Queer Voices from Japan: First Person Narratives from Japan's Sexual Minorities

by Mark McLelland (Editor), Katsuhiko Suganuma (Editor), James Welker (Editor)

Overview

Queer Voices from Japan examines the wide range of queer voices in Japan, and the longevity that these minority communities have enjoyed in society. Mark McLelland, Katsuhiko Suganuma, and James Welker bring together historical and contemporary narratives that contribute to the study of sexual identities in Japan. These essays trace the evolution of queer voices in Japan with analyses of the presence of homosexuality in the Japanese Imperial Army, the development of Japan's first gay bars, and same-sex experiences in the pre- and post-war periods. This book offers a variety of perspectives including a range of male-to-female and female-to-male transgender voices and experiences. The broad scope of this volume makes it an invaluable text for understanding the development of Japanese sex and gender categories in the twentieth century. Queer Voices from Japan is a compelling read that will appeal to those interested in Asian studies and human sexuality.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780739151501
Publisher:	Lexington Books
Publication date:	03/26/2007
Series:	Swedish Easy Reader #02
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	372
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Mark McLelland is lecturer in sociology in the School of Social Science, Media, and Communication at the University of Wollongong. Katsuhiko Suganuma is a doctoral candidate in the Department of English with Cultural Studies at the University of Melbourne. James Welker is a PhD student in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 A Visit with Yuasa Yoshiko, a Dandy Scholar of Russian Literature
Chapter 2 My Career in Danshoku: Notes on Sodomy
Chapter 3 Nostalgia for My Time in the Army: Concerning Male Nudity and Sadistic Photographs
Chapter 4 Minyak Kelapa?A Fragrant Breeze of Homosexuality
Chapter 5 Confessions of a Problem: A Round-Table Discussion with Male Prostitutes
Chapter 6 Grand Sodomia Conference: A Discussion of the Joys and Agonies of Homosexuality
Chapter 7 Lifestyles in the Gay Bars
Chapter 8 Roundtable: Female Homos Here We Go
Chapter 9 The Era of Dandy Beauties
Chapter 10 Wakakusa no Kai: The First Fifteen Years of Japan's Originial Lesbian Organization
Chapter 11 They've Got Their Happy Faces On: The Birth of Regumi no Gomame
Chapter 12 Japan's Lesbian Movement: Looking Back on Where We Came From
Chapter 13 Lesbians Living in the Mountains
Chapter 14 Breaking Gender Rules without Remorse
Chapter 15 True Tales from Ni-chome
Chapter 16 Togo Ken, The Legendary Okama: Burning with Sexual Desire and Revolt
Chapter 17 Who Should be Ashamed of Whom?
Chapter 18 Reflections on the Tokyo Lesbian and Gay Parade 2000
Chapter 19 How I Became a FtM Transgender Gay
Chapter 20 My Life as a Woman
Chapter 21 My Life as a Hustler

Editorial Reviews

With Queer Voices of Japan Mark Mclelland, James Welker, and Katsuhiko Suganuma have put together a marvelous collection of first-person accounts of queer lives since World War II which deserves to be on the reading list of every course dealing with the study of sexuality. The book offers an impressive variety of memoirs, interviews and roundtables, many of them stunning, moving, raw and original.

Sabine Frühstück

Queer Voices from Japan gives an informative and trustworthy account of Japanese GLBT people. It has brought into the light of day many voices which had almost disappeared from history.

The Gay & Lesbian Review

This book is one of these hard-to-put-down collections of essays making original intellectual contributions that would be impossible to condense into a standard social history, converying a plurality of perspectives on queer issues in Japan....the current volume is a laudable collaborative work which involves numerous translators, editors and contributors, all of whom have come together to produce an excellent queer handbook of postwar Japanese society.

Japanese Studies

The sincerity and the courage with which the ditors undertook this project, to say nothing of the importance of the collected materials for related academic fields, cannot be overestimated...[it is] a highly informative collection [that] can be seen as an ambitious forerunner to a wider and more extensive archival project to come in the future....A great contribution to the English-speaking academic community....the wide variety of collected materials is truly informative and can provide an excellent source with which to deepen the understanding of Japanese queer cultures.

Social Science Japan Journal, October 2008 - Akiko Shimizu

The editors have performed an invaluable service to the field in making these texts by and about queer Japanese people available in English for the first time. Their choice of materials is wide-ranging and representative of many important sectors of the queer community in Japan. This collection fills a major gap, and does so with style, sensitivity, and understanding.

Karen Kelsky

Queer Voices from Japan gives an informative and trustworthy account of Japanese GLBT people. It has brought into the light of day many voices which had almost disappeared from history.

Gay and Lesbian Review