Thomas Baudinette
Date: December 14, 2023
Time: 18:00-19:30 (JST)
Format: in person only
Registration: Not required
Venue: Room 301, 3F, Building 10, Sophia University
In this presentation, Thomas Baudinette introduces his research into Thailand's "Boys Love" media industry by reflecting on a decade of ethnographic observations of this popular culture form's celebrity production systems and transnational fandoms. Arguing that Thai BL represents an important example of queer emancipatory media that has garnered legions of dedicated fans across the globe, Baudinette explores what the rise of Thai BL can teach us about celebrity and fandom culture from an Asian perspective. Baudinette concludes by considering how the process of writing the first English language book on Thai BL has led him to challenge Western-centric theories of queer media and advocate for an appreciation for Asia's central positioning within new global regimes of queer knowledge production.
Dr. Thomas Baudinette is Senior Lecturer in Japanese Studies and International Studies at Macquarie University. A cultural anthropologist, his research primarily explores how popular media and fandom culture inform knowledge about gender and sexuality across East and Southeast Asia. He is the author of Regimes of Desire: Young Gay Men, Media, and Masculinity in Tokyo (University of Michigan Press, 2021) and Boys Love Media in Thailand: Celebrity, Fans, and Transnational Asian Queer Popular Culture (Bloomsbury, 2023). He is currently working on his third book, tentatively titled Queer Fantasies of Asia: Japanese and Korean Media Fandom in the Philippines.
This talk is organized by SGSRA and James Farrer (Professor of Sociology, Sophia University).
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