Rethinking the coming home alternative: hybridization and coming out politics in Hong Kong’s anti‐homophobia parades
2007; Routledge; Volume: 8; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/14649370701568052
ISSN1469-8447
Autores Tópico(s)LGBTQ Health, Identity, and Policy
ResumoAbstract Abstract In calling for the need to think about sexuality globally, scholars have given increasing attention to the historical specificities of local contexts. The return to the local, however, may not always be fruitful when the local and the global or the Western and the non‐Western are seen as binary opposites rather than permeable constructs. This paper examines the coming home/coming out controversy and calls into question the understanding of coming home as local resistance against global queering. It instead suggests the possibilities of cultural hybridity and blending of coming out and coming home. Using the First and the Second International Day Against Homophobia Hong Kong Parades as an example, this paper elucidates the complexity of cultural production in the interactions of the West and Non‐West, with attention on the effect of transnational mobility of political rhetoric and tactics. Acknowledgments The author presented an earlier version of this article at the Taipei Workshop on Inter‐Asia Queer Studies on January 7, 2007 and benefited from the valuable feedback of the participants. Special thanks go to Denise and Lulu for their assistance and support, and the Editors and Reviewers for constructive criticism and helpful comments. Notes 1. It is worth noting that not many gays and lesbians in Hong Kong identify themselves with the term tongzhi. Some lesbians have gender‐specific sexual identities such as TB (tomboy), TBG (tomboy’s girl) or pure (no role‐playing) (cf. Chou 2000 Chou, Wah‐Shan. 2000. Tongzhi: Politics of Same‐Sex Eroticism in Chinese Societies, New York: The Haworth Press. [Google Scholar]). Some gay men may use ‘0’ or ‘1’ to describe their role‐playing in sex; others may view themselves as ‘member/memba’. In Chengdu, the fifth most populous city in China, a local homosexual identity named ‘piao piao,’ meaning wandering men, has emerged (Wei 2007 Wei, Wei. ‘“Wandering Men” no longer wander around: the production and transformation of local homosexual identities in postsocialist Chengdu, China’. presented in Taipei Workshop on Inter‐Asia Queer Studies (as part of Urban Flow‐Rural Moves: The 8th Annual Conference of Cultural Studies Association [Taiwan]) on January 7, 2007 at National Taiwan University. [Google Scholar]). A list of all the identity categories would be endless. However, it is important to study how specific terms produce specific spaces of identification. 2. In the article published in 2001, Chou does not specify the background of his interviewees but simply refers them as tongzhi (Chou 2001). In his book Tongzhi Politics of Same‐Sex Eroticism in Chinese Societies, Chou differentiates the different discourses and strategies adopted by tongzhi from Hong Kong, China and Taiwan (Chou 2000 Chou, Wah‐Shan. 2001. “‘Homosexuality and the cultural politics of tongzhi in Chinese societies’”. In Gay and Lesbian Asia: Culture, Identity, Community, Edited by: Sullivan, Gerard and Jackson, Peter A. New York: The Haworth Press. [Google Scholar]). The coming home strategy is discussed with reference to the experiences of Hong Kong tongzhi. 3. In a discussion of the representation of gay and queer characters in the films and videos from East Asia, Berry points out that a dominant trope in the films that aim at a mainstream market is the representation of gayness as a family problem (Berry 2001 Berry, Chris. 2001. “‘Asian values, family values: film, video, and lesbian and gay identities’”. In Gay and Lesbian Asia: Culture, Identity, Community, Edited by: Sullivan, Gerard and Jackson, Peter A. New York: The Haworth Press. [Taylor & Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]). Although the narratives of these films suggest that the family is almost ubiquitous in East Asian cultures, gayness as a family problem is a trope of ongoing hybridity and contradiction rather than simply some foreign thing that can be resisted. Rofel argues that for gay men in China, their invocations of a global gayness articulate with the need to place themselves within Chinese culture (Rofel 1999 Rofel, Lisa. 1999. ‘Qualities of desire: imagining gay identities in China’. GLQ, 5(4): 451–478. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]). One of the moments in which these articulations appeared was in a weekly salon where debates about family and kinship took place. 4. The argument that it is through the encounter with the West in the mid‐nineteenth century that Chinese tolerance of same‐sex eroticism began to fade was popular among activists in the 1990s. Julian, who led the fight for the repealing of Hong Kong’s sodomy laws in the 1980s, expressed a similar view (Miller 1992 Miller, Neil. 1992. Out in the World: Gay and lesbian Life from Buenos Aires to Bangkok, New York: Vintage Books, Random House. [Google Scholar]: 99–100). In a conversation with a Western writer, Julian emphasized that in ancient China, sex was sex and love was love but marriage was marriage. A man married and carried on the family line, but he could have a male lover. It is under the twin influences of Victorian moralism and Chinese communist puritanism that people have taken up the Western notion that homosexuality is dirty and evil. 5. Taking Chou’s coming home alternative as a frame of reference, Heng turns to a search for original cultures, or pure types, that counteract the forces of globalization (Heng 2004 Heng, Russell. 2004. ‘Gay citizen and the Singaporean state–global forces, local agencies, and activism in an Asian polity’. Documentation, Papers and Reports of the Heinrich Böll Foundation, No. 7: Asian Modernity – Globalization Processes and their Cultural and Political Location, : 69–79. http://www.boell.de/en/05_world/2914.html [Google Scholar]). He differentiates two types of resistance against globalization in Singapore: One is ideologically driven whereas the other is organic. The first type of resistance refers to Singapore’s authoritarian obstruction of global queering in the pursuit of its own political agenda. An example of the state’s resistance is the prohibition of People Like Us, the first gay support group, from registering as a non‐governmental society. The second type of resistance refers to the coming home strategies adopted by gays and lesbians in Singapore. Heng describes this type of resistance as organic, expressing ‘local tastes and habits grounded naturally in some deeply entrenched traditions of a place and its culture’ (Heng 2004 Heng, Russell. 2004. ‘Gay citizen and the Singaporean state–global forces, local agencies, and activism in an Asian polity’. Documentation, Papers and Reports of the Heinrich Böll Foundation, No. 7: Asian Modernity – Globalization Processes and their Cultural and Political Location, : 69–79. http://www.boell.de/en/05_world/2914.html [Google Scholar]: 76). 6. Their petition cited the case of Pastor Ake Green, who was sentenced to one month in prison under Sweden’s law against hate speech. In his sermon, he labeled homosexuality ‘a deep cancerous tumor in the entire society’ and equated it with pedophilia (Wikipedia 2007a Wikipedia. 2007a. ‘Ake Green’ webpage last modified on 14 May, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ake_Green, accessed on 15 June 2007 [Google Scholar]). Finally, the conviction was overturned in the appeal court. Their petition also cited the case of Chris Kempling, a Canadian teacher who was suspended for a month for publishing his discriminatory views in the press. The disciplinary action was imposed by the body which regulates the teaching profession in British Columbia (Wikipedia 2007b Wikipedia. 2007b. ‘Chris Kempling’ webpage last modified on 17 June, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris Kempling, accessed on 15 June 2007 [Google Scholar]). 7. Established in 2003, Women Coalition of Hong Kong pledged to promote gender, sexual and identity diversities. It is a group that welcomes women who love women, women who are feminists and women who support sexual minorities. 8. In the Third IDAHO Hong Kong Parade, held on May 20, 2007, more than 500 people joined the procession. Organizers believe that it would take time for the number of participants to grow. Since societal prejudice against sexual minorities is prevalent and legal protection has not been made available, people still worry about the consequences of disclosing their sexual identity. 9. The sexuality minority group Horizons organized a gay parade in Lan Kwai Fong, Hong Kong’s most popular clubbing area, on October 15, 2004. While hundreds of people enjoyed watching the show, the rally was small. In my personal interview, organizer Reggie said that the group had not applied for ‘the letter of no objection’ from the police, (according to the law, the police can interfere and forbid any public procession of more than 30 people from being held if organizers fail to apply for letters of no objection). The gay parade was mainly ‘a coming out on behalf of our sisters and brothers who are still forced to remain in the closet.’ 10. In the 2006 parade, masks had been prepared for participants. However, because of the torrential rain, a participant said, the use of rain gears already served the function of a mask.
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