantasy? Yes. She's an alien.



There are many animes that have characters appointed to be country representatives.
Looking at Hetalia character tags, it would seem the Representative criteria is used when tagging. That'd also explain Code Geass.
Then should Fleet Girls Collection KanColle characters also be tagged as such.

[ Edited Feb 22, 2015 ]

私は日本語を少し読むと書くをできます。あなたも？

Hello Kiseijuu!

I think the tag "chinese" was meant so symbolize characters with chinese names from the beginning (it does not have to mean that they´re all from China, they could be from a fantasy/fictional world too)
The tag can also symbolize characters with traditional, chinese clothing too, like the Qipao for example (a one-piece chinese dress for women, Chun-Li from Street Fighter is wearing a dress like that) because that´s another common element in many anime series (it does not have to mean that only chinese characters is wearing those clothes, it could be a fantasy/fictional character who wears it too)

As for, if there is any point having the "chinese" tag and other ethnic tags for characters in a fantasy/fictional world I´m not so sure.
I guess it is a little bit complicated since the fictional/fantasy worlds, and the countries the characters live in probably has other epic names like "Motavia" or "Avlee" or something (just some examples I took from a videogame lol) and don´t have any countries like China, England, Germany or Japan etc., even though the influences from those countries often exists in many of these animes.
I totally agree with Rei, this is a very good question and is definitly something worth thinking about. (if I understand the question correctly, I´m from Sweden so I´m not really a super expert in english lol. But it sure sounds interesting from my point of view)

[ Edited Feb 22, 2015 ]

In the world, you are only someone.
But for someone else, you are the entire world.

@Rei
I think characters from Kingdom being tag as Chinese is accurate since the world setting that it took place are in fact in our real life world in China. It's not fictional setting/universe.

12 Kingdom however is certainly fictional setting. Totally different universe. Same goes for the Kou Empire from Magi. They had nothing to do with our real life Chinese people.

@ANIMazer
Yup. Ling Yao from FMA is from country of Xing, which is base and influence from our real life historical China. But since it from fanatsy setting and are totally unrelated with our real life Chinese, calling them Chinese seems a bit off. FMA took place in an entirely different universe and not real life like in Kingdom. Saiunkoku Monogatari also base on fantasy China,not real life China.

Yeah, I've been using the 'Chinese' tag for characters with Chinese-y names/looks. I probably should go through and remove it from characters who are not confirmed as Chinese because you're right and it shouldn't have fictional countries in there. It's honestly something I just haven't given much thought to... because it requires a lot more work and I'm a little stuck on it.

In all honesty, I've been thinking of removing it as a tag and adding it as an extra detail, I'm just not sure what field it would go under. Home Country? Ethnicity? Something else?

My bad on the Kanda one though, I thought he was from the China branch because it's been a while since I read the manga and I brain-farted XD

A food of thought related to this thread.

As we already know, One Piece setting took place in totally fantasy setting. However, according to One Piece author,Oda when asked by a fan, what are the nationalities of the Straw Hat is One Piece was in real world, Luffy will be Brazillain,Zoro ill be a Japanese while Nami is Sweedish. here are the rest of them.


http://onepiece.wikia.com/wiki/SBS_Volume_56#Chapter_549.2C_Page_144

So is it appropriate to consider Luffy as Brazilian and put the Brazilian tag on him?

[ Edited Feb 27, 2015 ]

What do you guys think about anime/manga with multiverse like Clamp universe? In Clamp, there are plenty of universe setting which is base on our real world such as xxxHolic, CCS and Tokyo Babylon. Are the Japanese in xxxHolic, CCS and Tokyo Babylon respectively all belong to same type of Japanese? Or am I thinking too much here? LOL!

The Clamp universe confuses me at the best of times, Kise XD You're thinking too much! I'm confused now lol

In regards to your previous One Piece question, I think that because it's not set in the real world then it wouldn't be right to put nationalities with them. He only answer what he thought they looked like, it's not official.

LiCobra The Clamp universe confuses me at the best of times, Kise XD You're thinking too much! I'm confused now lol In regards to your previous One Piece question, I think that because it's not set in the real world then it wouldn't be right to put nationalities with them. He only answer what he thought they looked like, it's not official.

Ok, so we basically we agree that as long as the world setting is set in our real world and preferably having geopolitic similar to this map, we can assign our real world ethnicity/nationality to them right even though some of them are multiuniverse?



About the Clamp thing, the multiuniverse in Clamp mean you have many different version of Japanese people like xxxHolic version of Japanese, CCS version of Japanese and Tokyo Babylon version of Japanese to the point there's no actual Japanese or ethnicity in Clamp universe? Yeah...I know it sound confusing. It's difficult for me to explain here.

Just curious, let just say you are a Chinese and you live in xxxHolic universe and your cross universe to CCS universe, will you be able to relate to the Chinese in CCS ethnically?

[ Edited Mar 24, 2015 ]

Huge SPOILER for those who haven't finish reading Tsubasa Reservoir. Sorry, I don't know how to do spoiler tag.

--SPOILER--
Watanuki Kimihiro is Tsubasa Li other self. Tsubasa Li's father, Clone Syaoran are reincarnated as a Chinese in Hong Kong while his mother clonse Sakura is reincarnated as Japanese. This would mean Kimihiro Watanuki and Tsubasa Li are half Chinese and half Japanese right?
--END of SPOILER--

Clamp crossover universe mind f*ck.

Digimon universe also has crossover too in Xros Hunter.

[ Edited Mar 24, 2015 ]