ABSTRACT
In a cartoon show targeted to young children, a boy peeks at a female friend as she stands naked before entering the bath. In a cartoon aimed at older children, junior high school boys stare at their teacher’s breasts as they are accidentally but repeatedly exposed. Sigmund Freud in his Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality treated scopophilia, or a pleasure in looking, as a normal aspect of sexuality. Machiko-sensei on which analysis of the male gaze in Japanese children’s cartoons is largely based, is a cartoon show viewed during two stays in Japan—one in 1980—1982 and one during 1987—1988. Machiko-sensei, a junior high school teacher in Japan, is young, attractive, and very devoted to a small group of male students. The standard plot involves a misadventure one of these students has fallen into and Machiko-sensei’s efforts to disentangle and thereby save him.
