Abstract
Yaoi describes homoerotic works created by fans, mostly girls and women, of young male characters in Japanese manga (comics) and anime (animation). Long established in Japan, yaoi has become popular in the West. Some same-sex attracted males in both regions have criticized yaoi’s representations as unrealistic and oppressive yet others enjoy them. Reading a Western yaoi story with the ideas of gender theorists Judith Butler, Elizabeth Grosz, and Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick as a frame of reference, I show how yaoi troubles conventional notions of identity and gender to the point where it may be considered a form of resistance to them.
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© 2011 Thomas Peele
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McHarry, M. (2011). Identity Unmoored: Yaoi in the West. In: Peele, T. (eds) Queer Popular Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-29011-6_13
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-29011-6_13
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