Aspirations for ‘Japanese gay masculinity’

Comparing Chinese and Japanese men’s consumption of porn star Koh Masaki

Dados Bibliográficos

ID13086306
AutoresThomas Baudinette (0000-0002-4095-5923, Macquarie University, autor correspondente)
Ano2020
Volume7
Fascículo3
Páginas258-268
Data de publicação2020-06-02
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoPorn Studies (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 2326-8743 • E-ISSN: 2326-8751
EditoraTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/23268743.2020.1715239
OpenAlexW2998948289
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas2
Referências citadas15

This article investigates Chinese and Japanese fandom for the Japanese gay porn star Koh Masaki (1983–2013), exploring how consumption of Koh’s films impacted fans’ understandings of their sexual desires and identities. I argue that both groups position Koh as a symbol of a ‘Japanese gay masculinity’ that is understood as normatively desirable. Interviews revealed that due to this normative desirability, Koh acted as an aspirational model in the everyday production of their identities as gay men. Furthermore, Japanese gay men utilized Koh’s explicitly Japanese masculinity to position themselves as legitimately masculine within the context of a Japanese mainstream media landscape that constructs same-sex-desiring men as ‘failed men’ due to their supposed effeminacy. For Chinese gay men, Koh was deployed to symbolically construct an ideal of ‘good Japanese guys’ that helped them navigate systems of anti-Chinese xenophobia that circulate throughout Japan’s gay cultural spaces

Consumption (sociology · Femininity · Mainstream · Masculinity · Political science · Social science · Sociology · Asian Culture and Media Studies · Gender Studies · Japanese History and Culture · Migration, Ethnicity, and Economy · Psychology