Board Thread:Questions and Answers/@comment-25951143-20150101110046/@comment-26871067-20161002082448

I didn't plan on posting in here until I was finished compiling and proofreading my documentation (my reread is finished, I'm cross-referencing kanji and asking two other translators to look over my translations), but something I've noticed in my refresher on the series is something I consider very important because it addresses a theory posited more than once in this thread.

It's the idea that Alluka dresses as a girl for Nanika's sake.

In the original Japanese, there is zero indication that Nanika is female.

Nanika is not referred to with gendered terminology.

Before anyone comes with the counterpoint of the "good girl" line, I'm going to state what Nanika actually said - いいコいいコして ("iiko iiko shite"). This, like most of Nanika's lines, is baby-talk. Her dialogue exclusively uses hiragana instead of kanji (this can be a good indication of whether or not Alluka is speaking, as her dialogue does use kanji). Nanika speaks like a very young child (we're talking around five years old), and the writing system in use reflects this. If anyone needs a rundown on Japanese writing systems I can explain, but I'd recommend you just google it.

There's no good English counterpart for this particular Japanese baby-talk phenomenon, but it's very common for extremely young children to ask for things with repeated words. For instance, in the flashback where Nanika first appears, what Killua wishes for is  高い して  "takai takai shite" - it literally means "Do "high high"", and is sort of equivalent to a toddler going "up, up!" when they want to be picked up. (That's the only equivalent I've been able to come up with, honestly.)

Due to the language differences, a lot of Nanika's lines have to be changed, which loses some of the subtext of just how simple and infantile her dialogue is. This is a big contrast to Alluka, who has age-appropriate speech patterns.

So, what Nanika is literally saying is "Do "iiko iiko"."  This is mostly translated as "Tell me I'm a good girl".

いいコ does not mean "good girl". いいコ means "good child". "Ko" is not a gendered term. The use of (variants on) "Tell me I'm a good girl" by translators is because "Do "good child, good child"" sounds stupid and doesn't reflect how English-speaking children talk. I personally would have translated the line as "say I did good" - I feel it captures the idea that she's asking to be praised for her actions, while "Tell me I'm a good girl" gives only contextual indication of a connection to her request and her her healing Tsubone's hand.

So how about the "she's crying" line that Alluka says? No dice. Implied subject - kanojo is not used. It's clear from context that Alluka is talking about Nanika, as she uses Nanika's name in the prior sentence and Nanika is the only one who could be hunched over and crying, but, again, because of how Japanese works, there's nothing gendered in the line.

If your argument hinges on Nanika being a girl and Alluka humoring her out of kindness, I'm saying right now that there's nothing in the manga saying Nanika is a girl.

All instances of feminine terminology are inserted by translators due to the fundamental differences between how Japanese and English work.

There is no indication that Alluka's speech patterns and clothing are influenced by Nanika - indeed, there is a noted difference between the way Alluka's dialogue is written and how Nanika's is. The fact is, they straight-up do not have the same speech patterns.

Alluka's use of atashi has nothing to do with Nanika, because Nanika doesn't use atashi. If Alluka was modifying her speech to match Nanika's, she would be speaking like Nanika. But she isn't. There is no evidence that Nanika is a girl. <span style="color:rgb(68,68,68);font-family:"HelveticaNeue",HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-weight:normal;">Her dialogue even has very little concept of self or self-awareness to it - again, she never uses a first-person pronoun. Japanese works differently from English, so in words like "suki", though the meaning is undeniably an expression of love, it... doesn't actually have "I" in it. The "I", as in many verbs, is inserted for the sake of clarity in English. I'm honestly hoping that Nanika's repetition of "suki" will be translated as "love you" in the English dub, since it retains the stilted way she speaks.

<span style="color:rgb(68,68,68);font-family:"HelveticaNeue",HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-weight:normal;">I'm inclined to believe that there's more evidence for Nanika being genderless (which would be supported by her now-known origins) than there is for her being female. Because, like I said, no one ever calls her a girl or implies she is one.

Feel free to check the Japanese manga yourselves if you feel I've missed anything.