N Harem

[Saraid Madnick]

Aharem structure is ambiguous. The most distinguishable trait is the group of polyamorous females or males who accompany the protagonist and, in some instances, live with the protagonist. Intimacy is customary but never necessary.

First, the protagonist, typically an everyman-archetype, has very little characterization other than being nice, reacting passively to their surroundings. This is done specifically to let the readers insert themselves in the character's stead or develop sympathy for the character.

Secondly, all the protagonist's love interests have low self-esteem, falling for the main character because of their nice personality and kindness or in more extreme cases, for showing basic human decency. The main character often spends time with them just to see their efforts to prove themselves to him. [2]

Third, the protagonist in most cases is either dense towards the girls' feelings or turns completelly flustered at the slightest possibility of romantic reciprocration, completelly shutting the girl off or running away. The intention is often to leave the chances of him ending up with any of the girls in specific as ambiguous as possible, specially since as this characters are recognized as a self insert, not picking a girl allows the male viewers to fantasize with an scenario where they can end up with their favorite girl without having to dismiss the canon of the series.[3]

A reverse harem is the gender opposite of a "straight"-harem, wherein a harem is directed towards male protagonists with women and/or gay men courting the protagonist. In a reverse harem, it focuses on female protagonists who are being courted by males and/or lesbians, usually seven or more.[4]

Harem endings typically follow two different routes, the main character ends up with one or more of the women. Occasionally, a "harem ending" occurs where the protagonist ends with all of the women, but this is more common in works intended for older audiences.[5][6]

Harem is considered to be one of the most traditional genres of anime and manga in respect to depicted sexual relationships, as most are heterosexual. However, this condition is not mandatory, and work in the genre can contain characters of various gender identities or sexualities. "Reverse harems" garner popularity, as they sometimes have the harem's genders mixed up without regard for the protagonist's sex or gender.

Firstly, it promotes a false expectation of relationships, claiming that being a nice will kickstart a relationship with someone, and eventually, the love interest will demonstrate their affection for the protagonist. It perpetuates mythos of men being entitled to female affection even if he does nothing for women. Often, real-life relationships require active participation from both parties, and waiting for the love interest to make the first move can lead to complaints about being "friend zoned".[8]

Secondly, the way female characters are written often draws criticism and controversy. Female characters are carefully manufactured to fit any of the tropes of ultimate male fantasy infatuated with them, are written with a singular goal to get with the protagonist, and any character development is put off to the side in order to advance the plot. In real life, women are flawed human beings who have social lives and other friends, participating in social events with multiple people.[9]

Although the institution has experienced a sharp decline in the modern era due to a rise in education and economic opportunities for women, as well as the influence of Western culture, the seclusion of women is still practiced in some parts of the world, such as rural Afghanistan and conservative states of the Persian Gulf.[4][7]

In the West, the harem, often depicted as a hidden world of sexual subjugation where numerous women lounged in suggestive poses, has influenced many paintings, stage productions, films and literary works.[3][4] Some earlier European Renaissance paintings dating to the 16th century portray the women of the Ottoman harem as individuals of status and political significance.[8] In many periods of Islamic history, individual women in the harem exercised various degrees of political influence,[9] such as the Sultanate of Women in the Ottoman Empire.

The practice of female seclusion is not exclusive to Islam, but the English word harem usually denotes the domestic space reserved for women in Muslim households.[11][12] Some scholars have used the term to refer to polygynous royal households throughout history.[13]

The ideal of seclusion was not fully realized as social reality. This was in part because working-class women often held jobs that required interaction with men.[11] In the Byzantine Empire, the very ideal of gender segregation created economic opportunities for women as midwives, doctors, bath attendants and artisans since it was considered inappropriate for men to attend to women's needs. At times women lent and invested money, and engaged in other commercial activities.[16] Historical records shows that the women of 14th-century Mamluk Cairo freely visited public events alongside men, despite objections of religious scholars.[11]

Female seclusion has historically signaled social and economic prestige.[11] Eventually, the norms of female seclusion spread beyond the elites, but the practice remained characteristic of upper and middle classes, for whom the financial ability to allow one's wife to remain at home was a mark of high status.[7][11] In some regions, such as the Arabian peninsula, seclusion of women was practiced by poorer families at the cost of great hardship, but it was generally economically unrealistic for the lower classes.[7]

Where historical evidence is available, it indicates that the harem was much more likely to be monogamous. For example, in late Ottoman Istanbul, only 2.29 percent of married men were polygynous, with the average number of wives being 2.08. In some regions, like Sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia, prevalence of women in agricultural work leads to wider practice of polygamy but makes seclusion impractical. In contrast, in Eurasian and North African rural communities that rely on male-dominated plough farming, seclusion is economically possible but polygyny is undesirable. This indicates that the fundamental characteristic of the harem is seclusion of women rather than polygyny.[17]

The idea of the harem or seclusion of women did not originate with Muhammad or Islam.[9] The practice of secluding women was common to many Ancient Near East communities, especially where polygamy was permitted.[18] In pre-Islamic Assyria and Persia, most royal courts had a harem, where the ruler's wives and concubines lived with female attendants, and eunuchs.[9] Encyclopdia Iranica uses the term harem to describe the practices of the ancient Near East.[19]

The popular assumption that Pharaonic Egypt had a harem is however an anachronism; while the women and children of the pharaoh, including his mother, wives, and children, had their own living quarters with its own administration in the Palace of the Pharaoh, the royal women did not live isolated from contact with men or in seclusion from the rest of the court in the way associated with the term "harem".[20] The custom of referring to the women's quarters of the pharaoh's palace as a "harem" is therefore apocryphal, and has been used because of incorrect assumptions that Ancient Egypt was similar to later Islamic harem culture.[20]

A number of regulations were designed to prevent disputes among the women from developing into political intrigues.[19] The women were guarded by the eunuchs who also prevented their disputes from developing into political plots; they were banned from giving gifts to their servants (as such gifts could be used as bribes) and were not allowed any visitors who had not been examined and approved by officials.[21] When the king traveled, his harem traveled with him, strictly supervised so as not to break regulations even under transport.[21]

In the 7th century BC, Assyria was conquered by the Median Empire, which appears to have adopted the harem custom. Reportedly, the Median nobility each had five wives, and employed eunuchs (though these eunuchs may have been non-castrated officials).[19]

Female seclusion and a special part of the house reserved for women were common among the elites of ancient Greece, where it was known as the gynaeceum.[22][23] However, while gender segregation was the official ideal in Classical Athens, it is debated how much of this ideal was actually enforced, and it is known that even upper-class women appeared in public and were able to come in contact with men, at least on religious occasions.[24]

These traditional Greek ideals were revived as an ideal for women in the Byzantine Empire (in which Greek culture eventually became dominant), though the rigid idealistic norms of seclusion expressed in Byzantine literature did not necessarily reflect actual practice.[22][15] The Byzantine Emperors were Greek Orthodox and did not have several wives, or official concubines, secluded in a harem. When Greek culture started to replace the Roman in the Byzantine Empire in the 6th century, it came to be seen as modest, especially for upper-class women, to keep to a special women's quarters (gynaikonitis), and until the 12th century, men and women are known to have participated in gender-segregated banquets at the Imperial Court; however Imperial women still appeared in public and did not live in seclusion, and the idealized gender segregation was never fully enforced.[25]

There is no evidence among early Iranians of harem practices, that is, taking large numbers of wives or concubines and keeping them in seclusion.[citation needed] However, Iranian dynasties are said to have adopted harem practices after their conquests in the Middle East, where such practices were used in some cultures such as Assyria (the Median Empire conquered Assyria in the 7th-century BC, and Media transformed into the Achaemenid Empire).[19] According to Greek sources, the nobility of the Medes kept no less than five wives, who were watched over by eunuchs.[19]

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