title: Evangelicalism

text: In Nigeria the Evangelical Church Winning All (formerly "Evangelical Church of West Africa") is the largest church organization with five thousand congregations and over three million members. It sponsors two seminaries and eight Bible colleges, and 1600 missionaries who serve in Nigeria and other countries with the Evangelical Missionary Society (EMS). There have been serious confrontations since 1999 between Muslims and Christians standing in opposition to the expansion of Sharia law in northern Nigeria. The confrontation has radicalized and politicized the Christians. Violence has been escalating.


title: Evangelicalism

text: In Ethiopia, Eritrea, and the Ethiopian and Eritrean diaspora, P'ent'ay (from Ge'ez: ጴንጤ), also known as Ethiopian–Eritrean Evangelicalism, or Wenigēlawī (from Ge'ez: ወንጌላዊ - which directly translates to “Evangelical”) are terms used for Evangelical Christians and other Eastern/Oriental-oriented Protestant Christians within Ethiopia and Eritrea, and the Ethiopian and Eritrean diaspora abroad. Prominent movements among them have been Pentecostalism (Ethiopian Full Gospel Believers' Church), the Baptist tradition (Ethiopian Kale Heywet Church), Lutheranism (Ethiopian Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus and Evangelical Lutheran Church of Eritrea), and the Mennonite-Anabaptist tradition (Meserete Kristos Church).


title: Evangelicalism

text: In Kenya, mainstream Evangelical denominations have taken the lead in promoting political activism and backers, with the smaller Evangelical sects of less importance. Daniel arap Moi was president 1978 to 2002 and claimed to be an Evangelical; he proved intolerant of dissent or pluralism or decentralization of power.


title: Evangelicalism

text: The Berlin Missionary Society (BMS) was one of four German Protestant mission societies active in South Africa before 1914. It emerged from the German tradition of Pietism after 1815 and sent its first missionaries to South Africa in 1834. There were few positive reports in the early years, but it was especially active 1859–1914. It was especially strong in the Boer republics. The World War cut off contact with Germany, but the missions continued at a reduced pace. After 1945 the missionaries had to deal with decolonization across Africa and especially with the apartheid government. At all times the BMS emphasized spiritual inwardness, and values such as morality, hard work and self-discipline. It proved unable to speak and act decisively against injustice and racial discrimination and was disbanded in 1972.


title: Evangelicalism

text: Since 1974, young professionals have been the active proselytizers of Evangelicalism in the cities of Malawi.


title: Evangelicalism

text: In Mozambique, Evangelical Protestant Christianity emerged around 1900 from black migrants whose converted previously in South Africa. They were assisted by European missionaries, but, as industrial workers, they paid for their own churches and proselytizing. They prepared southern Mozambique for the spread of Evangelical Protestantism. During its time as a colonial power in Mozambique, the Catholic Portuguese government tried to counter the spread of Evangelical Protestantism.


title: Evangelicalism

text: The East African Revival was a renewal movement within Evangelical churches in East Africa during the late 1920s and 1930s that began at a Church Missionary Society mission station in the Belgian territory of Ruanda-Urundi in 1929, and spread to: Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya during the 1930s and 1940s contributing to the significant growth of the church in East Africa through the 1970s and had a visible influence on Western missionaries who were observer-participants of the movement.


title: Evangelicalism

text: Protestantism in Brazil largely originated with German immigrants and British and American missionaries in the 19th century, following up on efforts that began in the 1820s.


title: Evangelicalism

text: In the late nineteenth century, while the vast majority of Brazilians were nominal Catholics, the nation was underserved by priests, and for large numbers their religion was only nominal. The Catholic Church in Brazil was de-established in 1890, and responded by increasing the number of dioceses and the efficiency of its clergy. Many Protestants came from a large German immigrant community, but they were seldom engaged in proselytism and grew mostly by natural increase.


title: Evangelicalism

text: Methodists were active along with Presbyterians and Baptists. The Scottish missionary Dr. Robert Reid Kalley, with support from the Free Church of Scotland, moved to Brazil in 1855, founding the first Evangelical church among the Portuguese-speaking population there in 1856. It was organized according to the Congregational policy as the Igreja Evangélica Fluminense; it became the mother church of Congregationalism in Brazil. The Seventh-day Adventists arrived in 1894, and the YMCA was organized in 1896. The missionaries promoted schools colleges and seminaries, including a liberal arts college in São Paulo, later known as Mackenzie, and an agricultural school in Lavras. The Presbyterian schools in particular later became the nucleus of the governmental system. In 1887 Protestants in Rio de Janeiro formed a hospital. The missionaries largely reached a working-class audience, as the Brazilian upper-class was wedded either to Catholicism or to secularism. By 1914, Protestant churches founded by American missionaries had 47,000 communicants, served by 282 missionaries. In general, these missionaries were more successful than they had been in Mexico, Argentina or elsewhere in Latin America.


title: Evangelicalism

text: There were 700,000 Protestants by 1930, and increasingly they were in charge of their own affairs. In 1930, the Methodist Church of Brazil became independent of the missionary societies and elected its own bishop. Protestants were largely from a working-class, but their religious networks help speed their upward social mobility.


title: Evangelicalism

text: Protestants accounted for fewer than 5 percent of the population until the 1960s, but grew exponentially by proselytizing and by 2000 made up over 15 percent of Brazilians affiliated with a church. Pentecostals and charismatic groups account for the vast majority of this expansion.


title: Evangelicalism

text: Pentecostal missionaries arrived early in the 20th century. Pentecostal conversions surged during the 1950s and 1960s, when native Brazilians began founding autonomous churches. The most influential included Brasil Para o Cristo (Brazil for Christ), founded in 1955 by Manoel de Mello. With an emphasis on personal salvation, on God's healing power, and on strict moral codes these groups have developed broad appeal, particularly among the booming urban migrant communities. In Brazil, since the mid-1990s, groups committed to uniting black identity, antiracism, and Evangelical theology have rapidly proliferated. Pentecostalism arrived in Brazil with Swedish and American missionaries in 1911. it grew rapidly, but endured numerous schisms and splits. In some areas the Evangelical Assemblies of God churches have taken a leadership role in politics since the 1960s. They claimed major credit for the election of Fernando Collor de Mello as president of Brazil in 1990.


title: Evangelicalism

text: According to the 2000 census, 15.4 percent of the Brazilian population was Protestant. A recent research conducted by the Datafolha institute shows that 25 percent of Brazilians are Protestants, of which 19 percent are followers of Pentecostal denominations. The 2010 census found out that 22.2 percent were Protestant at that date. Protestant denominations saw a rapid growth in their number of followers since the last decades of the 20th century. They are politically and socially conservative, and emphasize that God's favor translates into business success. The rich and the poor remained traditional Catholics, while most Evangelical Protestants were in the new lower-middle class–known as the "C class" (in a A–E classification system).


title: Evangelicalism

text: Chesnut argues that Pentecostalism has become "one of the principal organizations of the poor," for these churches provide the sort of social network that teach members the skills they need to thrive in a rapidly developing meritocratic society.


title: Evangelicalism

text: One large Evangelical church that originated from Brazil is the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God (IURD), a neo‐Pentecostal denomination begun in 1977. It now has a presence in many countries, and claims millions of members worldwide.


title: Evangelicalism

text: Protestants remained a small portion of the population until the late-twentieth century, when various Protestant groups experienced a demographic boom that coincided with the increasing violence of the Guatemalan Civil War. Two former Guatemalan heads of state, General Efraín Ríos Montt and Jorge Serrano Elías have been practicing Evangelical Protestants, as is Guatemala's former President, Jimmy Morales. General Montt, an Evangelical from the Pentecostal tradition, came to power through a coup. He escalated the war against leftist guerrilla insurgents as a holy war against atheistic "forces of evil".


title: Evangelicalism

text: Protestant missionary activity in Asia was most successful in Korea. American Presbyterians and Methodists arrived in the 1880s and were well received. Between 1910 and 1945, when Korea was a Japanese colony, Christianity became in part an expression of nationalism in opposition to Japan's efforts to enforce the Japanese language and the Shinto religion. In 1914, out of 16 million people, there were 86,000 Protestants and 79,000 Catholics; by 1934, the numbers were 168,000 and 147,000. Presbyterian missionaries were especially successful. Since the Korean War (1950–53), many Korean Christians have migrated to the U.S., while those who remained behind have risen sharply in social and economic status. Most Korean Protestant churches in the 21st century emphasize their Evangelical heritage. Korean Protestantism is characterized by theological conservatism coupled with an emotional revivalistic style. Most churches sponsor revival meetings once or twice a year. Missionary work is a high priority, with 13,000 men and women serving in missions across the world, putting Korea in second place just behind the US.


title: Evangelicalism

text: Sukman argues that since 1945, Protestantism has been widely seen by Koreans as the religion of the middle class, youth, intellectuals, urbanites, and modernists. It has been a powerful force supporting South Korea's pursuit of modernity and emulation of the United States, and opposition to the old Japanese colonialism and to the authoritarianism of North Korea.


title: Evangelicalism

text: South Korea has been referred as an "evangelical superpower" for being the home to some of the largest and most dynamic Christian churches in the world; South Korea is also second to the U.S. in the number of missionaries sent abroad.


title: Evangelicalism

text: According to 2015 South Korean census, 9.7 million or 19.7 percent of the population described themselves as Protestants, many of whom belong to Presbyterian churches shaped by Evangelicalism.


title: Evangelicalism

text: According to the 2010 census, 2.68 percent of Filipinos are Evangelicals. The Philippine Council of Evangelical Churches (PCEC), an organization of more than seventy Evangelical and Mainline Protestant churches, and more than 210 para-church organizations in the Philippines, counts more than 11 million members as of 2011.


title: Evangelicalism

text: In 2019, it was reported that Evangelicalism in France is growing and a new Evangelical church is built every 10 days and now counts 700,000 followers across France.


title: Evangelicalism

text: John Wesley (1703–1791) was an Anglican cleric and theologian who, with his brother Charles Wesley (1707–1788) and fellow cleric George Whitefield (1714–1770), founded Methodism. After 1791 the movement became independent of the Anglican Church as the "Methodist Connection". It became a force in its own right, especially among the working class.


title: Evangelicalism

text: The "Clapham Sect" was a group of Church of England evangelicals and social reformers based in Clapham, London; they were active 1780s–1840s). John Newton (1725–1807) was the founder. They are described by the historian Stephen Tomkins as "a network of friends and families in England, with William Wilberforce as its center of gravity, who were powerfully bound together by their shared moral and spiritual values, by their religious mission and social activism, by their love for each other, and by marriage".


title: Evangelicalism

text: Evangelicalism was a major force in the Anglican Church from about 1800 to the 1860s. By 1848 when an evangelical John Bird Sumner became Archbishop of Canterbury, between a quarter and a third of all Anglican clergy were linked to the movement, which by then had diversified greatly in its goals and they were no longer considered an organized faction.


title: Evangelicalism

text: In the 21st century there are an estimated 2 million Evangelicals in the UK. According to research performed by the Evangelical Alliance in 2013, 87 percent of UK evangelicals attend Sunday morning church services every week and 63 percent attend weekly or fortnightly small groups. An earlier survey conducted in 2012 found that 92 percent of evangelicals agree it is a Christian's duty to help those in poverty and 45 percent attend a church which has a fund or scheme that helps people in immediate need, and 42 percent go to a church that supports or runs a foodbank. 63 percent believe in tithing, and so give around 10 percent of their income to their church, Christian organizations and various charities 83 percent of UK evangelicals believe that the Bible has supreme authority in guiding their beliefs, views and behavior and 52 percent read or listen to the Bible daily. The Evangelical Alliance, formed in 1846, was the first ecumenical evangelical body in the world and works to unite evangelicals, helping them listen to, and be heard by, the government, media and society.


title: Evangelicalism

text: Since the 70s, the number of Evangelicals and Evangelical congregations has grown strongly in Switzerland. Population censuses suggest that these congregations saw the number of their members triple from 1970 to 2000, qualified as a "spectacular development" by specialists. Sociologists Jörg Stolz and Olivier Favre show that the growth is due to charismatic and Pentecostal groups, while classical evangelical groups are stable and fundamentalist groups are in decline. A quantitative national census on religious congregations reveals the important diversity of evangelicalism in Switzerland.


title: Evangelicalism

text: By the late 19th to early 20th century, most American Protestants were Evangelicals. A bitter divide had arisen between the more liberal-modernist mainline denominations and the fundamentalist denominations, the latter typically consisting of Evangelicals. Key issues included the truth of the Bible—literal or figurative, and teaching of evolution in the schools.


title: Evangelicalism

text: During and after World War II, Evangelicals became increasingly organized. There was a great expansion of Evangelical activity within the United States, "a revival of revivalism". Youth for Christ was formed; it later became the base for Billy Graham's revivals. The National Association of Evangelicals formed in 1942 as a counterpoise to the mainline Federal Council of Churches. In 1942–43, the Old-Fashioned Revival Hour had a record-setting national radio audience. With this organization, though, fundamentalist groups separated from Evangelicals.


title: Evangelicalism

text: According to a Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life study, Evangelicals can be broadly divided into three camps: traditionalist, centrist, and modernist. A 2004 Pew survey identified that while 70.4 percent of Americans call themselves "Christian", Evangelicals only make up 26.3 percent of the population, while Catholics make up 22 percent and mainline Protestants make up 16 percent. Among the Christian population in 2020, mainline Protestants began to outnumber Evangelicals.


title: Evangelicalism

text: Evangelicals have been socially active throughout US history, a tradition dating back to the abolitionist movement of the Antebellum period and the prohibition movement. As a group, evangelicals are most often associated with the Christian right. However, a large number of black self-labeled Evangelicals, and a small proportion of liberal white self-labeled Evangelicals, gravitate towards the Christian left.


title: Evangelicalism

text: Recurrent themes within American Evangelical discourse include abortion, evolution denial, secularism, and the notion of the United States as a Christian nation.


title: Evangelicalism

text: In the 1940s, in the United States, neo-evangelicalism developed the importance of social justice and Christian humanitarian aid actions in Evangelical churches.The majority of evangelical Christian humanitarian organizations were founded in the second half of the 20th century. Among those with the most partner countries, there was the foundation of World Vision International (1950), Samaritan's Purse (1970), Mercy Ships (1978), Prison Fellowship International (1979), International Justice Mission (1997).


title: Evangelicalism

text: A particularly controversial doctrine within the Evangelical Churches is that of prosperity theology, which spread in the 1970s and 1980s in the United States, mainly through Pentecostal and charismatic televangelists. This doctrine is centered on the teaching of Christian faith as a means to enrich oneself financially and materially through a "positive confession" and a contribution to Christian ministries. Promises of divine healing and prosperity are guaranteed in exchange for certain amounts of donation.Some pastors threaten those who do not tithe with curses, attacks from the devil and poverty.The collections of offerings are multiple or separated in various baskets or envelopes to stimulate the contributions of the faithful.


title: Evangelicalism

text: Since the 1970s, multiple financial scandals of embezzlement have been reported in churches and evangelical organizations. The Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability was founded in 1979 to strengthen financial integrity in evangelical organizations and churches that voluntarily wish to be members and to undergo annual accounting audits.


title: Evangelicalism

text: In Pentecostalism, drifts accompanied the teaching of faith healing. In some churches, pricing for prayer against promises of healing has been observed. Some pastors and evangelists have been charged with claiming false healings. Some churches in the United States and Nigeria, have advised their members against vaccination or medicine, stating that it is for the weak in faith and that with a positive confession, they would be immune. In 2019, in Mbandjock, in Cameroon, three deaths are linked to this position in a church. This position is not representative of all evangelical churches, as the document indicates "The Miraculous Healing" published in 2015 by the National Council of Evangelicals of France, which mentions that medicine is one of the gifts of God made to humans. Churches and certain evangelical humanitarian organizations are also involved in medical health programs. Many evangelical churches have also hosted vaccination centers. Pentecostal pastors adhering to prosperity theology have been criticized by journalists for their bling-bling lifestyle (luxury clothes, big houses, high end cars, private planes, etc.).


title: Evangelicalism

text: Some churches and evangelical organizations have been criticized by victims of rape and domestic violence for their silent handling of cases of abuse by pastors or members. Failure to report abuses to the police appears to be prevalent in churches which are not members of an evangelical Christian denomination, or affiliated to denominations which attach great importance to the autonomy of the churches. The evangelical organization GRACE was founded in 2004 by the Baptist professor Boz Tchividjian to help churches combat sexual abuses, psychological abuses and physical abuses in Christian organizations.


title: Evangelicalism

text: In 2011, American evangelical professor Ed Stetzer of Wheaton College attributed the increase in the number of evangelical churches claiming to be nondenominational Christian to individualism.


title: Evangelicalism

text: In 2018, Baptist theologian Russell D. Moore criticized some American Baptist churches for their moralism, emphasizing strongly the condemnation of certain personal sins, but silent on the social injustices that afflict entire populations, such as racism. In 2020, the North American Baptist Fellowship, a region of the Baptist World Alliance, officially made a commitment to social injustice and spoke out against institutionalized discrimination in the American justice system.


title: Evangelicalism

text: In 2018, American professor Scot McKnight of Northern Baptist Theological Seminary criticized evangelical megachurches for the weak external accountability relationship of their leaders by not being members of a Christian denomination, further exposing them to abuse of power.


title: Evangelicalism

text: The fact that evangelicals do evangelism and speak about their faith in public is often criticized by the media and associated with proselytism. According to the evangelicals, freedom of religion and freedom of expression allow them to talk about their faith like anything else. Christian films made by American evangelical production companies are also regularly associated with proselytism. According to Sarah-Jane Murray, screenwriting teacher at the US Film and Christian Television Commission United, Christian films are works of art, not proselytism. For Hubert de Kerangat, communications manager at Saje distribution, distributor of these American Christian films in France, if Christian films are "proselytes", all films are "proselytes", since each film transmits a message, whether the viewer is free to approve or not.


title: Semen

text: Semen, also known as seminal fluid, is an organic bodily fluid created to contain spermatozoa. It is secreted by the gonads (sexual glands) and other sexual organs of male or hermaphroditic animals and can fertilize the female ovum. Semen is produced and originates from the seminal vesicle, which is located in the pelvis. The process that results in the discharge of semen from the urethral orifice is called ejaculation. In humans, seminal fluid contains several components besides spermatozoa: proteolytic and other enzymes as well as fructose are elements of seminal fluid which promote the survival of spermatozoa, and provide a medium through which they can move or "swim". The fluid is designed to be discharged deep into the vagina, so the spermatozoa can pass into the uterus and form a zygote with an egg.


title: Semen

text: Semen is also a form of genetic material. In animals, semen has been collected for cryoconservation. Cryoconservation of animal genetic resources is a practice that calls for the collection of genetic material in efforts for conservation of a particular breed.


title: Semen

text: Depending on the species, spermatozoa can fertilize ova externally or internally. In external fertilization, the spermatozoa fertilize the ova directly, outside of the female's sexual organs. Female fish, for example, spawn ova into their aquatic environment, where they are fertilized by the semen of the male fish.


title: Semen

text: During internal fertilization, however, fertilization occurs inside the female's sexual organs. Internal fertilization takes place after insemination of a female by a male through copulation. In most vertebrates, including amphibians, reptiles, birds and monotreme mammals, copulation is achieved through the physical mating of the cloaca of the male and female. In marsupial and placental mammals, copulation occurs through the vagina.


title: Semen

text: During the process of ejaculation, sperm passes through the ejaculatory ducts and mixes with fluids from the seminal vesicles, the prostate, and the bulbourethral glands to form the semen. The seminal vesicles produce a yellowish viscous fluid rich in fructose and other substances that makes up about 70% of human semen. The prostatic secretion, influenced by dihydrotestosterone, is a whitish (sometimes clear), thin fluid containing proteolytic enzymes, citric acid, acid phosphatase and lipids. The bulbourethral glands secrete a clear secretion into the lumen of the urethra to lubricate it.


title: Semen

text: Sertoli cells, which nurture and support developing spermatocytes, secrete a fluid into seminiferous tubules that helps transport sperm to the genital ducts. The ductuli efferentes possess cuboidal cells with microvilli and lysosomal granules that modify the ductal fluid by reabsorbing some fluid. Once the semen enters the ductus epididymis the principal cells, which contain pinocytotic vessels indicating fluid reabsorption, secrete glycerophosphocholine which most likely inhibits premature capacitation. The accessory genital ducts, the seminal vesicle, prostate glands, and the bulbourethral glands, produce most of the seminal fluid.


title: Semen

text: The seminal plasma provides a nutritive and protective medium for the spermatozoa during their journey through the female reproductive tract. The normal environment of the vagina is a hostile one (c.f. sexual conflict) for sperm cells, as it is very acidic (from the native microflora producing lactic acid), viscous, and patrolled by immune cells. The components in the seminal plasma attempt to compensate for this hostile environment. Basic amines such as putrescine, spermine, spermidine and cadaverine are responsible for the smell and flavor of semen. These alkaline bases counteract and buffer the acidic environment of the vaginal canal, and protect DNA inside the sperm from acidic denaturation.


title: Semen

text: A 1992 World Health Organization report described normal human semen as having a volume of 2 mL or greater, pH of 7.2 to 8.0, sperm concentration of 20×10 spermatozoa/mL or more, sperm count of 40×10 spermatozoa per ejaculate or more, and motility of 50% or more with forward progression (categories a and b) of 25% or more with rapid progression (category a) within 60 minutes of ejaculation.


title: Semen

text: A 2005 review of the literature found that the average reported physical and chemical properties of human semen were as follows:


title: Semen

text: Semen is typically translucent with white, grey or even yellowish tint. Blood in the semen can cause a pink or reddish colour, known as "hematospermia", and may indicate a medical problem which should be evaluated by a doctor if the symptom persists.


title: Semen

text: After ejaculation, the latter part of the ejaculated semen coagulates immediately, forming globules, while the earlier part of the ejaculate typically does not. After a period typically ranging from 15 to 30 minutes, prostate-specific antigen present in the semen causes the decoagulation of the seminal coagulum. It is postulated that the initial clotting helps keep the semen in the vagina, while liquefaction frees the sperm to make their journey to the ova.


title: Semen

text: A 2005 review found that the average reported viscosity of human semen in the literature was 3–7 centipoises (cP), or, equivalently, millipascal-seconds (mPa·s).


title: Semen

text: Semen quality is a measure of the ability of semen to accomplish fertilization. Thus, it is a measure of fertility in a man. It is the sperm in the semen that is the fertile component, and therefore semen quality involves both sperm quantity and sperm quality.


title: Semen

text: The volume of semen ejaculate varies but is generally about 1 teaspoonful or less. A review of 30 studies concluded that the average was around 3.4 milliliters (mL), with some studies finding amounts as high as 5.0 mL or as low as 2.3 mL. In a study with Swedish and Danish men, a prolonged interval between ejaculations caused an increase of the sperm count in the semen but not an increase of its amount.


title: Semen

text: Semen can be stored in diluents such as the "Illini Variable Temperature" (IVT) diluent, which have been reported to be able to preserve high fertility of semen for over seven days. The IVT diluent is composed of several salts, sugars and antibacterial agents and gassed with CO.


title: Semen

text: Semen cryopreservation can be used for far longer storage durations. For human sperm, the longest reported successful storage with this method is 21 years.


title: Semen

text: Semen can transmit many sexually transmitted diseases and pathogens, including viruses like HIV and Ebola. Swallowing semen carries no additional risk other than those inherent in fellatio. This includes transmission risk for sexually transmitted diseases such as human papillomavirus or herpes, especially for people with bleeding gums, gingivitis or open sores. Viruses in semen survive for a long time once outside the body.


title: Semen

text: The presence of blood in semen or hematospermia may be undetectable (it can only be seen microscopically) or visible in the fluid. Its cause could be the result of inflammation, infection, blockage, or injury of the male reproductive tract or a problem within the urethra, testicles, epididymis or prostate. It usually clears up without treatment, or with antibiotics, but if persistent further semen analysis and other urogenital system tests might be needed to find out the cause.


title: Semen

text: In rare circumstances, humans can develop an allergy to semen, called human seminal plasma sensitivity. It appears as a typical localized or systemic allergic response upon contact with seminal fluid. There is no one protein in semen responsible for the reaction. Symptoms can appear after first intercourse or after subsequent intercourse. A semen allergy can be distinguished from a latex allergy by determining if the symptoms disappear with use of a condom. Desensitization treatments are often very successful.


title: Semen

text: Females may benefit from absorbing seminal fluid. Such benefits include male insects transferring nutrients to females via their ejaculate; in both humans and bovines, the fluid has antiviral and antibacterial properties; and useful bacteria such as Lactobacillus have been detected in fluid transferred from birds and mammals.


title: Semen

text: Qigong and Chinese medicine place huge emphasis on a form of energy called 精 (pinyin: jīng, also a morpheme denoting "essence" or "spirit") – which one attempts to develop and accumulate. "Jing" is sexual energy and is considered to dissipate with ejaculation, so masturbation is considered "energy suicide" amongst those who practice this art. According to Qigong theory, energy from many pathways/meridians becomes diverted and transfers itself to the sexual organs during sexual excitement. The ensuing orgasm and ejaculation will then finally expel the energy from the system completely. The Chinese proverb 一滴精，十滴血 (pinyin: yì dī jīng, shí dī xuè, literally: a drop of semen is equal to ten drops of blood) illustrates this point.


title: Semen

text: The scientific term for semen in Chinese is 精液 (pinyin: jīng yè, literally: fluid of essence/jing) and the term for sperm is 精子 (pinyin: jīng zǐ, literally: basic element of essence/jing), two modern terms with classical referents.


title: Semen

text: In the Indian system of medicine called Ayurveda semen is said to be made from 40 drops of blood. It is considered as the end of the food digestion cycle.


title: Semen

text: One of the key aspects of Hindu religion is abstinence called Brahmacharya. It can be lifelong or during a specific period or on specific days. Brahmacharya attaches great importance to semen retention.


title: Semen

text: Many yogic texts also indicate the importance of semen retention and there are specific asanas and Bandhas for it like Mula Bandana and Aswini Mudra.


title: Semen

text: In Ancient Greece, Aristotle remarked on the importance of semen: "For Aristotle, semen is the residue derived from nourishment, that is of blood, that has been highly concocted to the optimum temperature and substance. This can only be emitted by the male as only the male, by nature of his very being, has the requisite heat to concoct blood into semen." According to Aristotle, there is a direct connection between food and semen: "Sperms are the excretion of our food, or to put it more clearly, as the most perfect component of our food."


title: Semen

text: The connection between food and physical growth, on the one hand, and semen, on the other, allows Aristotle to warn against "engag[ing] in sexual activity at too early an age ... [since] this will affect the growth of their bodies. Nourishment that would otherwise make the body grow is diverted to the production of semen. Aristotle is saying that at this stage the "body" is still growing; it is best for sexual activity to begin when its growth is 'no longer abundant', for when the body is more or less at full height, the transformation of nourishment into semen does not drain the body of needed material."


title: Semen

text: Additionally, "Aristotle tells us that the region round the eyes was the region of the head most fruitful of seed ("most seedy" σπερματικώτατος), pointing to generally recognised effects upon the eyes of sexual indulgence and to practices which imply that seed comes from liquid in the region of the eyes." This may be explained by the belief of the Pythagoreans that "semen is a drop of the brain [τὸ δε σπέρμα εἶναι σταγόνα ἐγκέφαλου]."


title: Semen

text: Greek Stoic philosophy conceived of the "Logos spermatikos" ("seminal word") as the principle of active reason that fecundated passive matter. The Jewish philosopher Philo similarly spoke in sexual terms of the Logos as the masculine principle of reason that sowed seeds of virtue in the feminine soul.


title: Semen

text: The Christian Platonist Clement of Alexandria likened the Logos to physical blood as the "substance of the soul", and noted that some held "that the animal semen is substantially foam of its blood". Clement reflected an early Christian view that "the seed ought not be wasted nor scattered thoughtlessly nor sown in a way it cannot grow."


title: Semen

text: Women were believed to have their own version, which was stored in the womb and released during climax. Retention was believed to cause female hysteria.


title: Semen

text: In ancient Greek religion as a whole, semen is considered a form of miasma, and ritual purification was to be practised after its discharge.


title: Semen

text: In some pre-industrial societies, semen and other body fluids were revered because they were believed to be magical. Blood is an example of such a fluid, but semen was also widely believed to be of supernatural origin and effect and was, as a result, considered holy or sacred. The ancient Sumerians believed that semen was "a divine substance, endowed on humanity by Enki", the god of water. The semen of a god was believed to have magical generative powers. In Sumerian mythology, when Enki's seed was planted in the ground, it caused the spontaneous growth of eight previously-nonexistent plants. Enki was believed to have created the Tigris and Euphrates rivers by masturbating and ejaculating into their empty riverbeds. The Sumerians believed that rain was the semen of the sky-god An, which fell from the heavens to inseminate his consort, the earth-goddess Ki, causing her to give birth to all the plants of the earth.


title: Semen

text: Dew was once thought to be a sort of rain that fertilized the earth and, in time, became a metaphor for semen. The Bible employs the term "dew" in this sense in such verses as Song of Solomon 5:2 and Psalm 110:3, declaring, in the latter verse, for example, that the people should follow only a king who was virile enough to be full of the "dew" of youth.


title: Semen

text: The orchid's twin bulbs were thought to resemble the testicles, which is the etymology of the disease orchiditis. There was an ancient Roman belief that the flower sprang from the spilled semen of copulating satyrs.


title: Semen

text: In a number of mythologies around the world, semen is often considered analogous to breast milk. In the traditions of Bali, it is considered to be the returning or refunding of the milk of the mother in an alimentary metaphor. The wife feeds her husband who returns to her his semen, the milk of human kindness, as it were.


title: Semen

text: When the British Secret Intelligence Service discovered that semen made a good invisible ink, Sir George Mansfield Smith-Cumming noted of his agents that "Every man (is) his own stylo".


title: Semen

text: The Borborites, also known as the Phibionites, were an early Christian Gnostic sect during the late fourth century AD whose alleged practices involving sacred semen are described by the early Christian heretic-hunter Epiphanius of Salamis in his "Panarion". Epiphanius claims that the Borborites had a sacred text called the "Greater Questions of Mary", which contained an episode in which, during a post-resurrection appearance, Jesus took Mary Magdalene to the top of a mountain, where he pulled a woman out of his side and engaged in sexual intercourse with her. Then, upon ejaculating, Jesus drank his own semen and told Mary, "Thus we must do, that we may live." Upon hearing this, Mary instantly fainted, to which Jesus responded by helping her up and telling her, "O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?" This story was supposedly the basis for the Borborite Eucharist ritual, in which they allegedly engaged in orgies and drank semen and menstrual blood as the "body and blood of Christ" respectively. Bart D. Ehrman, a scholar of early Christianity, casts doubt on the accuracy of Epiphanius's summary, commenting that "the details of Epiphanius's description sound very much like what you can find in the ancient rumor mill about secret societies in the ancient world".


title: Semen

text: In some cultures, semen is considered to have special properties associated with masculinity. Several tribes of Papua New Guinea, including the Sambia and the Etoro, believe that semen promotes sexual maturation among the younger men of their tribe. To them, semen possesses the manly nature of the tribal elders, and in order to pass down their authority and powers, younger men of their next generation must fellate their elders and ingest their semen. Prepubescent and postpubescent males are required to engage in this practice. This act may also be associated with the culturally active homosexuality throughout these and other tribes.


title: Semen

text: Semen ingestion has had central importance in some cultures around the world. In Baruya culture, there is a secret ritual in which boys give fellatio to young males and drink their semen, to "re-engender themselves before marriage".


title: Semen

text: There are several sexual practices involving the ingestion of semen, which may be done with one or more partners. Practices involving the oral intake of semen include:


title: Semen

text: A huge variety of euphemisms and dysphemisms have been invented to describe semen. For a complete list of terms, see "sexual slang".


title: Semen

text: Slang terms for semen include "cum", "jizz", "spunk" (primarily British English), "spooge" and/or "splooge", "load", "nut", "seed", and "love juice". The term "cum" can also refer to an orgasm (when used as a verb rather than as a noun), while "load" is derived from the phrase "blowing a load", referring to an ejaculation. The term "nut" originally refers to the testicles, but can be used to refer both semen and ejaculation.


title: Wind River (film)

text: Wind River is a 2017 neo-Western crime film written and directed by Taylor Sheridan. The film stars Jeremy Renner and Elizabeth Olsen as a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service tracker and an FBI agent, respectively, who try to solve a murder on the Wind River Indian Reservation in Wyoming. Gil Birmingham, Jon Bernthal, and Graham Greene also star.


title: Wind River (film)

text: Sheridan has said that he wrote the film to raise awareness of the issue of the high number of Indigenous women who are raped and murdered, both on and off reservations.


title: Wind River (film)

text: "Wind River" premiered at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival and was released in the United States on August 4, 2017. The film received generally positive reviews from critics and was a box office success, grossing $45 million against an $11 million budget. It was theatrically released by The Weinstein Company (TWC), but in October 2017, following the reporting of numerous sexual abuse allegations against Harvey Weinstein, the film's distribution rights for home media were acquired by Lionsgate. Weinstein's credits and logo were omitted on home media and streaming services, as TWC lost its distribution rights.


title: Wind River (film)

text: During the winter on Wyoming's Wind River Indian Reservation, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Agent Cory Lambert discovers the frozen body of 18-year-old Natalie Hanson. FBI Special Agent Jane Banner arrives to investigate the possible homicide. Banner learns from Natalie's father Martin that his daughter was dating a new boyfriend who is unknown to him. Natalie's autopsy shows signs of blunt trauma and rape, and confirms Lambert's deduction that Natalie died from pulmonary hemorrhage caused by inhaling subzero air. The medical examiner is unable to classify the death as a homicide, so Banner cannot get additional help from her supervisors.


title: Wind River (film)

text: Lambert discovers that Natalie's boyfriend is Matt Rayburn, who works as a security guard at a nearby oil drilling site. Lambert and Banner soon discover Matt's naked, mutilated body in the snow. Lambert reveals to Banner that his 16-year-old daughter Emily died in a similar manner to Natalie three years earlier, and the case remains unsolved.


title: Wind River (film)

text: Banner, tribal police Chief Ben Shoyo, and other law enforcement officers visit the drilling site where they are met by Curtis, the security supervisor, and several security guards. They claim Matt left a few days prior following an argument with Natalie. One guard mentions they heard about Natalie's body being found and Banner states that Natalie's name has not been released to the public. The guards claim they learned it by monitoring a police scanner. One of Banner's team notices the guards are slowly surrounding them and draws his weapon. The confrontation quickly escalates into an armed standoff which Banner defuses.


title: Wind River (film)

text: In a flashback, Matt's drunken colleagues barge into his trailer while he is in bed with Natalie. Matt is provoked to violence, and the other guards retaliate while Pete rapes Natalie. Matt is beaten to death but his attempt to fight back gives Natalie an opportunity to try to escape by running cross-country to the mobile home where her brother lives.


title: Wind River (film)

text: In the present, Lambert traces the tracks from where Matt's corpse was found back to the drilling camp. As Banner and the others approach Pete's trailer, Lambert radios a warning to Shoyo. Pete responds to a veiled warning from Curtis by firing a shotgun through the door, wounding Banner. A gunfight ensues, and Shoyo and the other officers are killed. As the remaining guards prepare to execute Banner, Lambert kills four with his rifle. A wounded Pete flees on foot but Lambert apprehends him. At Gannett Peak, Lambert forces Pete to confess, then offers him the same chance Natalie had; rather than being shot, he can try to stay alive by running to a distant road while barefoot and wearing only lightweight clothing. Pete runs but quickly succumbs as his lungs give out from the frigid air.


title: Wind River (film)

text: Lambert visits Banner in the hospital and praises her toughness. He visits with Martin and they share grief over the deaths of their daughters. As the film ends, a title card states that missing persons statistics are kept for every demographic group except Native American women, whose numbers remain unknown.


title: Wind River (film)

text: According to Sheridan, he was inspired to write this film because he learned about the "thousands of actual stories just like it": referring to the high number of Indigenous women who are victims of sexual assault and/or murder. He wrote and directed the movie to make more people aware of this problem.


title: Wind River (film)

text: The film is the third installment of Taylor Sheridan's trilogy of "the modern-day American frontier", the first being "Sicario" in 2015, and "Hell or High Water" the next year. Principal photography on the film began on March 12, 2016, in Utah and lasted until April 25, 2016.


title: Wind River (film)

text: The Weinstein Company acquired the distribution rights on May 13, 2016, during the 2016 Cannes Film Festival. In January 2017, it was announced that the company would no longer distribute the film, but the distribution deal was later finalized. It had a limited release on August 4, 2017, before going wide on August 18.


title: Wind River (film)

text: In October 2017, following reporting on the Harvey Weinstein sexual abuse scandal, Lionsgate announced that it would distribute the film on home media and streaming services. The Weinstein Company (TWC) name and logo were omitted from the credits, trailer, and packaging. As a result, The Weinstein Company finally stopped distributing the film. Sheridan had required that TWC be deleted from the materials, and demanded that all money Weinstein would have made on this work be donated to charity.


title: Wind River (film)

text: "Wind River" grossed $33.8 million in the United States and Canada and $11.2 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $45 million, against a production budget of $11 million.


title: Wind River (film)

text: In the film's limited opening weekend, it made $161,558 from four theaters (a per-location average of $40,390, one of the best of 2017), finishing 29th at the box office. In its second week, the film expanded to 45 theaters and grossed $622,567. The film expanded to 694 theaters on August 18 and grossed $3 million, finishing tenth at the box office. The following week the film was added to an additional 1,401 theaters (for a total of 2,095) and made $4.6 million (an increase of 54.6%), finishing fourth at the box office. The film opened in another 507 theaters and made $5.7 million the following weekend, and an estimated $7.2 million over the four-day Labor Day weekend, finishing in the second spot at the U.S. box office consistently for the next 13 days. It was the sixth-highest grossing indie film of 2017.


title: Wind River (film)

text: On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 88% based on 249 reviews, with an average rating of 7.67/10. The website's critical consensus reads, ""Wind River" lures viewers into a character-driven mystery with smart writing, a strong cast, and a skillfully rendered setting that delivers the bitter chill promised by its title." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 73 out of 100, based on 44 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by PostTrak gave the film a 90% overall positive score and a 70% "definite recommend".


title: Wind River (film)

text: Owen Gleiberman of "Variety" described "Wind River" as a "humanistic crime drama, though this one has more skill than excitement". Chris Plante of "The Verge" described it as "a thrilling, violent finale to the "Hell or High Water" and "Sicario" trilogy", and as "Coen brothers noir meets the case of the week."


title: Wind River (film)

text: Writing for "Rolling Stone", Peter Travers praised Sheridan's direction and the cast, giving the film 3/4 stars. He wrote: "[It's] the set-up for what could have been a conventional whodunit – thankfully, Sheridan is allergic to all things conventional. To him, the action is character, and he's lucked out by finding actors who not only understand his approach but thrive on it." David Ehrlich of IndieWire gave the film a B, writing: "[If] "Wind River" shares Sheridan’s self-evident weaknesses, it also makes the most of his signature strengths. [...] "Wind River" may not blow you away, but this bitter, visceral, and almost paradoxically intense thriller knows what it takes to survive."


title: Wind River (film)

text: In a "High Country News" article titled "Why do white writers keep making films about Indian Country?", Native commentator Jason Asenap praises the film as "a thinking-person's thriller" full of complex characters, and describes the film's focus on missing Native American women as "admirable." He criticizes the film for perpetuating the "dying Indians" motif:


title: Wind River (film)

text: "at least in Hollywood, the Indians die. To this day, the Indians die, and not just physically, but culturally. Simpson and Sheridan are invested in making us see how America has screwed Native people, but to the point of rubbing it in our faces. Is it so terrible to live in one’s own homeland? It may be hard to get out, but it certainly feels condescending for a non-Native to write as much."


title: Wind River (film)

text: The filmmakers were criticized for casting non-Native actors in some of the Native American roles. Kelsey Chow had been advertised as Eastern Band Cherokee, leading the Eastern Band Cherokee to issue a statement that she is neither an enrolled member nor descended from the tribe.


title: Wind River (film)

text: In November 2022, Kari Skogland signed on to direct a sequel titled "Wind River: The Next Chapter", from a screenplay by Patrick Massett and John Zinman, and starring Martin Sensmeier. Principal photography will commence in January 2023.


title: Shōnen manga

text: Of the four primary demographic categories of manga, is the most popular category in the Japanese market. While manga ostensibly targets an audience of young males, its actual readership extends significantly beyond this target group to include all ages and genders. The category originated from Japanese children's magazines at the turn of the 20th century and gained significant popularity by the 1920s. The editorial focus of manga is primarily on action, adventure, and the fighting of monsters or other forces of evil. Though action narratives dominate the category, there is deep editorial diversity and a significant number of genres and subgenres within manga, especially when compared to other comic cultures outside of Japan, including comedy, crime, romance, slice of life, and sports.


title: Shōnen manga

text: The Japanese word (少年 /ɕoːnen/) translates literally to "few years". historically referred to juveniles in a general sense, and was used by the Japanese publishing industry to designate publications aimed at children and young people until the end of the 19th century. The word shifted to its current usage of referring specifically to media aimed at adolescent boys beginning with the practice of segmenting periodicals (especially manga magazines) by sex and age-specific target groups, which was established at the beginning of the 20th century and accelerated starting in the 1960s. This system of segmentation is now openly used as a categorization system by manga publishers and extends into works that are adapted from manga, such as anime.


title: Shōnen manga

text: manga refers to manga aimed at an audience of adolescent boys, with the primary target audience alternately defined as 9 to 18 years old and as 12 to 18 years old. Of the four primary demographic categories of manga (, , , and ), it is the most popular category in the Japanese market.


title: Shōnen manga

text: The actual readership of manga, as is the case for all demographic categories of manga, extends significantly beyond this adolescent male target group to include all ages and genders. For example, a 2006 survey of female manga readers found that "Weekly Shōnen Jump" was the most popular manga magazine among this demographic, placing ahead of magazines that specifically target a female readership. The target group orientation of manga is particularly evident in the non-manga content of manga magazines, which include advertising and articles on topics tailored to the interests of young males, such as video games. Non-manga content often corresponds to a major manga series in a given magazine, for example, advertisements for a video game adaptation of the series, or articles about an animated film adaptation of the series.


title: Shōnen manga

text: Children's magazines with sex-segregated readerships have existed in Japan since the early 1900s. While early youth magazines were ostensibly unisex – "Shōnen Sekai" was the first youth magazine in Japan in 1895, targeting a readership of both boys and girls – in practice, the editorial content of these publications largely concerned topics that were of interest to boys. This provoked the emergence of first exclusively (girls) magazines in 1902, and magazines subsequently began to exclusively target a male audience. Initially, these magazines did not publish manga; the first magazine to do so was "Shōnen Pakku", first published in 1907. This was followed by "Shōnen Club" in 1914 and later "Yōnen Club". Among the most successful and influential manga series in these early magazines were "Norakuro" by Suihō Tagawa, which follows the life of an anthropomorphic dog soldier, and "Tank Tankuro" by Gajo Sakamoto, about a robot-like character who can change his appearance.


title: Shōnen manga

text: During the post-war occupation of Japan, the Japanese publishing industry was rebuilt under initially strict guidelines. Stories focused on war, combat, and most competitive sports were banned with the aim of discouraging belligerence and hindering the use of manga for pro-Imperial propaganda. Manga developed during this period under the influence of artist Osamu Tezuka, with series such as "Astro Boy" and "Kimba the White Lion". Tezuka was inspired by American cartoons, and pioneered the so-called "story manga": long-running manga series with a cinematic style and continuity across multiple chapters, contrasting what had previously been a medium defined by one-off comic strips. Science fiction stories about robots, space travel, and heroic space-faring adventures enjoyed popularity during this period; many sci-fi stories took themes and concepts from war comics and re-imagined them with pacifist ideals, such as "Tetsujin 28-go" by Mitsuteru Yokoyama.


title: Shōnen manga

text: One of the first new manga magazines of the post-war period was "Manga Shōnen", which launched in 1947 and published works by Tezuka, Leiji Matsumoto, and Shōtarō Ishinomori. As post-war censorship codes were repealed and Japan entered a period of significant economic development in the 1950s, sales of manga and the number of manga magazines increased significantly, and and manga came to further establish themselves as distinct categories. The first works of sports manga also emerged from manga during this time; notable early works include "" by Eiichi Fukui as the first manga series in the genre, and "Ashita no Joe" by Asao Takamori and Tetsuya Chiba, which became one of the most commercially successful works in the genre. 1959 saw the launch of "Shōnen Sunday" and "Weekly Shōnen Magazine", the first weekly manga magazines. Other weeklies, such as "Shōnen Champion", "Shōnen King", and "Shōnen Ace", emerged in the 1960s. "Weekly Shōnen Jump" was first published in 1968, and would establish itself as the best-selling manga magazine across demographic categories, a position it holds to this day. Many of the most popular and commercially successful series originated in "Weekly Shōnen Jump", including "Dragon Ball" by Akira Toriyama, "Naruto" by Masashi Kishimoto, "Bleach" by Tite Kubo, "One Piece" by Eiichiro Oda, and "Slam Dunk" by Takehiko Inoue.


title: Shōnen manga

text: manga became formalized as a category of manga aimed at an older male audience in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and many artists associated with the realist movement migrated to manga. The demise of the (rental manga) market led many artists to move into magazine publishing, including manga, bringing their distinct themes and style with them. As a result, manga came to deal with more serious and political themes, and saw an increase in depictions of violent and explicit subjects, as well as an increase in profanity. Significant artists of this era include Shigeru Mizuki, creator of the horror series "GeGeGe no Kitarō"; and George Akiyama, whose manga series "Ashura" depicts cannibalism, child abuse, and mass murder. Although this provoked a public backlash, it did not lead to the decline for the industry: series with anarchic, offensive humor became popular in and manga alike, with "Crayon Shin-Chan" by Yoshito Usui becoming an internationally famous example of this phenomenon. Manga artist Go Nagai originated the sexually-charged genre with "Harenchi Gakuen", which was serialized in "Weekly Shōnen Jump".


title: Shōnen manga

text: The stylistic and thematic differences between and began to narrow considerably beginning in the 1980s, with widespread exchange of stylistic devices and themes. For example, the characteristic large eyes of manga became common in manga to convey the emotions of characters, and female characters have enjoyed greater prominence as both supporting and primary characters in manga. Other graphic storytelling techniques that originated in manga, such as montages of multiple panels, were imported into manga and have become common stylistic devices. Female manga artists also began to enjoy increasing critical and commercial success as manga creators. As a result of the combined influence of and the rise of female artists, romance emerged as a subgenre of manga, especially romantic comedy. When manga began to emerge in the western world in the early 1990s, the category was so dominant in these new markets that it came to shape the image of manga as a whole. While made gains in popularity by the 2000s, remains the most popular category of manga, both in Japan and internationally.


title: Shōnen manga

text: This thematic orientation of manga is readily inferred from the formal values or slogans that manga magazines assign themselves: for example, "friendship, perseverance, and victory" for "Weekly Shōnen Jump", and "courage, friendship and fighting spirit" for "CoroCoro Comic". The editorial focus of manga is primarily on action, adventure, and the fighting of monsters or other forces of evil. Action stories are so dominant in manga that some manga and non-manga works are occasionally designated as not because of their ostensible target group, but because of their content focus on action and adventure. Though action narratives dominate the category, there is deep editorial diversity and a significant number of genres and subgenres within manga, especially when compared to other comic cultures outside of Japan. This includes but is not limited to comedy, crime, romance, slice of life, and stories about activities such as sports and the lives of different types of working professionals.


title: Shōnen manga

text: The action genre is itself is expressed through a variety of subgenres, from historical and contemporary drama to science fiction and fantasy. war fiction has been alternately jingoistic or critical of militarism and violence, with "Barefoot Gen" by Keiji Nakazawa as a notable example of the latter. Samurai appeared frequently as idealized role models for boy readers in early , analogous to representations of cowboys in western comics; samurai stories shifted to comedy and sportsmanship in the post-war period, before returning to themes of idealized themes of good versus evil. Though manga typically attempts to convey a message of peace, the category has been criticized by individuals such as director Hayao Miyazaki for promoting overly simple good/evil dichotomies.


title: Shōnen manga

text: A protagonist is often characterized by contradictory qualities: short-tempered and cool, serious and cynical, clumsy and infallible, or who appears as a good-for-nothing but possesses hidden abilities. In some cases, the contradiction takes on a literal form in the form of , where the hero is able to switch between two personas with different appearances and personalities; examples of this device include "Yu-Gi-Oh" by Kazuki Takahashi and "Samurai Deeper Kyo" by Akimine Kamijyo. Transformation abilities are often linked with bonds to a spirit, monster or robot. A major narrative device in manga is rivalry between the protagonist and his opponent, with a fight or a quest often appearing as a central element; "Dragon Ball" is among the most popular and commercially successful examples of this archetypal story.


title: Shōnen manga

text: Typically, a protagonist is an outsider, or in some way disadvantaged compared to others, but who through training, perseverance, and willpower eventually succeeds against all odds. Plots typically follow the basic structure of the hero's journey, with much of the story focused on the protagonist's training and transformation into a hero, and on characters who earn their status as heroes through effort and tenacity rather than by virtue of birth or assignment. For long-running series, the hero's journey repeats itself; as a new story arc begins, the enemy becomes more powerful and the danger to be overcome becomes greater. In addition to these external conflicts, a protagonist often also faces internal conflicts, typically focused around maturity and growing older. In contrast to manga, which often focuses on the thoughts and interior monologue of the hero, typically advances plot through dialogue and action. Happy endings are common in manga, but are not obligatory.


title: Shōnen manga

text: Comics theorist Neil Cohn regards the art style of as generally "edgier" than that of manga, and notes how most regular manga readers are able to easily distinguish between and based on visual appearance alone. Visually, a protagonist often possesses what manga critic Jason Thompson describes as "insanely spiky hair" that distinguishes the protagonist's silhouette from that of other characters. The eyes of characters in the post-war period are significantly smaller than those of characters in manga; large eyes are used in manga to better convey the emotions of the characters, an aspect which has historically been given less focus in manga. A common visual device in action scenes is to depict the contours of figures with rough, coarse motion lines to give the appearance of movement.


title: Shōnen manga

text: Historically, the protagonists of manga were almost exclusively men and boys; women and girls appeared primarily in supporting roles as sisters, mothers, or girlfriends, if at all. This was especially true of stories that developed out of manga beginning in the 1970s, with "The Abashiri Family" by Go Nagai as one of the earliest representative works of this development, as well as an early example of a manga with a female protagonist. Since the 1980s, women and girls have played a more active role in manga, fighting alongside male characters and not merely as passive support. "Dr. Slump" by Akira Toriyama was an early representative work of this development, with its mischievous child protagonist Arale Norimaki being among the first manga to depict this type of archetypal character as a girl rather than a boy. The 1980s also saw female manga artists rise to greater prominence: notably horror manga artist Kei Kusunoki, and Rumiko Takahashi with her romantic comedies "Urusei Yatsura" and "Ranma ½".


title: Shōnen manga

text: Especially in series that are aimed at an older audience, female characters are often presented in a manner that is attractive to the male target audience as so-called (literally "beautiful young girls"). They exist as objects of romantic or sexual desire not merely for the male characters, but also for the ostensibly heterosexual male reader as a form of fan service. While these objectifying tropes have persisted in manga, women have also developed more active roles in these fan service-oriented stories. A common romantic comedy trope in manga since the 1980s has been to pair a weak male protagonist with a strong female love interest who is not only the target of his romantic and sexual desire, but also his good friend and confidante. In the harem genre, which originated from manga, a male protagonist is surrounded by several female characters who desire him, and who are often more confident and assertive than he is; examples include "Negima! Magister Negi Magi" by Ken Akamatsu and "Hanaukyo Maid Team" by Morishige. In other cases, the male protagonist is unsuccessful in his attempts to woo the female character, or the story is focused around the originally naïve and infantile male protagonist maturing and learning how to develop healthy relationships with women.


title: Shōnen manga

text: For certain series, a female readership who read in or interpret subtextual homoerotic relationships between canonically heterosexual male characters constitute a significant proportion of the series' audience; this is especially true of series featuring male characters who are (literally "beautiful boys"), or who are perceived as such by readers. This reading of manga is expressed in the form of fan works such as (self-published amateur manga) and the (male-male romance) genre of manga and anime, which includes both original and derivative works. Manga scholar Yukari Fujimoto notes in her analysis of the female readership of the titles "One Piece", "Naruto", and "The Prince of Tennis" that homoerotic interpretations of manga tend to be most common among titles that do not include prominent female characters that a female readership is able to identify with.


title: Shōnen manga

text: manga is traditionally published in dedicated manga magazines that specifically target an audience of . At the industry's peak in the mid-1990s, there were 23 total magazines, which collectively sold 662 million copies in 1995. The total manga magazine market that year included 265 magazines, with a total of 1.595 billion copies sold.


title: Shōnen manga

text: A manga magazine is typically several hundred pages long, and contains over a dozen series or one-shots. The largest Japanese magazines in terms of circulation are "Weekly Shōnen Jump" by Shueisha, "Weekly Shōnen Magazine" by Kodansha, and "Weekly Shōnen Sunday" by Shogakukan; these publishers are also the largest publishers of manga generally. The fourth largest magazine, albeit by a significant margin, is "Weekly Shōnen Champion" by Akita Shoten, which was among the most popular manga magazines in the 1970s and 1980s. The magazines "CoroCoro Comic" and the now-defunct "Comic BomBom" technically belong to the (children's manga) demographic, but are often counted as magazines as they target an audience of school-aged boys. A list of the top magazines by circulation as of 2015 are listed below:


title: Ozarks

text: The Ozarks, also known as the Ozark Mountains, Ozark Highlands or Ozark Plateau, is a physiographic region in the U.S. states of Missouri, Arkansas, Oklahoma and the extreme southeastern corner of Kansas. The Ozarks cover a significant portion of northern Arkansas and most of the southern half of Missouri, extending from Interstate 40 in central Arkansas to Interstate 70 in central Missouri.


title: Ozarks

text: There are two mountain ranges in the Ozarks: the Boston Mountains of Arkansas and the St. Francois Mountains of Missouri. Buffalo Lookout, the highest point in the Ozarks, is located in the Boston Mountains. Geologically, the area is a broad dome with the exposed core in the ancient St. Francois Mountains. The Ozarks cover nearly , making it the most extensive highland region between the Appalachians and Rockies. Together with the Ouachita Mountains, the area is known as the U.S. Interior Highlands.


title: Ozarks

text: The Salem Plateau, named after Salem, Missouri, makes up the largest geologic area of the Ozarks. The second largest is the Springfield Plateau, named after Springfield, Missouri, nicknamed the "Queen City of the Ozarks". On the northern Ozark border are the cities of St. Louis and Columbia, Missouri. Significant Ozark cities in Arkansas include Fayetteville, Bentonville, Springdale, Eureka Springs, and Fort Smith. Branson, just north of the Arkansas–Missouri border, is a tourist destination and popularizer of Ozark culture.


title: Ozarks

text: "Ozarks" is a toponym believed to be derived as an English-language adaptation of the French abbreviation "aux Arcs" (short for "aux Arcansas", meaning "of/at/to the Arcansas [plural]"). Originally, in the decades prior to the French and Indian War, "aux Arkansas" referred to the trading post at Arkansas Post, located in wooded Arkansas Delta lowland area above the confluence of the Arkansas River with the Mississippi River.


title: Ozarks

text: Other possible derivations include "aux arcs" meaning "[land] of the arches", in reference to the dozens of natural bridges formed by erosion and collapsed caves in the Ozark region. These include Clifty Hollow Natural Bridge (actually a series of arches) in Missouri, and Alum Cove in the Ozark–St. Francis National Forest. By the early 20th century, the "Ozarks" had become a generic and widely used term.


title: Ozarks

text: The Ozarks consist of five physiographic subregions: the Boston Mountains of north Arkansas and Cookson Hills of east Oklahoma; the Springfield Plateau of southwest Missouri, northeast Oklahoma, and northwest Arkansas and including Springfield, Joplin and Monett/Aurora in Missouri, Tahlequah in Oklahoma, and Fayetteville and Harrison in Arkansas; the White River Hills along the White River, including Branson and Mountain Home to Batesville; the Salem Plateau or Central Plateau, which includes a broad band across south central Missouri and north central Arkansas including the Lebanon, Salem and West Plains areas; the Courtois Hills of southeastern Missouri; the Osage-Gasconade Hills around the Lake of the Ozarks; the Saint Francois Mountains; and the Missouri River and Mississippi River border areas along the eastern and northeastern flanks.


title: Ozarks

text: Karst features such as springs, losing streams, sinkholes and caves are common in the limestones of the Springfield Plateau and abundant in the dolomite bedrock of the Salem Plateau and Boston Mountains. Missouri is known as "The Cave State" with over 7,300 recorded caves, second in number only to Tennessee. The majority of these caves are found in the Ozark counties. The Ozark Plateaus aquifer system affects groundwater movement in all areas except the igneous core of the St. Francois Mountains. Geographic features include limestone and dolomite glades, which are rocky, desert-like areas on hilltops. Kept open by periodic fires that limit growth of grasses and forbs in shallow soil, glades are home to collared lizards, tarantulas, scorpions, cacti and other species more typical of the Desert Southwest.


title: Ozarks

text: The Boston Mountains contain the highest elevations of the Ozarks, with peaks over , and form some of the greatest relief of any formation between the Appalachians and Rocky Mountains. The Ouachita Mountains to the south rise a few hundred feet higher, but are not geographically associated with the Ozarks. The Boston Mountains portion of the Ozarks extends north of the Arkansas River Valley , is approximately long, and is bordered by the Springfield and Salem Plateau to the north of the White River. Summits can reach elevations of just over , with valleys deep. Turner Ward Knob is the highest named peak. Found in western Newton County, Arkansas, its elevation is . Nearby, five unnamed peaks have elevations at or slightly above . Drainage is primarily to the White River, with the exception of the Illinois River, although there also is considerable drainage from the south slopes of the Boston Mountains to the Arkansas River. Major streams of this type include Lee Creek, Frog Bayou, Mulberry River, Spadra Creek, Big Piney Creek, Little Piney Creek, Illinois Bayou, Point Remove Creek, and Cadron Creek. Many Ozark waterways have their headwaters in the uplands of the Boston formation, including the Buffalo, Kings, Mulberry, Little Red and White rivers.


title: Ozarks

text: Topography is mostly gently rolling in the Springfield and Salem plateaus, whereas the Saint Francois Mountains are more rugged. Although the Springfield formation's surface is primarily Mississippian limestone and chert, the Salem Plateau is made of older Ordovician dolomites, limestones, and sandstones. Both are rife with karst topography and form long, flat plains. The formations are separated by steep escarpments that dramatically interrupt the rolling hills. Although much of the Springfield Plateau has been denuded of the surface layers of the Boston Mountains, large remnants of these younger layers are present throughout the southern end of the formation, possibly suggesting a peneplain process. The Springfield Plateau drains through wide, mature streams ultimately feeding the White River.


title: Ozarks

text: The St. Francois Mountains in the northeastern Ozarks are the eroded remnants of an ancient range which form the geological core of the highland dome. The igneous and volcanic rocks of the St. Francois Mountains are the exposed remains of a Proterozoic mountain range hundreds of millions of years old. The remaining hills are the exposed portion of an extensive terrane (the Spavinaw terrane in part) of granitic and rhyolitic rocks dating from 1485 to 1350 mya that stretches from Ohio to western Oklahoma. The core of the range existed as an island in the Paleozoic seas. Reef complexes occur in the sedimentary layers surrounding this ancient island. These flanking reefs were points of concentration for later ore-bearing fluids which formed the rich lead-zinc ores that have been and continue to be mined in the area. The igneous and volcanic rocks extend at depth under the relatively thin veneer of Paleozoic sedimentary rocks and form the basal crust of the entire region.


title: Ozarks

text: A major unconformity in the region attests that the Ozarks were above sea level for several hundred million years from the time of the volcanism in the Precambrian until the mid-Cambrian with an erosionally produced relief of up to . The seas encroached during the late Cambrian producing the Lamotte Sandstone, thick, followed by carbonate sedimentation. Coral reefs formed around the granite and rhyolite islands in this Cambrian sea. This carbonate formation, the Bonneterre, now mostly dolomite, is exposed around the St. Francis Mountains, but extends in the subsurface throughout the Ozarks and reaches a thickness of . The Bonneterre is overlain by of dolomite, often sandy, silty or cherty, forming the Elvins Group and the Potosi and Eminence formations. Withdrawal of the seas resulted in another unconformity during the latest Cambrian and early Ordovician periods. Hydrothermal mineralizing fluids formed the rich lead ore deposits of the Lead Belt during this time.


title: Ozarks

text: Sedimentation resumed in the Ordovician with the deposition of the Gunter sandstone, the Gasconade dolomite and the prominent Roubidoux sandstone and dolomite. The sandstone of the Roubidoux forms prominent bluffs along the streams eroding into the southern part of the Salem Plateau. The Roubidoux and Gunter sandstones serve as significant aquifers when present in the subsurface. The source of the sands is considered to be the emerging Wisconsin Dome to the northeast. The Ozark region remained as a subsiding shallow carbonate shelf environment with a significant thickness of cherty dolomites such as the Jefferson City, Cotter and Powell formations.


title: Ozarks

text: Portions of the Ozark Plateau, the Springfield Plateau of southwest Missouri and northern Arkansas, are underlain by Mississippian cherty limestones locally referred to as "Boone chert", consisting of limestone and chert layers. These are eroded and form steep hills, valleys and bluffs.


title: Ozarks

text: The Boston Mountains are a high and deeply dissected plateau. The rocks of the region are essentially little disturbed, flat-lying sedimentary layers of Paleozoic age. The highest ridges and peaks are capped by Pennsylvanian sandstone such as the basal Atoka and the "Middle Bloyd". The deeply eroded valleys are cut into Mississippian limestone and below that layer Ordovician dolomite.


title: Ozarks

text: During the Pennsylvanian period the Ozark Plateau was uplifted as a result of the Ouachita orogeny. During the late Paleozoic the deep ocean basin that existed in central and southern Arkansas was lifted when South America collided with North America, creating the folded Ouachita Mountains and uplifting the Ozark plateau to the north.


title: Ozarks

text: Formal conservation in the region began when the Ozark National Forest was created by proclamation of President Theodore Roosevelt in 1908 to preserve across five Arkansas counties. Another were added the following year. The initial forest included area as far south as Mount Magazine and as far east as Sylamore.


title: Ozarks

text: In 1939, Congress established Mark Twain National Forest at nine sites in Missouri. Wildlife management areas were founded in the 1920s and '30s to restore populations to viable numbers. In the 1930s and 1940s Aldo Leopold, Arthur Carhart and Bob Marshall developed a "wilderness" policy for the Forest Service. Their efforts bore fruit with The Wilderness Act of 1964 which designated wilderness areas "where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by men, where man himself is a visitor and does not remain", though this included second growth public forests like the Mark Twain National Forest.


title: Ozarks

text: Land was also added to Ozark National Forest during this period, with over in total additions. Some land was reclaimed by the government through the Resettlement Administration during the Great Depression. In 1976, Congress established the Hercules Glades Wilderness, the first of 13 designated wilderness areas in the Ozarks. In 1986, Congress established the Ozark Plateau National Wildlife Refuge in northeast Oklahoma. Protected areas ensure the recovery of endangered and threatened species of animals and plants, including the red wolf, Ozark big-eared bat, Indiana bat, eastern small-footed bat, southeastern bat, southeastern big-eared bat; longnose darter, Ozark cavefish, Ozark cave crayfish, Bowman's cave amphipod, Ozark cave amphipod, bat cave isopod; and Ozark chinquapin. It is a habitat of migratory birds and contains geological, archeological, historical, and paleontological resources.


title: Ozarks

text: Commercial farms and processing operations are known to raise levels of chemical and biological contaminants in Ozark streams, threatening water supplies, recreational use and endangered native species.


title: Ozarks

text: Many of the rivers and streams in the Ozarks have been dammed. Most of the dams in the region were initially built for the dual purpose of flood control and hydropower generation but have also become major economic drivers through recreational use in places such as Branson, Missouri, and Mountain Home, Arkansas.


title: Ozarks

text: The Army Corps of Engineers among others, operates multiple dams in the Ozarks region. Some of the largest lakes created by these dams are on the White River. Beginning in 1911 with the construction of Powersite Dam on the White River near Branson, Missouri and the impoundment of Lake Taneycomo the Ozarks rivers have been harnessed for electrical power, recreation, and flood control. After the President Franklin D, Roosevelt signed the Flood Control Act of 1938, six large flood control dams were constructed on the White River and its tributaries..


title: Ozarks

text: Multiple smaller lakes have been created by dams in the White River basin from 1911 through 1960. These smaller lakes include Lake Sequoyah, a small recreational fishing lake east of Fayetteville, Arkansas, formed in 1961; Sequoyah is the uppermost impoundment on the White River. Below Sequoyah (northeast of Fayetteville) is Beaver Lake, formed in 1960. The White River continues northeasterly into Table Rock Lake (1958) in Missouri, which feeds directly into Lake Taneycomo, where the river zigzags southeasterly into Arkansas forming Bull Shoals Lake along the Arkansas-Missouri line. Completed in 1952, Bull Shoals is the furthest downstream lake on the White River proper. Norfork Lake was formed by damming the North Fork River, a tributary of the White River, in 1941.


title: Ozarks

text: Additional large lakes in the Ozarks region include Lake of the Ozarks, Pomme de Terre Lake, and Truman Lake in the northern Ozarks. These three lakes were formed by impounding the Osage River and its tributary the Pomme de Terre River in 1931, 1961 and 1979 respectively.


title: Ozarks

text: Grand Lake o' the Cherokee in northeast Oklahoma, on the western portion of the Ozark Plateau, was created in 1940 with the damming of the Grand River. Stockton Lake was formed in 1969 by damming the Sac River near the city of Stockton, Missouri, and supplements the water supply of Springfield in nearby Greene County. .


title: Ozarks

text: The creation of the lakes significantly altered the Ozark landscape and affected traditional Ozark culture through displacement. The streams provided water and power to communities, farms and mills concentrated in the valleys prior to impoundment. Many cemeteries, farm roads, river fords and railways were lost when the lakes came, disrupting rural culture, travel and commerce. Baxter County, Arkansas, alone saw nearly 400 people displaced to make way for the reservoir created by Norfork Dam. The town of Forsyth, Missouri, was relocated in its entirety to a spot from its previous location. Prior to damming, rivers and streams in the White and Osage River basins were of similar character to the current conditions of the Buffalo, Elk, Niangua, Gasconade, Big Piney, Current, Jacks Fork, Eleven Point and Meramec rivers.


title: Ozarks

text: Because of the success of the Army Corps efforts to dam the large rivers in the Ozarks, the Ozarks Society began protests to keep the other rivers in the Ozarks free flowing. The Buffalo National River was created by an Act of Congress in 1972 as the nation's first National River, administered by the National Park Service. The designation came after over a decade of battling a proposed Army Corps dam in the media, legislature, and courts to keep the Buffalo River free flowing. The Ozark Society, the main force behind the dam protest, still leads the fight to keep the Buffalo River pristine and protected. Today, the Buffalo River sees approximately 800,000 visitors camping, canoeing, floating, hiking, and tubing annually. In Missouri, the Ozark National Scenic Riverways was established in 1964 along the Current and Jacks Fork rivers as the first US national park based on a river system. The Eleven Point River is included in the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System established in 1968. These parks and rivers are a major economic driver for some of the least populated counties in Arkansas and Missouri, attracting up to 1.5 million tourists annually.


title: Ozarks

text: Many other waterways and streams have their headwaters in the Boston Mountains portion of the Ozarks such as the Mulberry River, the White River, War Eagle Creek, Little Mulberry Creek, Lee Creek, Big Piney Creek, and the Little Red River. To the south, the Arkansas River valley separates the Boston Mountains from the Ouachita Mountains.


title: Ozarks

text: Missouri Ozark rivers include the Gasconade, Big Piney, and Niangua rivers in the north central region. The Meramec River and its tributaries Huzzah Creek and Courtois Creek are found in the northeastern Ozarks. The Black and St. Francis rivers mark the eastern crescent of the Ozarks. The James, Spring and North Fork rivers are in south-central Missouri. Forming the west central border of the Ozarks from Missouri through Kansas and into Oklahoma are the Spring River and its tributary, Center Creek. Grand Falls, Missouri's largest natural waterfall, a chert outcropping, includes bluffs and glades on Shoal Creek south of Joplin. All these river systems see heavy recreational use in season, including the Elk River in southwestern Missouri and its tributary Big Sugar Creek.


title: Ozarks

text: Ozark rivers and streams are typically clear water, with baseflows sustained by many seeps and springs, and flow through forests along limestone and dolomite bluffs. Gravel bars are common along shallow banks, while deep holes are found along bluffs. Except during periods of heavy rain or snow melt – when water levels rise quite rapidly – their level of difficulty is suitable for most canoeing and tubing.


title: Ozarks

text: Fish hatcheries are common due to the abundance of springs and waterways. The Neosho National Fish Hatchery was built in 1888; it was the first federal hatchery. The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission, Missouri Department of Conservation and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service operate numerous warm and cold water hatcheries and trout parks; private hatcheries such as at Rockbridge are found throughout the region.


title: Ozarks

text: The Ozarks contain ore deposits of lead, zinc, iron and barite. Many of these deposits have been depleted by historic mining activities, but much remains and is currently being mined in the Lead Belt of southeast Missouri. Historically, the lead belt around the Saint Francois Mountains and the Tri-State district lead-zinc mining area around Joplin, Missouri, have been important sources of metals. Mining practices common in the early 20th century left significant abandoned underground mine problems and heavy metal contamination in topsoil and groundwater in the Tri-State district.


title: Ozarks

text: Much of the area supports beef cattle ranching, and dairy farming is common across the area. Dairy farms are usually cooperative affairs, with small farms selling to a corporate wholesaler, who packages product under a common brand for retail sales. Petroleum exploration and extraction also takes place in the Oklahoma portion of the Ozarks, as well as in the east half of the Boston Mountains in Arkansas. Logging of both softwood and hardwood timber species on both private land and in the National Forests has long been an important economic activity.


title: Ozarks

text: The majority of the Ozarks is forested. Oak-hickory is the predominant type; eastern junipers are common, with stands of pine often seen in the southern range. Less than a quarter of the region has been cleared for pasture and cropland. Forests that were heavily logged during the early-to-mid-20th century have recovered; much of the remaining timber in the Ozarks is second-growth forest. However, deforestation of frontier forest contributed through erosion to increased gravel bars along Ozark waterways in logged areas; stream channels have become wider and shallower, and deepwater fish habitat has been lost.


title: Ozarks

text: The numerous rivers and streams of the region saw hundreds of water-powered timber and grist mills. Mills were important centers of culture and commerce; dispersed widely throughout the region, mills served local needs, often thriving within a few miles of another facility. Few Ozark mills relied on inefficient water wheels for power; most utilized a dam, millrace and water turbine.


title: Ozarks

text: During the New Deal, the Civilian Conservation Corps employed hundreds in the construction of nearly 400 fire lookouts throughout the Ozarks at 121 known sites in Arkansas and 257 in Missouri. Of those lookouts, about half remain, and many of them are in use by the U.S. Forest Service. A 2007 report by the National Trust for Historic Preservation deemed these fire lookouts and related structures as one of America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places.


title: Ozarks

text: In the 1960s, federal activity promoted modernization, especially through better transportation and tourism. The Ozarks Regional Commission sponsored numerous projects.


title: Ozarks

text: Tourism is the growth industry of the Ozarks as evidenced by the growth of the Branson, Missouri, entertainment center celebrating traditional Ozark culture. The rapidly growing Northwest Arkansas metropolitan area has also become a tourist hub, drawing nationwide attention for the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas.


title: Ozarks

text: Poultry farming and food processing are significant industries throughout the region. The Tyson Foods corporation and ConAgra Foods each operates several hundred poultry farms and processing plants throughout the Ozarks. Schreiber Foods has operations throughout southern Missouri.


title: Ozarks

text: The trucking industry is important to the regional economy, with national carriers based there including J. B. Hunt, ABF, and Prime, Inc. Springfield remains an operational hub for the BNSF Railway. Logging and timber industries are also significant in the Ozark economy, with operations ranging from small family-run sawmills to large commercial concerns. Fortune 500 companies such as Wal-Mart, Leggett & Platt, Bass Pro Shops, and O'Reilly Auto Parts are based in the Ozarks.


title: Ozarks

text: The area is home to several Missouri wine and spirit regions, including the Ozark Highlands and Ozark Mountain American Viticultural Areas, and the Ozark Highland Spirits Region. There are a number of microbreweries throughout the region.


title: Ozarks

text: "Ozark" also refers to the distinctive culture, architecture, and dialect shared by the people who live on the plateau. Early settlers in Missouri were pioneers who came west from the Southern Appalachians at the beginning of the 19th century, followed in the 1840s and 1850s by Irish and German immigrants. Much of the Ozark population is of English, Scots-Irish, and German descent, and the Ozark families from which the regional culture derived tend to have lived in the area since the 19th century.


title: Ozarks

text: Early settlers relied on hunting, fishing, trapping, and foraging to supplement their diets and incomes. Today hunting and fishing for recreation are common activities and an important part of the tourist industry. Foraging for mushrooms (especially morels) and for ginseng is common and financially supported by established buyers in the area. Other forages include poke, watercress, persimmons and pawpaw; wild berries such as blackberry, black raspberry, raspberry, red mulberry, black cherry, wild strawberry and dewberry; and wild nuts such as black walnut and even acorns. Edible native legumes, wild grasses and wildflowers are plentiful, and beekeeping is common.


title: Ozarks

text: Print and broadcast media have explored Ozark culture broadly. Books set in the Ozarks include "Where the Red Fern Grows", "The Shepherd of the Hills", and "As a Friend". The 1999 film "Ride with the Devil", based on the book "Woe to Live On", depicts conflict in southwest Missouri during the Civil War. "Winter's Bone", a novel by Daniel Woodrell (author of "Woe to Live On"), reflects on contemporary methamphetamine culture and its impact on families on the plateau. Released as a feature film in 2010, "Winter's Bone" received the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival, as well as other awards. Several early and influential country-music television and radio programs originated from Springfield in the 1950s and '60s, including ABC-TV's "Ozark Jubilee" and "The Slim Wilson Show" on KYTV. The Clampett clan of "The Beverly Hillbillies" TV show provide a stereotypical depiction of Ozark people. Ozark musicians include Porter Wagoner and old-time fiddler Bob Holt. Netflix drama series "Ozark" takes place in Osage Beach, Missouri and revolves around the well-to-do Byrde family as their lives are uprooted and they are forced to move from Chicago to the Ozarks after a money laundering scheme goes wrong. The series focuses on the Byrdes' dealings in the Ozarks, as well as their interactions with local Ozark crime families. The series premiered on July 21, 2017.


title: Ozarks

text: Examples of commercial interpretations of traditional Ozark culture include the two major family theme parks in the region, Silver Dollar City and the now defunct Dogpatch USA, and the resort entertainment complex in Branson. Ozark Folkways in Winslow, Arkansas, and Ozark Folk Center State Park in Mountain View, Arkansas, interpret regional culture through musical performance and exhibitions of pioneer skills and crafts.


title: Ozarks

text: Traditional Ozark culture includes stories and tunes passed orally between generations through community music parties and other informal gatherings. Many of these tunes and tales can be traced to British origins and to German folklore. Moreover, historian Vance Randolph attributes the formation of much Ozark lore to individual families when "backwoods parents begin by telling outrageous whoppers to their children and end by half believing the wildest of these tales themselves." Randolph collected Ozark folklore and lyrics in volumes such as the national bestseller "Pissing in the Snow and Other Ozark Folktales" (University of Illinois Press, 1976), "Ozark Folksongs" (University of Missouri Press, 1980), a four-volume anthology of regional songs and ballads collected in the 1920s and 1930s, and "Ozark Magic and Folklore" (Courier Dover Publications, 1964). Evidenced by Randolph's extensive field work, many Ozark anecdotes from the oral tradition are often bawdy, full of wild embellishments on everyday themes. In 1941–42, commissioned by Alan Lomax of the Archive of Folk Culture, Randolph returned to the Ozarks with a portable recording machine from the Library of Congress and captured over 800 songs, ballads and instrumentals. Selected from among these several hundred recordings, 35 tracks were released on "Various Artists: Ozark Folksongs" (Rounder Records) in 2001.


title: Ozarks

text: Square dances were an important social avenue throughout the Ozarks into the 20th century. Square dances sprang up wherever people concentrated around mills and timber camps, springs, fords, and in towns small and large. Geographically isolated communities saw their own local dance tunes and variations develop. Of all the traditional musicians in the Ozarks, the fiddler holds a distinct place in both the community and folklore. Community fiddlers were revered for carrying local tunes; regionally, traveling fiddlers brought new tunes and entertainment, even while many viewed their arrival as a threat to morality. In 2007, Gordon McCann, a chronicler of Ozarks folklife and fiddle music for over four decades, donated a collection of audio recordings, fieldnotes and photographs to Missouri State University in Springfield. The collection includes more than 3,000 hours of fiddle music and interviews recorded at jam sessions, music parties, concerts and dances in the Ozarks. Selected audio recordings along with biographical sketches, photographs and tune histories were published in Drew Beisswenger and Gordon McCann's 2008 book/37-track CD set "Mel Bay Presents Ozarks Fiddle Music: 308 Tunes Featuring 30 Legendary Fiddlers With Selections from 50 Other Great Ozarks Fiddlers".


title: Ozarks

text: From 1973 to 1983, the Bittersweet project, which began as an English class at Lebanon High School in Missouri, collected 476 taped and transcribed interviews, published 482 stories, and took over 50,000 photographs documenting traditional Ozark culture.


title: Ozarks

text: Population influx since the 1950s, coupled with geographically lying in both the Midwest and Upper South, proximity to the Mississippi embayment, the Osage and Northern Plains, contributes to changing cultural values in the Ozarks. Theme parks and theatres seen to reflect regional values have little in common with traditional Ozark culture. Community tradition bearers remain active, in decreasing numbers, far afield of commercial offers.


title: Ozarks

text: Ozark religion, like that of Appalachia, was predominantly Baptist and Methodist during periods of early settlement; it tends to the conservative or individualistic, with Episcopalians, Assemblies of God, Baptists including Southern Baptists, Church of Christ, Pentecostals, and other Protestant denominations present, as well as Catholics. Religious organizations headquartered in the Ozarks include the Assemblies of God and Baptist Bible Fellowship International in Springfield and the General Association of General Baptists in Poplar Bluff.


title: Smiling Friends

text: Smiling Friends is an adult animated television series created by Zach Hadel and Michael Cusack for Cartoon Network's night-time programming block Adult Swim, which revolves around a small charity dedicated to making people smile.


title: Smiling Friends

text: The pilot episode aired April 1, 2020, unannounced as part of Adult Swim's annual April Fools' Day event alongside the premiere of Cusack's other series, "". On May 19, 2021, Adult Swim ordered a full season that was initially set to premiere in late 2021. A panel dedicated to the series was held during the Adult Swim Festival on November 12, 2021, where co-creator Zach Hadel mentioned the show will premiere "within a few months", pushing the release schedule ahead to 2022. The first season contains 9 episodes, including the pilot and an 11-minute special. The first season eventually premiered on January 10, 2022, with Adult Swim airing all episodes of the season, except for the special, in one night despite initial plans for a weekly release.


title: Smiling Friends

text: "Smiling Friends" has become a critical and ratings success, receiving praise for its writing, visuals, and tone. The series was renewed for a second season on February 9, 2022.


title: Smiling Friends

text: The series follows the day-to-day lives and misadventures of a business dedicated to making its customers smile. A pair of employees, cynical Charlie and cheerful, optimistic Pim, try to help out the troubled people who call their company's hotline, though this task usually proves to be more challenging than anticipated due to the often deep-seated nature of their clients' problems.