One of the two digits worth of things that keeps me tossing and turning at night (this is no joke, I might actually have a serious problem) is whether something is considered manga. As someone who will just as simply call a manga a comic, as would I when addressing the Italian equivalent fumetto or the Dutch equivalent stripverhalen. Unfortunately, the country of origin seems to mean the world to certain comic fans, getting into their heads that the region denotes the content. I believe that all titles in this medium can be boiled down to comics, but that the region that the material was originally intended needs to be upheld. Take a weird example, Hirohiko Araki’s 2009’s manga, Rohan at the Louvre and its connection to France’s Louvre art museum.
Hirohiko Araki is known worldwide for his super famous manga epic Baoh from the early eighties and the following OVA adaption that has made him a star. Actually that is a complete lie, what his name is regularly linked to be the decades spanning Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure (if you count its Seinen continuity follow up Steel Ball Run that is). Araki’s distinct art style is not only recognizable from Jojo’s alone, but as well from the magazine covers and art speculations like with Rohan at the Louvre. The story behind that, from what I found, was Araki contributed to Rohan at the Louvre as part of their “Le Louvre invite la bande dessinée” or “Cartoons- The Louvre Invites Comic-Strip Art” exhibit, but later had it published fully in Japan.
