Chihiro Ogino (荻野 千尋, Ogino Chihiro), her nickname Sen (Sen, lit. "one-thousand") is a 10 year old girl who is the protagonist in the Japanese animated film "Spirited Away" aka "Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi" (千と千尋の神隠し).
In Japanese, "sen" means a thousand, which could also be pronounced as "chi" in the name Chihiro. The "hiro" in Chihiro means to ask questions (Monji, J., n.d.)
When Chihiro was stuck in the spirit world, she needed to work to avoid fading away in the spirit world. Yubaba made a deal which is to give her a job in exchange for her name. Yubaba took away her name, only leaving "千 (Sen)" behind, which became Chihiro's new name in the spirit world. If she were to live there permanently and eventually forget her real name, the memories of Chihiro before the spirit world: her family, friends and life before the spirited world will be forgotten. The act of taking away her name is a way to symbolise her losing herself in the spirit world. (宮本創始, 2019)
How did the character Chihiro come about?
the director of the film, Hayao Miyazaki, was inspired by one of his peers' daughter and her friends who, at that time, were nearing adolescence and extremely apathetic. He decided he needed to make a movie for ten-year-old girls. There wasn’t a lot out there for them; their magazines were heavily focused on romance and crushes. “I felt this was not what they held dear in their hearts, not what they wanted,” Miyazaki said. “And so I wondered if I could make a movie in which they could be heroines.” Shoten T. (2001)
From the start of the movie, Chihiro was made to seem as a whiny child who is a scaredy cat. When her parents wanted to check out what's on the other side of a dark tunnel that they came across, Chihiro was scared to go because she had bad feelings about that place. Chihiro was reluctant to go and said she would stay behind. It's obvious that Chihiro is a child who gets scared of things easily because when she said she didn't want to follow, her parents were okay about it, which shows that they are used to her fearful behaviour. but alas, she was also too afraid to stay alone on this side so she clung onto her mother as they walked through the tunnel.
Later on, when her parents walked through a street full of abandoned restaurants, they found one which had freshly cooked food just sitting there and so they sat down and ate without even questioning or raising suspiciousness about the place. Chihiro found it unsettling and didn't want to sit down and eat with them. She even tried to tell her parents to leave and end up becoming frustrated and then dejected. She gave up trying to make them leave because they weren't listening to her. Even though Chihiro is a child who may seem easily scared, she is also curious. She had wandered around the place on her own, leaving her parents to eat away.
Chihiro's frustrated and then dejected face
When the sun went down, Chihiro's parents had turned to pigs. Chihiro panicked and ran away. She was in denial that those pigs were her parents so she kept calling out for them.Even when she was in trouble, her first instinct is to call out for her mother.
Later on in the movie, she slowly grows mature when she became Sen. In the spirit world, Sen is forced to do everything on her own as her parents had turned into pigs. She learned that she can't wait around for someone to do things for her. She had to learn things the hard way. Chihiro's character development shows that during her time in the spirit world, she had matured from an easily scared girl with a child-like personality to a hardworking, self-sufficient, and brave young girl who had to learn to put her fears aside for those she cares for. She no longer screams and runs when faced with a challenge, instead she is calm and faces it head-on. To protect her friends and rescue her parents from a spell that had turned them into pigs, Chihiro got rid of her former personality and quickly adapted to her environment. She then eventually became a courageous, quick-witted and reliable person.
宮本創始. (2019, March 23). 千と千尋の神隠し【謎解き・考察】～宮崎駿が伝えたかった事～. Retrieved from http://rinrism.com/maxim/anime/senchihi#i
Ghibli Gifs. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.pinterest.com/pin/549509592023388998/
Giphy. (2018, April 05). Spirited Away Manga GIF. Retrieved from https://giphy.com/gifs/manga-spirited-away-kSnbg0Cs5xoT6
Giphy. (2018, January 22). Studio Ghibli Cleaning GIF. Retrieved from https://giphy.com/gifs/studio-ghibli-hayao-miyazaki-ClbZrxHClgrdu
Giphy. (2018, April 05). Studio Ghibli GIF. Retrieved from https://giphy.com/gifs/studio-ghibli-hayao-miyazaki-spirited-away-XoZJKVn54024w
Monji, J. (n.d.). Chihiro's Journey: Analyzing. Retrieved from https://www.rogerebert.com/far-flung-correspondents/chihiros-journey-analyzing-spirited-away
Shoten T. (2001). Retrieved from http://www.nausicaa.net/miyazaki/interviews/sen.html
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