josei

Cover illustration to the josei manga series Kōrei Shussan Don to Koi!! [ja] by Motoko Fujita [ja], an autobiography chronicling the author's pregnancy at the age of 43

Josei manga (女性漫画; lit. "women's comics", pronounced [dʑoseː]), also known as ladies' comics (レディースコミック) and its abbreviation redikomi (レディコミ; "lady-comi"), is an editorial category of Japanese comics that emerged in the 1980s. In a strict sense, josei refers to manga marketed to an audience of adult women, contrasting shōjo manga, which is marketed to an audience of girls and young adult women. In practice, the distinction between shōjo and josei is often tenuous; while the two were initially divergent categories, many manga works exhibit narrative and stylistic traits associated with both shōjo and josei manga. This distinction is further complicated by a third manga editorial category, young ladies (ヤングレディース), which emerged in the late 1980s as an intermediate category between shōjo and josei.