2011-02-18, 12:22 AM
-Ghost- Wrote:I don't know about in other countries, but in America ''otaku'' generally just refers to people who are really into anime and manga.
It doesn't have entirely the same meaning here than it does in Japan. It's not that the people ''don't know what otaku really means'', it's just that the word's meaning was changed when it came over to other areas. It's like when people call ''normal'' cartoons, ''cartoons'', and they call Japanese cartoons ''anime''.
No, I know what you mean with this. The problem is, unlike using anime for Japanese animation and manga for their comics, otaku isn't a word needed to differentiate two things. It's just a misinterpretation of a word. Though I guess one could argue that it's used to separate normal geeks from the kind that are into Japanese nerdom, but otaku isn't synonymous to nerd or geek as manga and anime are synonymous to animation and comics.