Boys Love Media in Thailand Celebrity, Fans, and Transnational Asian Queer Popular Culture
Produktdetaljer
Biografisk notat
Thomas Baudinette is Senior Lecturer in International Studies at Macquarie University, Australia. A cultural anthropologist, his research explores queer media and its fandoms in East and Southeast Asia. His first book is Regimes of Desire: Young Gay Men, Media, and Masculinity in Tokyo (2021).Thomas Baudinette optimizes his Japanese cultural studies expertise as well as various methods to unravel the vibrancy of fandom, star industry, gender politics, and transnationalism within the Thai BL media since its soul-searching period. This seminal work vigorously inspires continual and future dialogues among BL scholars in Thailand, Asia, and beyond.
Natthanai Prasannam, Kasetsart University, Thailand
The book presents a groundbreaking exploration of Thailand’s Boys’ Love media. With thought-provoking theoretical debates, this book unveils the transformative nature of Thai BL, showcasing its role in reshaping Thailand’s popular culture landscape and its transnational impact throughout East and Southeast Asia. A must-read for understanding the emergence of queer representation and the interplay between Thai and Japanese BL cultures as well as the intriguing connections between Thai BL media and Korean fandom practices. It is an insightful journey that illuminates the dynamic exchange between diverse cultural influences, reshaping the landscape of queer representation and media consumption in Asia.
Amporn Jirattikorn, Chiang Mai University, Thailand
Over the past several years, the Thai popular culture landscape has radically transformed due to the emergence of “Boys Love” (BL) soap operas which celebrate the love between handsome young men. Boys Love Media in Thailand: Celebrity, Fans, and Transnational Asian Queer Popular Culture is the first book length study of this increasingly significant transnational pop culture phenomenon. Drawing upon six years of ethnographic research, the book reveals BL’s impacts on depictions of same-sex desire in Thai media culture and the resultant mainstreaming of queer romance through new forms of celebrity and participatory fandom.
The author explores how the rise of BL has transformed contemporary Thai consumer culture, leading to heterosexual female fans of male celebrities who perform homoeroticism becoming the main audience to whom Thai pop culture is geared. Through the case study of BL, this book thus also investigates how Thai media is responding to broader regional trends across Asia where the economic potentials of female and queer fans are becoming increasingly important. Baudinette ultimately argues that the center of queer cultural production in Asia has shifted from Japan to Thailand, investigating both the growing international fandom of Thailand’s BL series as well as the influence of international investment into the development of these media. The book particularly focuses on specific case studies of the fandom for Thai BL celebrity couples in Thailand, China, the Philippines, and Japan to explore how BL series have transformed each of these national contexts’ queer consumer cultures.
Introduction
1. A History of Boys Love Media and Fandom in Thailand
2. Adapting Japanese BL: Constructing Thai Fans, Mainstreaming Queer Romance
3. The Boys Love Machine: Producing Queer Idol Celebrity at GMM
4. Sharing Intimacies: Social Media, GMM Fan Events, and BL Idol Fandom
5. Thai BL Goes Global: Exploring the Queer Potentials of Chinese and Philippine Fandoms
6. Japan’s Thai BL Boom: Thailand as a New Center for Transnational Asian Queer Popular Culture
Notes
Index
Bloomsbury’s Asian Celebrity and Fandom Studies series is the first dedicated home for the publication of book-length research on stardom, celebrity and fandom cultures across Asia. Promoting new and innovative research in Asian media, screen and cultural studies, the series explores the vibrant, diverse and influential world of Asian celebrity across national, transnational and diasporic contexts.
From K-Drama to Japanese pop, from transnational superstars to local microcelebrities and influencers, the series covers such topics as:
· Celebrity culture across Asia
· Celebrity and Asian identity
· Gender and sexuality in Asian celebrity and fandom cultures
· Celebrity politics and activism in Asia
· The fandom economy
· Internet celebrity in Asia
Proposals are welcome for both single author monographs and edited collections. For further advice please contact the Series Editors:
Jian Xu is Associate Professor in Communication at Deakin University, Australia. He has published widely on Chinese celebrity and digital cultures.
j.xu@deakin.edu.au
Sean Redmond is Associate Dean of Media, Writing and Publishing at RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia. He is Founding Editor of the journal Celebrity Studies.
sean.redmond@rmit.edu.au