This reading list is in progress. Also, you definitely don’t need to read all of these. But if you are so inclined………………
Deborah Levitt, The Animatic Apparatus: Animation, Vitality, and the Futures of the
Image. 2018 (<– read this if you want something short but effective; also if you like Ghost in the shell)
Evan Calder Williams, Shard Cinema. 2017 (<– read this if you feel strangely captivated by the ubiquitous scenes of glass shattering in slow motion in movies, also if you want academic writing with a poetic touch)
Thomas Lamarre, The Anime Machine: A Media Theory of Animation. 2009 (<– if it’s dense, bear with it. Lamarre writes with the most touching empathy and generosity. absolutely phenomenal book. Ghibli and Chobits come up a lot.)
Ian Condry, The soul of anime: Collaborative creativity and Japan’s Media Success Story. 2013 (<– read this if you are curious about animation production, also if you’re into Evangelion)
Patrick W. Galbraith, Otaku and the Struggle for Imagination in Japan. 2019 (<– read this if you want to empathise in ways that seemed impossible before, for complex gender feelings, inter-dimensional relationships, and also for a moving history of Akihabara, Tokyo’s weeb district)
Patrick W. Galbraith, The Ethics of Affect: Lines and Life in a Tokyo Neighborhood. 2021 (<– read this if you want more of the above)
Ito Mizuko, Okabe Daisuke, and Tsuji Izumi, eds. Fandom Unbound: Otaku Culture in a Connected World. 2012 (<– read for insight into how subcultures in Japan conduct themselves, subculture oriented infrastructure ie. doujin conventions; read if you wonder about otaku who are not men; all around a great English language resource; all available on jstor.)
Azuma Hiroki, Otaku: Japan’s database animals. 2001 (transl. 2009) (<– read this because it’s influential and at its heart quite potent, but it is not without faults. full of entertaining graphs.)
…… for some more references, quotes and general writing, you can also look through my notes which are shared on my website.