Scanlation: reproduction and subaltern consumption of manga in cyberculture

Abstract

This article discusses the media practice known in the field of cyberculture as scanlation, a process of scanning, translating, editing and free distribution over the internet of Japanese comics, called manga. Scanlation refers to a contemporary revisiting of gift economy, through which the Japanese creative industry products has been used, reproduced and redistributed in subaltern circuits of consumption.