Embodied Entanglements: Gender, Identity, and the Corporeal in Asia

Ideas on the (human) body, gender, and identity lie at the core of many socio-political issues and cultural trends in Asia today, while also inspiring innovative research on artistic expression from Asia's past. By focusing on socio-political as well as cultural issues from diverse geographical and historical contexts, this book highlights complex links and interactions that bind these three interpretative axes. How do bodies become conduits for the expression and negotiation of gender and other identities? What do the lived experiences of women and LGBTQ+ people in Asia reveal about biopolitics, normative expectations, and value systems in different societies? How does art reflect the representation and fashioning of gendered bodies and ambiguous identities? Cutting across the quotidian and the avant-garde, activism and art, violence and pleasure, as well as the intimate and the political, this book sheds new light on Asian cultures and societies, spanning India, Indonesia, Japan, mainland China, Taiwan, and Thailand, affirming thus the region's significance in broader debates on biopolitics, gender, and human dignity.