This volume explores the cultural politics of gender and sexuality amidst rapid social, political, and economic transformations in contemporary Asia. To date, no edited books have brought together studies of gender and sexuality from across many different societies in Asia. Few books focus on the lived experiences of gendered subjects, or the interfaces between political economy and gender and sexuality. This volume fills a significant gap in the literature and makes major contributions by not only exploring the intersections of gender and sexuality, but also integrating it with cultural and p ... More

This volume explores the cultural politics of gender and sexuality amidst rapid social, political, and economic transformations in contemporary Asia. To date, no edited books have brought together studies of gender and sexuality from across many different societies in Asia. Few books focus on the lived experiences of gendered subjects, or the interfaces between political economy and gender and sexuality. This volume fills a significant gap in the literature and makes major contributions by not only exploring the intersections of gender and sexuality, but also integrating it with cultural and political economic analysis. This volume offers a current, grounded, and critical analysis of the complex intersections of gender, sexuality, and political economy across different societies in Asia, namely, China, Japan, Cambodia, Vietnam, India, Pakistan, Hong Kong, Thailand, and Taiwan. It centers on the stories of the gendered subjects themselves as an entrée into a systematic investigation of the cultural politics of gender and sexuality in Asia. Contributors in this volume have conducted intense ethnographic fieldwork in Asian societies, and their chapters unravel the ways in which intimate gendered and sexual experiences are impinged upon by state policies, economic realities, cultural ideologies, and social hierarchies. Their grounded, unique research sheds light on how configurations of gender and sexuality are constituted, negotiated, contested, transformed, and at times, perpetuated and reproduced in private, intimate experiences in the current era.