Queer Bangkok

　　The Thai capital Bangkok is the unrivalled centre of the country's gay, lesbian, and transgender communities. These communities are among the largest in Southeast Asia, and indeed in the world, and have a diversity, social presence, and historical depth that set them apart from the queer cultures of many neighbouring societies.

　　The first years of the twenty-first century have marked a significant transition moment for all of Thailand's LGBT cultures, with a multidimensional expansion in the geographical extent, media presence, economic importance, political impact, social standing, and cultural relevance of Thai queer communities. This book analyses the roles of the market and media — especially cinema and the Internet — in these transformations, and considers the ambiguous consequences that the growing commodification and mediatization of queer lives have had for LGBT rights in Thailand. A key finding is that in the early twenty-first century processes of global queering are leading to a growing Asianization of Bangkok's queer cultures.

　　This book traces Bangkok's emergence as a central focus of an expanding regional network linking gay, lesbian, and transgender communities in Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Indonesia, the Philippines and other rapidly developing East and Southeast Asian societies.

作者簡介

Peter A. Jackson

　　Peter A. Jackson is professor of Thai cultural studies in the Australian National University's College of Asia and the Pacific. He has written extensively on modern Thai cultural history with special interests in religion and sexuality. He is editor-in-chief of the Asian Studies Review and founder of the Thai Rainbow Archives Project, which is collecting and digitizing Thai gay, lesbian, and transgender magazines and community organization newsletters (see thairainbowarchive.anu.edu.au/index.html).

List of Contributors  vii
A Note on Thai Transcription and Citation of Thai Names  xi
Queer Bangkok after the Millennium: Beyond Twentieth-Century Paradigms  1
Peter A. Jackson

I Markets and Media in Bangkok’s Queer Cultural Transformations  15
1. Bangkok’s Early Twenty-First-Century Queer Boom  17
Peter A. Jackson
2. Competing Cultures of Masculinity: When Thai Transgender  43
Bodies Go Through Muay Thai
Stephane Rennesson
3. Back in the Spotlight: The Cinematic Regime of Representation  59
of Kathoeys and Gay Men in Thailand
Serhat Unaldi
4. Loves of Siam: Contemporary Thai Cinema and Vernacular Queerness  81
Brett Farmer
5. Encounters in the Sauna: Exploring Gay Identity and Power Structures in Gay Places in Bangkok 99
Nikos Dacanay
6. Cyberspace, Power Structures, and Gay Sexual Health: The Sexuality of Thai Men Who Have Sex with Men (MSM)in the Camfrog On-line Web-cam Chat Rooms  121
Ronnapoom Samakkeekarom and Pimpawun Boonmongkon

II Queer Bangkok in Twenty-First-Century Global and Regional Networks 141
7. The Romance of the Amazing Scalpel: “Race”, Labour, and Affect  in Thai Gender Reassignment Clinics 143
Aren Z. Aizura
8. Bangkok’s Beautiful Men: Images of Thai Liberality in an Indonesian  Gay Novel  163
Ben Murtagh
9. Speaking of Bangkok: Thailand in the History of Gay Singapore  181
Alex Au

III LGBT Activism, Rights, and Autonomy in Thailand  193
10. Capitalism, LGBT Activism, and Queer Autonomy in Thailand  195
Peter A. Jackson
11. The Language of Rights, Deviance, and Pleasure: Organizational Responses to Discourses of Same-Sex Sexuality and Transgenderism
in Thailand 205
Megan Sinnott
12. The Rainbow Lobby: The Sexual Diversity Network and the Military-Installed Government in Thailand 229
Douglas Sanders
13. Transpeople (Khon kham-phet) in Thailand: Transprejudice, Exclusion, and the Presumption of Mental Illness 251
Sam Winter
Notes 269
A Glossary of Thai LGBT Terms  285
Bibliography  287
Index  303