Literally translated means "Lover of the Japanese Painting Style", but more accurately means a second-generation
Otaku, or someone non-Japanese who loves the
Japanese arts. This can range from a taste in their decorating style, to foods like
sushi,
sashimi,
sake, the look of
hiragana,
katakana, and
kanjii, to, of course, the
anime and
manga that make up the majority of reading material in modern-day
Japan.
The largest injection of Otaku Culture actually came after the original airings of
Astro Boy,
Speed Racer,
Voltron, and
Gigantor. These had a small cult following, mostly of children, and many people forgot about them until shortly after 1973, when at a
Comic Book Convention some tapes had been exchanged with Japanese fans of US
cartoons. Now one must keep in mind the sort of people who go to comic book conventions. (I myself am one). Now turn the clock back twenty-five years.
The name of one of the series sent over was
Kyûtî Hanî, or as it very quickly came to be known,
Cutie Honey. The cartoon itself features a
heroine who transforms into the
avatar of goodness through the time-honored method of her clothes being ripped off by invisible forces and replaced with her super-hero outfit. Of course in this transformation there is a split-second of nudity. Something never before seen in
American Cartoons. (
Heavy Metal was not released until 1981, largely in response to the huge craze that very soon took place). In any event... suddenly the tapes found themselves copied and passed around...creating an even larger demand for animated nudity. Which led to even more tapes being imported to America from Japan. A whole new world had opened up.
Of course this caused problems. People would say "You only like Japanese Cartoons for the nudity!" and the poor soul would be forced to make up some sort of story about how they have always been interested in Japanese things.
"Oh yeah? Like what?"
Well, one thing leads to another and soon pre-pubescent boys around America are researching all things Japanese to keep up a good facade defense for their
Japornimation habit. As would be expected, some actually found the culture fascinating.
"Dude, they make this wine out of rice, called
sake!"
"They have public baths...duuude."
"Oh wow! Check out some of the cool Dragons they have!!!"
And so on, and so on... everyone found their own niche, their own favorites, their own
machineries of joy. And soon the boys grew up to be men. The men came to get
significant others and introduced them to this concept. They bred sometimes, and the children were exposed. Many people came to love the culture. A good deal of them never even bothered with the anime, manga, or hentai, but rather the more elegant practices, like
Nihonga, the Japanese Style of painting, Haiku, architecture, eastern religions...
This is how the
Nihongaphile (
Nihonga aka "Japanese art" +
phile aka "lover of") came to pass. They are the second generation
Otaku who delights in the more refined aspects of a rather beautiful culture. For the dedicated Nihongaphile I would heartily recommend reading almost all of
ssjbulma's nodes, as she has described a great number of obscure Japanese cultural aspects quite eloquently.