Black and brown characters in Japanese animation

Pet Sins September 2005 Issue: Dark-skinned characters of Anime and Manga

Black and brown characters in Japanese animation

Some might ask what would be the use of making a list of black and brown Japanese animation characters. Well, from the start, we were looking at the various ways in wich black people are protrayed in anime. It became necessary to have a compilation of most of the known black/brown anime characters so that viewers would be able to discuss trends and voice their preferences for the character designs of black/brown people.

As Japanese pop culture becomes more influential internationally, it becomes more important to view it with the kind of critical eye that is applied to American pop culture. We hereby present these listings of dark-skinned anime characters (many of which are African/Indian-inspired), for your comparison:

Dark-skinned Villains in Anime

Dark-skinned Heroes in Anime
Dark-skinned Neutral Characters in Anime

Acknowledgements: Wildperfect and Wu started this listing with contributions by nubia_enigma, nara and other members of the black4anime yahoogroup. Since then, many other readers have contributed to the list. A shout-out to Solitarybird, Debbie, L.B. and all the other readers who wrote in with character suggestions and bios. With your help, we have been updating this list regularly.

Character list in alphabetical order

This may look like a long list, but it is actually disproportionately small, considering the actual number of people of color in the world, and the many thousands more white-looking characters in anime.