A Phrase I made up...

Prior to setting up this site, I performed Web and Usenet searches for the term "anthromedia" and found no more than a few mentions of it anywhere. I figured that it wouldn't hurt to assign a plausible second meaning to it for my own purposes: media (images, stories, films, TV shows, etc) containing anthropomorphic characters. The simplest definition of anthropomorphics, as it relates to Joe Average, would be "funny animals", or cartoon animals, such as those that make up the lion's share of the cast of the average Warner Bros. cartoon. Or the entire cast of Disney's "Robin Hood"The present established term for these characters, is "furry". Sometimes this term is also applied to fans of the genre ("furries").

One significant problem with the term "furry" is that it has in the past few years, taken on a bit of an undesirable connotation in certain quarters. Some baggage, if you will. Due to the less-than-considerate-of-others behavior of a somewhat vocal minority of people within the fandom, the term has recieved something of a black eye among a number of larger entities, most notably in the science-fiction/fantasy fandoms, as well as among some creative types in the entertainment industry.

The most far-out elements of the fandom have in the past linked to it practices and /or concepts which usually have little or nothing to do with anthropomorphic animals, except in the minds of those who subscribe to the notion that furry (among other things) is whatever an individual chooses it to mean and therefore cannot be defined. Complicating matters is the fact that there is no single entity that the fandom is built around--it mostly feeds on the material created within itself, meaning that there is no visual / literary, or commercial work that one can point to and state "This is what this fandom is about" to the exclusion of all other material.

Another source of confusion lies in the fact that two opposing camps have overlapping claims to the term "furry". One faction consists of artists, writers, and their fans, who are largely interested in the art and stories. In other words, the main thrust of their interest is toward things--i.e. the fictional characters appearing in, depicted or described within the art and stories. The other camp is sometimes referred to as "furry lifestylers". Their main thrust is more toward a strong personal identification with certain species of real and/or fictionalized animals, as well as other things like animal spiritualism and totemism (or practices masquerading as such) and species dysphoria (a perception that one is actually a non-human animal born into the wrong body, often coupled with a dislike of one's human form). It would be safe to say that furry lifestylism is more concerned with the states of mind of individuals, rather than the things created by them.

While the two camps are not mutually exclusive--it's possible to have interests spanning the two--nevertheless, the differences between them have fostered a long-simmering animosity that periodically erupts into protracted verbal fistfights ("flamewars") across the two Usenet newsgroups catering to each faction (alt.fan.furry and alt.lifestyle.furry). Much of this has revolved around the tendency of fans not wanting to look like "freaks" to the general public, a desire that is at cross-purposes with many lifestylers who vigorously defend their right to not care what the public perception is of them and their practices.

A smattering of attempts have been made to create a new term for an alternate, media-centered furry fandom free of the baggage that the original one continues to carry in the eyes of many outsiders. Most of these have met with little success--"Anthropomorphic", while technically correct, is a long, clumsy term, and the other choices have tended to be less appealing or more confusing, such as "Tezukadom", which derives it's name from Osamu Tezuka, the creator of animated Japanese TV shows (such as 'Kimba the White Lion") featuring anthropomorphic characters. The term went over like a lead balloon, probably because only longtime Japanimation fans  are familiar with the name.

Which brings me to my substitution: "AnthroMedia". I thought it made a tidy little phrase that handily describes a media-centric view of anthropomorphics while passively excluding the unrelated personal-state-of-mind material that has caused so many heated disagreements in the past.

A full discussion of the issues involved is somewhat beyond the scope of this article --it's only here to tell you why, if you happened to be looking for anthropology-related material, why this site is using the term to refer to what amounts to cartoon animals. And chances are, you wouldn't have found this site at all unless it had been indexed by some search engine while I wasn't looking.

10/25/99, revised 5/23/2001
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