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lyrical--creature-blog · 7 years ago

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“Half Spirits”

In another installation in what seems to be slowly becoming a series of “fictional terms with potential real life applicability”, I want to discuss another concept with the potential to describe real world phenomenon. Some of this, to be clear, will be UPG. Japanese culture is heavily steeped in its belief and involvement with spirits (more often than not referred to as yokai). A concept rooted in both folklore and pop culture media is the idea of a “half spirit” or “hanyo” (also spelled “hanyou”) - that is, an individual born of the union between a spirit/yokai, and a human, or alternatively, a human tampered with by “unnatural means” to become a half-spirit. With that being said, there are at least two major distinct differences between the half-spirits of Japanese folklore, and those of Japanese pop culture. In folklore, there are many common tales involving children born of the union between a yokai (often, if not always, a woman), and a (often, if not always, male) human. In these stories, their children are indistinguishable from other humans. They possess no abnormal physical or spiritual traits, with only one, arguably two exceptions. Contrary to this, in Japanese pop culture, hanyo children will often display mixed human/spirit traits and characteristics, and possess some degree of spiritual power. Examples would be shows such as Inuyasha, InuxBoku, Otome Youkai Zakuro, etc. The second distinction is that the term “Hanyo” is actually a modern invention, attributed to mangaka Takahashi Rumiko, who coined the neologism by combining the kanji for Han (half) and the kanji for Yo (apparition). Thusly, hanyo is not actually a historically rooted term. In the real world, the folklore version is the most probable, obviously, however I’d consider it likely that it be more a combination of the two (within reason). As it’s believed in some circles that those with unusual features (pointy ears, green eyes, etc) may have something like fairy blood in them, it could be posed that the same could be said of hanyo. Additionally, just as I mentioned in my last post about Slay Vegas, it would be fair to assume that a half spirit would possess some character traits or abilities above that of a “normal human”. Within practicality however, these would likely be limited to things like Fairy Sight, healing, and so on, and so forth. Some may argue that a concept based in Japanese folklore has no business being exported outside of Japan. I would disagree, at least in this particular instance, as there are many similarities between mythologies from around the world, and the concept of humans and ethereal beings marrying and procreating is certainly not something limited to Japan. It is, however, the only culture that has created a specific term for their offspring, as far as I can tell. And considering the term hanyo is a word rooted in pop culture and thus not historically sacrosanct, I believe it can safely be transferred from fiction to the real world. Now, I want to expound a bit further on this concept, but please note everything beyond this point is UPG. One thing worth considering is how, or even more importantly, why, would half-spirits be made. I have a number of theories. As for the how: -As suggested through folklore, a spirit and a human would, for whatever reason, procreate, just as a normal human pairing would (this could be a one time interaction, or multiple times as a bonded couple. It could be with the sole desire to simply have a family together, or with purposes more abstract than that (see the “why” section below). It could be a male spirit and female human, or vice versa. (I don’t hold strictly to the idea of the “magical wife” being the only format for hanyo to be born. I think this is simply a trend influenced by male authors coveting “special” brides, and not indicative of female spirits being more likely to seek out human companionship than male spirits.) -An otherwise normal human pregnancy could be altered, cursed, or blessed, depending on the reason and the spirit involved, to turn the gestating child into a half-spirit. This could likely be done without the knowledge of the biological parents. -During conception, a spirit could possess the body of one of the biological parents in order to conceive a half spirit child. Why: -A spirit, as stated above, may fall in love with a human and wish to build a family with them, same as any human couple might. -A spirit may be nearing the end of its life and wish to leave behind an heir (potentially less likely, as I don’t think spirits possess the same kind of ego as humans do in this regard) -A spirit may wish to procreate but cannot find a spiritual mate, so they take a human one. -A human may have won the favor of a spirit, knowingly or unknowingly, or a spirit may have found itself indebted to a human, and thus blesses their future child (or children) as a token of their gratitude or payment of debt, turning it into a half spirit, blessed with unique abilities or traits. This could extend even to a spirit taking pity on a human, and giving them a blessing as an act of kindness. -On the opposite end of the spectrum, a human may have angered, cheated, or wronged a spirit, and the spirit would curse their offspring in revenge, or as payment for their debts. This kind of half spirit child would likely be erratic and troublesome, and bring misery to their household, or be sickly and weak and sapped of its normal vitality. -A spirit could make half-spirit children for its own purposes. Perhaps a guardian of the forest would create half spirit children to increase the number of people willing to protect nature. Perhaps a spirit with a hatred for humans would create half spirits to weaken human bloodlines. Perhaps a large number of half-spirits being born in one area would increase that spirit’s power and influence within the local spiritual hierarchy. The reasons could be many, possibly innumerable. In my opinion and experience, spirits are extremely varied. Their reasons and motivations would be as countless as they themselves are. The half-spirits they create, likewise, would also be varied. Some would be for good, some for ill, some benign. There may be tell-tale evidence, or only subtle symptoms. Some possible signs include: -Being born of a one night stand, or a short term relationship which concluded shortly after your conception or birth. Little is known about who your other biological parent is or was. -Having been marked from an early age by adults in your life as being different, abnormal, unique, “something special”, a “round peg the world tries to fit into a square hole”, or otherwise set apart from other people. -Being abnormally talented or skilled, especially in areas pertaining to the supernatural, such as magic, healing, insight, foresight, empathy, etc. -Having been predicted by doctors to be sickly or unwell, but being born healthy. (Or vice versa). -Being a Slay Vega -Being a rainbow baby (a child born after a miscarriage or child death, especially if there were multiple) -You were born with features considerably or completely different than what you ended up with after a few weeks or months time. (E.g. being born with black hair but ending up with blonde hair). -Your birth marked the end of some kind of turbulence in your family (or alternatively, marked the beginning of it) -One of your parents passed away or disappeared shortly after your birth -Feeling inherently drawn to nature, craving its presence, feeling allied with it. -Feeling inhuman or set apart from humans. -One of your parents is notably different from most people. They are more beautiful, kind, they draw the love of others, people inherently trust them, they have a healing touch, etc. -Having a history of magic practitioners in your family, or at least one parent involved in magical practices. Again, these are only a few possible symptoms. Once more, if you resonate with the above concept or information, I would encourage you to feel free to use the term hanyo to establish community with other likeminded individuals. However, because the term hanyo is used in reference to several fictional characters, I propose the tags “ #Hanyokai ” and “ #Hanyo Com “ for those who wish to find others like them.

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