Keywords

1 Introduction

The departure from the idea of gender as an essentialist binary construct has provoked questions about definitions. “What is gender, how is it produced and reproduced, what are its possibilities?” asks gender theorist Judith Butler in the preface to the 1999 edition of Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (p. xxiii). Butler is known for drawing attention to the separation of biological sex from gender and for proposing the idea of gender performativity. As Butler (1999) theorizes, gender “proves to be performative—that is, constituting the identity it is purported to be. In this sense, gender is always a doing, though not a doing by a subject who might be said to preexist the deed” (p. 33). In other words, gender is the result of socially and culturally constructed discourse and learning trajectory; we are taught to accept what gender should be, how to “do” it, and to assume that the ways in which we perform gender are natural. Referring to social scientists Candace West and Don H. Zimmerman’s article “Doing Gender” (1987), sociologist Sally Hines (2018) observes how “the need to ‘do’ gender correctly in relation to society’s expectations of what is appropriate gendered behaviour weighs heavily in all activities” (p. 68). And yet, gendering often goes unnoticed as it permeates nearly all aspects of everyday life. Understanding gendered constructs means recognizing their organization within systems of asymmetrical power. The oppositional constructions of gender binary (male–female, man-woman) in particular imply power structures, rendering the “gendered nature of power” resistant to change (Mostow 2003a, p. 8). The deconstruction of conventional ideas about gender, and such associated notions as biological sex, sexuality, masculinity and femininity, has long received increasing attention in many fields, including Japanese popular culture where the concepts have been studied in connection with cross-dressing, cosplay (costume role playing), manga (comics), anime (animated film), advertisement industry, theater, music, television, and social media.

Although the following chapters examine gender in Japan—in cosplay, manga, anime, advertisements, and so on—I wish to emphasize that this collection of essays is not aiming to create a comprehensive study of Japanese popular culture as that has already been successfully done by others.Footnote 1 Instead, by using case studies from Japanese popular culture, which is loosely taken to include advertisements and social media, the following chapters challenge us to think about gender, sexuality, masculinities, and femininities in new ways. Rejecting the seemingly stabilizing gender polarity constructed as oppositional means recognizing the complexities and range of gendered identities and numerous ways in which masculinities and femininities can be manifested.

Hines (2018) observes that “The idea of gender fluidity suggests that gender is not fixed by biology, but shifts according to social, cultural and individual preference” (p. 9). Such fluidity and change may be signaled through external gender markers like clothing, hair, make-up, colors. If the traditional practice, by now outdated, was to think that girls wear dresses, boys wear pants, girls like pink, boys like blue, girls play with dolls, boys with cars, girls grow into women who wear skirts, high heels, and make-up, then what happens when men do as well (and women no longer may not)? When women first started to wear pants, or “bloomers,” they were fiercely attacked—verbally, emotionally, physically—but by now, it is a common sight to see women wearing what for a time was considered male attire. It would follow, then, that men in dresses and high heels should similarly be destigmatized. At present, instead, as Emerald King observes in Chapter 8 quoting the East Asian studies scholar Rachel Leng: “it takes a real man to dress like a 10-year-old girl” (Leng 2013, p. 89). As one reads through the chapters, it becomes apparent that a much larger revolt and refusal of traditions seem to be operating, even beyond gender, as is also testified in Sharon Kinsella’s recent collaborative film, Josō (2021). The stereotypical gendered roles and responsibilities, typified in the Japanese salary-man, no longer appear attractive, neither to men nor to women.

It is only rather recently that gender has more widely been recognized as a dynamic, fluid, even as a rapidly changing concept. However, even conventional ideas of gender polarity prove to be evasive, or in continuous flux: although the traditional socio-culturally constructed gender (man-woman) has been differentiated from biological sex (male–female), both term pairs tend to be used interchangeably. Official forms often ask one’s gender identification, which is labeled male/female (rather than man-woman), now also “non-binary” or “other.” And scholars tend to talk about same-sex relations, thus evoking biological differences but then refer to women-loving-women (or men-loving-men) rather than using the labels female-male. Such confusing overlap**, as scholar Thomas F. Strychacz reminds us in Dangerous Masculinities (2008), derives from the fact that “there is no natural and absolute relationship between the sexed body and gendered identities” (p. 20). If so, does the separation of sex and gender then serve a purpose? Scholars have pondered, indeed, why the emphasis is placed on the few bodily differences when there are so many body parts people have in common. Procreation no longer seems a valid argument for underscoring differences between men and women (or males and females) as that commonly is not the main scope of sexual relations and many cannot or prefer not to have children. Moreover, the tendency seems to be to move toward sex/gender-neutral educational institutions, workplaces, mixed-gender armies, perhaps also prisons—and even public bathrooms.

The destabilization of gender polarity has been accomplished to a great extent by (re)labeling, with a naming process that ranges from non-binary, gender-queer, agender, transgender, intersexual, cisgender, pansexual, and so on, to one’s identification as gender fluid (see, for example, Hines 2018, pp. 10–11, 38–39). The term “x-gender” (x-jendaa) is used in Japan where it has been identified as “a form of anti-identity” (Johnson 2020, p. 124). Although labels and categories can be used to normalize gender that is neither male nor female, such classifications are extremely fluid, interwoven, and evasive of any fixed definition, with naming practices that may constantly change. The existence of various alternatives for self-definition can be liberating but also confusing, especially if one’s identification changes over time. Perhaps term-borrowing could prove to be useful in this context: the Japanese term “sei” could be introduced in transnational conversation about gender and sex since, as Michelle H. S. Ho notes in Chapter 2, it can be defined as “either sex, gender, or both” and thus would be useful for contemporary discourse on non-normative, non-binary, agender, or gender fluid identifications, simplifying seemingly rather jumbled labeling.

Similarly, English-language speakers refer to “he,” “she,” and now “they” as those who do not identify with such labels as male–female sex/gender, but since the plural form tends to create more confusion than clarity, perhaps a new term should be invented, something that would be more in line with “he” and “she,” for example, borrowing the Japanese term “ji” (pronounced “gee”), which means “the autonomy of the self” (Ho footnote 19), which could be anglicized with a similar sounding term, such as “zhee.” Similar processes have been adopted in Sweden where a gender-neutral “hen” has been added to “hon” (she) and “han” (he); the Finnish language, instead, uses one gender-neutral “hän” for all genders. Gender-neutral pronouns would be ideal for term-borrowing. In other words, linguistic choices work toward naturalizing gender that is neither-nor or may be both, male–female.

Gender has been analyzed through inter- and multidisciplinary approaches in which the cross-pollination between such fields as linguistics, popular culture, social studies, history, anthropology, ethnography, Black studies, literature, body studies, masculinity studies, queer and LGBTQ+ studies, to name a few, contribute to the ways in which gender can be analyzed and articulated, at times intersecting with such categories as race, ethnicity, social class, sexuality, and so forth.Footnote 2 The oppositional positioning of men vs. women is commonly associated with such binary notions as male vs. female (referring to biological sex), masculinity vs. femininity or linked to sexuality, again perceived as forming a contrast between hetero- vs. homosexuality, or, as often has been the case, between “normal” and “deviant.” When examining the meaning of gender, biological sex, sexuality or masculinities/femininities, it is important to recognize that modern societies tend to be divided into something that has been labeled as the dominant or mainstream society, culture, and their representatives who assume positions of authority and those who differ from these, such as representatives of other gender(s) and non-heterosexuals, often perceived as “others” who tend to be labeled as “deviant” from the “norm” and thus are marginalized; it implies a hierarchy that involves control by one group over another. The pressure to conform to normativity reflects individuals’ need for social approval and acceptance. Therefore, it is important to shift such center-marginal positionings and question what is “normal” and “natural” or “deviant” by introducing more varied expressions of gender into the mainstream, as already is occurring in various parts of the world.

Without delving into the (“Western”) history of gender, sex, and sexuality, which already has brilliantly been done by numerous scholars,Footnote 3 a few examples will suffice to point to the arbitrary nature of the concepts. For instance, Hines (2018, p. 31) reminds us about sexual historian Thomas Laqueur’s findings about ancient Greece, where men and women represented “one sex”; it is only in the eighteenth century, according to Laqueur, that the shift to a “two-sex” model occurred in Western Europe. At that time, such philosophers as Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778) proposed that the public sphere suited men better than women whose nature was deemed more nurturing, thus more inclined to taking care of children and domestic chores. Certain character traits were deemed typical of women/females (perceived as feminine, weak, and emotional), who authoritarian voices positioned in contrast to men/males (constructed as courageous, rational, intellectual) (Hines 2018, pp. 35–36). The simplification of gender into more stabilized hierarchical opposites occurred in tandem with the categorization and labeling of sexuality in the nineteenth century. Prior to that, the male–female or hetero-homosexual polarizations seem to have not existed, at least not presented as essentialist concepts. With the birth of sexology, sexuality was not only approached in terms of religious morality but of pseudo-scientific inquiry.Footnote 4

What is thus presented as “normal” is actually the result of arbitrary articulations that through repetition become internalized. The general acceptance and assumption concerning heterosexuality as natural has been contested by such scholars as Jonathan Ned Katz (1995/2007) who explains that when the term first was used in the United States in Dr. James G. Kiernan’s article published in a medical journal in 1892, it was equated with perversion. In the article, which also introduced the word “homosexual,” “heterosexuals” referred to those who desired two different sexes, not those attracted to a different sex (Katz 2007, pp. 19–20). A year later, in 1893 (according to some 1892), both terms appeared in sexologist Richard von Krafft-Ebing’s Psychopathia Sexualis, in which “hetero-sexuals” were presented as desiring one different sex, now signifying normality although associated with fetishism and perversity; “homo-sexuals” were pathologized because non-reproductive. In the same publication, males and females were presented as “opposite” (Katz 2007, pp. 22–23, 30). The normalizing process of one over the other gradually started to occur in conjunction with the separative categorization and labeling of sex and sexuality. Moreover, as Hines (2018) observes: “Rather than being something we did, sexuality became a key facet of who we are” (p. 85).

This idea of oppositional sexuality, together with the understanding of gender as polarity, has been challenged widely. Already in 1948, the American sexologist Alfred Kinsey (1894–1956) perceived sexuality as a continuum, a concept that others, such as the American feminist poet Adrienne Rich and historian Carroll Smith-Rosenberg subsequently adapted, the latter referring to it also as spectrum; others, such as Butler and Gilbert Herdt theorized about the concept of “third gender” and “third sex” to refer to the existence of more than two options for gender identification (Butler 1986; Katz 2007; Lewin and Leap 2002); and before Butler (2004), the French philosopher and writer Simone de Beauvoir (1949/1997) and the Black American author James Baldwin (1985/2012) promoted the idea that masculinity pertains to women as well as men, like femininity may characterize both men and women, and consequently, femininity and masculinity are not traits of differently sexed bodies. Baldwin called it androgyny, arguing that “we are all androgynous, not only because we are all born of a woman impregnated by the seed of a man but because each of us, helplessly and forever, contains the other—male in female, female in male” (p. 698). Whether he meant this to be taken literally or to merely indicate human interconnectivity, he, nonetheless, suggests that the differentiation between male and female may not be so straightforward.

The idea of gender being something more complex than the simplified male–female construct has existed in various countries for centuries, including many Asian countries. In India, for example, at birth the hijra are assigned male status but subsequently they identify and live as female (Hines 2018, p. 79). Another example of gender intermixing, among many others, are Thailand’s kathoey (or “ladyboys”) as well as Thailand’s masculine-feminine female couples Tom-Dees. The labels that have been used to describe kathoey—briefly (and superficially) defined as biological men with feminine traits—include transsexual, transvestite, drag-queen, hermaphrodite; and they have variously been understood to identify as homo-, hetero-, or bisexual. Gender, biological sex, and sexual practices are thus intermixed in an effort to provide labels to what appear as non-conforming identity positions. The important aspect is that both kathoey and Tom-Dees have existed openly for hundreds of years and seem to be part of national gender identity. It is only more recently that the kathoey have started to be stigmatized as many of them have become entertainers, more precisely sex-workers, catering in particular to men from Western countries. Consequently, their social position and image have greatly changed during time. The latter, Tom-Dees, or couples of (biological) women who some label “lesbians” because the “Toms” are mannish women, sometimes perceived as resembling kathoey, but who wear men’s clothing and refer to themselves with masculine pronouns; their partners, “Dees,” instead, appear as more feminine females. Although they may appear similar to Western ideas of butch-femme couples, Toms in Tom-Dee couples are closer to transgender men. However, as historian Peter A. Jackson (2016) observes, the representatives of non-binary genders (which in itself is a problematic term as it recognizes gender as a binary construct, male–female) need to be understood in the context of their uniqueness, in their pertinence to a certain place and time, in this case, acknowledging their long history in Thailand. More importantly, as Jackson (2016) points out, the term “queer,” which is often used in Western discourse, is not employed in Thailand where another term, phet (meaning “eroticized gender”) is being used (p. 203). Hence, Jackson reminds us that we should refrain from using the contemporary “Western” framework and remember that any definition of gender fluctuates according to the explanatory attributes attached to it or used to describe it, and gender diversity has its unique manifestations at different time periods, in various countries and locations. As Butler (1999) suggests: “gender is not always constituted coherently or consistently in different historical contexts” (p. 6). Thus, recognizing the existence of these gender transforming cultures contributes to the destigmatization of what is presently understood as “non-normative” gender(s).

It is worth noting that when examining various manifestations of gendered realities, for instance in the Asian context, it is important to avoid generalizations that would reduce complex subjectivities into flat, homogenized stereotypes. Paradoxically, or perhaps because of the firmly rooted, traditionally accentuated, rigid gender roles, rules, and hierarchies in Japanese society, on the one hand, subcultures have flourished in Japanese popular culture that offer playful as well as more serious channels for expressing and experimenting with an extensive variety of gender manifestations, on the other hand. Japan, then, seems fertile ground for exploring gender(s), providing various contexts and case studies. After all, Japan tends to be a trendsetter, especially in youth culture. As Lucy Glasspool observes in Chapter 9: “Japanese pop culture (unlike Japanese mainstream society) abounds with gender-ambivalent characters” (see Chapter 9, p. 254). The prevalent traditional expectations concerning gender are dramatically contrasted with a certain liberty to express non-conforming masculinities and femininities. Consequently, many of the chapters that follow recognize the polyphonic nature of gender, posing questions rather than providing answers, questioning conventional assumptions about gender, pushing us to rethink such concepts as femininity and masculinity, or the multiple ways in which femininities and masculinities (in the plural) can be expressed. At times the concepts merge, collapsing into each other. It would seem possible to talk about a certain type of a collage or mélange of culturally codified signs of masculinities and femininities that could be referred to as mascufemininity (male-femininity) and/or femimasculinity (female-masculinity)—that is, if we wish to distinguish between female and male femininity and masculinity.

The question, however, remains: how should gender be defined—is it biological, emotional, cultural, or social construction, or a combination of these? And what exactly is gender? I would like to suggest that rather than referring to gender as continuum or spectrum, it might more accurately be defined a kaleidoscope which is within all of us: we all have (what has been identified as) maleness/masculinities and femaleness/femininities that we manifest in various degrees, in different circumstances, in a similar way as our sexualities may find expression through various forms. Perhaps we are all kaleidoscopic, perhaps identifying more strongly with one gender in particular but acknowledging the existence of both within us. A similar idea is expressed by some of the participants in josō (male-to-female cross-dressing) contests organized at Japanese universities, interviewed by Ayuma Miyazaki (Chapter 3).

Although moving backwards in time—to recognize that gender, sexuality, masculinities/femininities, maleness/womanliness are all constructs, interpreted differently in various locations at various times—and removing categorizations, classifications, and labels are far from easy, the arbitrary nature and invented labels mean that they can be deconstructed. The chapters here brought together provide alternative readings for definitions of gender, sexuality, masculinities and femininities, at times encouraging us to consider that man/masculinity and woman/femininity could pertain to either sex and all genders.

Many of the case studies discussed in the chapters challenge conventional assumptions associated not only with gender but also normativity, ultimately deconstructing the assumed nature of the concept itself. Although the chapters focus on Japan, the subject matter and topics addressed do not pertain to Japan alone; the discussion on gender takes part in an already initiated examination of what gender is, how masculinities and femininities may be understood and performed. Taken together, these chapters use examples from Japanese popular culture to generate new transnational conversations about gender that move beyond any national or geographic specificity.

2 Gender Diversity in Japan

Scholar Maia Tsurumi (2000) argues that “in Japan, society’s standards of what is male and what is female are defined by men,” suggesting that many feminists, or perhaps particularly feminists, would agree with this statement (p. 178). Gender in Japan has traditionally been constructed through emphasizing distinct gender roles for men and women, the geisha and samurai being historical examples of such, but there also is, and has been, a strong presence of gender ambiguous figures. In addition, cross-dressing has been a prominent feature in Noh Theater since the fourteenth century and in Kabuki performances of the sixteenth century. The actors can be perceived as truly “performing” their gender, in particular the onnagata (men acting as women), similarly to the enigmatic geisha, a subject of many books, films, paintings, and prints, in which she embodies the aesthetics of eroticism (Pandey 2009). Such eroticism is also found in the artistic expression of Japanese poetry and narrative. During Edo period, portraits of beautiful boys appeared in literary works by such famous authors as Saikaku Ihara (Great Mirror of Male Love, 1687) and even earlier, in one of Japan’s most well-known tales dating back to the eleventh century: Genji monogatari (The Tale of Genji) written by Murasaki Shikibu. The story continues to fascinate readers and art lovers as testified by a recent exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York dedicated to Murasaki Shikibu and Genji in 2019 (“The Tale of Genji: A Japanese Classic Illuminated”) (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1
A painting of a river and people stay on the river bank. Lighted candles and floor mats are on the floor. Moon in the sky, rocks, and trees are on the right side.

Toyokuni 3rd, Genji and beauties in a villa with moonlit garden, triptych (1854). Copyright Private Collection

Full size image

The Japanese woodblock prints, ukiyo-ē (pictures of the floating world), that appeared during the samurai rule in Edo period (1603–1868) when the Kabuki Theater emerged, feature images inspired by Genji monogatari (ukiyo-ē and Kabuki can perhaps be seen as representing Edo period’s popular culture). Other ukiyo-ē prints portray actors, courtesans, geishas, beauties, chonin belles, or men in daily life. In particular, the prints from the second half of the eighteenth century depict a connection between the world of theater and pleasure quarters. Important for the society at the end of the eighteenth century was the refined aesthetic presentation of sensual experience.

The sensual is explicitly depicted in Japanese erotic woodblock prints (shunga) that were consumed by both men and women in the eighteenth century (Monden 2018; Screech 2009, p. 93; Miller 2006, p. 155). Cultural studies scholar Masafumi Monden (2018) quotes art historian Timon Screech (2009, p. 97), the publisher of “the first critical study of shunga in any language” (Mostow 2003a), who has argued that rather than operating along sexual binaries, these sexual images placed emphasis on age and the associated options of passive (young) and active (older) roles that were assumed. Gender, moreover, was coded through

the way in which the assimilation of the two bodies made social gender-coding through dress or hairstyle commensurately more important. If a person dressed her or himself in the clothes of a certain gender, they became a true representative of that gender (Screech 2009, p. 104; qtd. in Monden 2018, pp. 68–69).

Similarly, art historian Joshua S. Mostow (2003a, b) emphasizes that gender and sexuality in late seventeenth-century Edo had little in common with how we perceive them today; hence, we should avoid applying such terminology as, for instance, “gay” to Japanese homoerotic practices since “sexual passion for males” was quite different from what is meant by the term “homosexual” (Mostow 2003a, b). Art historians, as Mostow (2003a) explains, have considered the early modern period art “as accurate records of an age now past and as keys to a realm of sexual and aesthetic pleasure untainted by the foreign, religiously inspired pathologies of the nineteenth century” (p. 6). They offer a glimpse into the intimacy of sexual relations, simultaneously documenting gender. These images have fascinated scholars and art enthusiasts: the so-called “shunga boom” of the 1990s followed a more general “Edo boom” that started in Japan and abroad in the 1980s (Mostow 2003a, p. 5).

In some of the ukiyo-ē prints, it is possible to identify the presence of the androgynous wakashu (beautiful youth), whose gender was determined by biological sex, age, and physical features, all particularly pertinent to this time period. Their external identification markers included dress and hairstyle; these visual codes are recognizable in some ukiyo-ē prints.

3 The Androgynous and Beautiful Youth

The wakashu youth are immortalized in ukiyo-ē similarly to the famous Kabuki actors who excelled in female roles, the onnagata. These young males called wakashu were the “third gender”: they resembled women in their outer appearance and, to some extent, in their behavior, but they could be recognized by their particular hairstyle (a slightly shaven crown covered with flocks, which appeared very similar to women’s hairstyle). Their roles and responsibilities may appear to us as ambiguous as their physical characteristics. As Claire Voon (2017, n.p.) explains:

wakashu comprised a gender of their own, as defined by biological sex, age, outward appearance, and their role in an established sexual hierarchy, that was unique to this period. These young males were not only depicted as sexually ambiguous in art but were also, in the real world, objects of desire to both adult men and women.

However, we again should avoid applying certain vocabulary: wakashu should not be confused with the “Western” idea of a bisexual male (Mostow 2003a, b). Perhaps the most important aspect of the wakashu was the intensity of their feelings, the degree of affections and devotion, but significant was also their age, which generally varied between eleven and twenty-three (Mostow 2003b). I wish to point out that the aim here is not so much to create a history of gender(s) than to recognize that the varied expressions of masculinities/femininities and a range of genders are not recent phenomena. What is important to note in this context is the existence of more than two genders and the femininization of young males, both resonating with gendering practices found in present-day Japanese popular culture.

Age, as pointed out above, played a significant role in the gendering, sexualizing, and characterization processes of wakashu. It was in the mid-Edo period, from circa 1716, that children (kodomo) were differentiated from youth, from the adolescent girl (shōjo) and adolescent boy (shōnen), who were situated in a temporary, liminal state between child- and adulthood. Although they have been treated as being characterized by separate aesthetics and expectations, some shōnen images are similar to shōjo/girls’ culture, which was associated with the poetic, romantic, lyrical, and sentimental (Monden 2018, p. 75). The contemporary cute and boyish look of male beauty (bishōnen, beautiful boy) seems to find its roots in these Edo-period images. The contemporary cute boys started to perform on television in the 1960s, their image flourished in the 1970s, and in the 1980s they were embodied by the cute male aidoru (idol) performers, known as bishōnen (Monden 2018, p. 71). As Monden (2018) explains:

bishōnen is contrariwise slender, boyish, and predominantly kawaii (cute). This kawaii masculinity is omnipresent in contemporary Japanese culture, from advertising to television programs, from magazines to fashion media, exerting influence upon the self-image of contemporary Japanese men. The term bishōnen has been used extensively in its literal sense—any beautiful young man. Yet, […] the term is much more than just a genre label; in studies of the aesthetic imagination of Japanese boyhood, it denotes a critical concept and an imagined figure of the boy. (p. 65)

The term kawaii, indeed, may be translated as “cute” although, as Kinsella (1995) suggests, central in kawaii aesthetics is youthfulness, the pretty and delicate childlikeness (p. 229). One is here reminded of the young Genji, “the shining one” “of such beauty that he hardly seemed meant for this world.” He is further described as a sensitive youth, a young man who excelled in everything, writing poetry and playing koto so that he made “the heavens echo” (Shikibu 1000/1992, pp. 17–20). Perhaps this Heian-period beautiful youth could be identified as a forefather of kawaii aesthetics.

The beautiful boys and effeminate men represent a form of masculinity that differs from what is commonly perceived as conventional maleness; in Japan (and elsewhere) maleness is often associated with aggression, even violence. The effeminate figures contribute to the “feminization of masculinity” that according to Yumiko Iida (2005) “often implies a fear and anxiety on the part of patriarchy over the boundary-crossing practice that seriously challenges the stability of gendered cultural hegemony” (p. 56). However, such redefinition of masculinity is also part of what Iida sees as “the increasing presence of gender ambiguous identities” (p. 57). Feminization of masculinity, thus, plays a significant role in contemporary Japanese society in which many women continue to struggle under the social pressure to follow traditional gendered paths of getting married and giving up their careers. Marriage in Japan, at the moment, is the privilege of heterosexual couples alone; same-gender partners wishing to marry need to travel abroad to exchange their vows. What is more, sociologist and cultural historian Mark J. McLelland (2000) argues that “Japanese society maintains a strict double standard regarding the sexual expression of men and women,” which limits women’s alternatives and stigmatizes those women who appear more open about their sexuality (McLelland 2000, pp. 14–15). And here, sexuality refers to sexuality in general. This, in part, explains women’s attraction to androgynous beautiful young boys who materialize in manga.Footnote 5 Their youthful physical beauty provides both aesthetic pleasure and sexual attraction (Monden 2018).

Consequently, the presence of cross-dressing and beautiful boys that now appear in contemporary manga has a long tradition and history. The boys’ love narratives depict androgynous beautiful boy characters who are attracted to other beautiful boys who, however, are neither purely male nor female. The love stories between adolescent boys cater not only to male but also to female readers whose sexuality often is culturally suppressed. Despite the love and sexual interest between young male characters, these manga then appeal to women who may fantasize of romance and sexuality with the beautiful boy protagonists. These androgynous boys, who may be perceived as resembling girls, thus blur the boundaries of binary constructs of both gender and sexuality. As gender and sexuality studies scholar James Welker (2006) notes, the 1970s “boys’ love” (shōnen ai) manga, which is a subgenre of girls’ comics, “illustrates how visual and cultural borrowing helped to liberate writers and readers to work within and against the local heteronormative paradigm in the exploration of alternatives” (p. 841). The genre that captivates readers of all genders provides them a liberatory outlet for experimenting with sexuality, even if only in imagination.

In many manga, the female and male characters are drawn to physically resemble each other, with the only distinguishing elements being their hair, certain facial features, and height, which furthers cross-gender identification (Tsurumi 2000, p. 180). Not only manga but also anime, cosplay, and cross-dressing contests allow “people to project their own ideas onto the images” (Izawa 2000, p. 140). In addition to physical and emotional attraction, sex and even violence can safely be explored in an imagined, fictitious world removed from reality; and not only ideas but also desires, dreams, fantasies, and fears can be channeled through such popular culture genres as animated films, manga, or cosplay for personal catharsis, for finding release from mundane pressures, or overcoming limitations and expressing identities that are not always compatible with mainstream acceptability. At the same time, though, popular culture can provide a stage for powerful statements about gender, sexuality, and normativity, influencing mainstream attitudes. As Tsurumi (2000) suggests: “the idea that manga reflect and may even influence reality is one that is widely accepted by manga fans and critics and by academic scholars” (p. 184).

4 Gender in Japanese Popular Culture

In his “Introduction” to Japan Pop: Inside the World of Japanese Popular Culture (2000), Timothy J. Craig locates the roots of today’s Japanese popular culture in “the vibrant bourgeois culture, born of the common people and aimed at the new urban middle class, which developed and flourished during Japan’s Edo period (1603–1868)” (p. 7). As he points out, “Japanese popular culture has become a transnational phenomenon, evolving at home as well as abroad: Japanese animation and comics have built a huge global following, and their Japanese names, anime and manga, have entered the international lexicon” (Craig 2000, p. 4). Several of these trends specific to Japanese popular culture, including anime, manga, video-gaming, and cosplay, flourished in the late 1980s and early 1990s. To quote Miyuki Hashimoto (2007): “Since the beginning of the 90’s, Japanese popular culture such as anime (cartoons), manga (comics), computer games and pop music have become increasingly popular among young people on an international scale, owing to the widespread use of new information technologies” (p. 87). Gender and sexuality are centralized in the music scene, cosplay, and particularly in manga and anime that have been recognized as “sexually hybrid” as they allow, and even encourage, cross-gender identification (Mostow 2003a, p. 13).

But not only has Japanese popular culture become internationally acclaimed but so has particularly Japanese fan culture (otakism) been adopted abroad. As Hashimoto (2007) explains: “Otaku, as members of this fan culture are called, usually invest substantial amounts of personal resources into consuming and (re)creating Japanese popular culture. As an essential element, Japanese Otaku also have a special bond with a character of their choice taken from Japanese popular culture; such a bond is often of a sexual nature and also shows a distinctive fetishistic tendency” (p. 87). This fandom is particularly accentuated in J-rock, whose band members have drawn inspiration from gothic, punk, and glam rock, in particular, in the way they dress. Their make-up and clothing are imitated by their fans, whose behavior can be seen as fetishistic. Both the bands and their fans emphasize visual expression, therefore, the popular culture genre has been labeled “visual-kei” (Hashimoto 2007, p. 87).

Visual kei (style) of the music scene with its elaborate gender-crossing emerged in the late 1980s, taking its inspiration from anime, manga, and games but also American and British hard rock, punk, heavy metal, and glam rock bands. For the most part, visual kei musicians tend to be men, as Ken McLeod (2013) suggests, “who either cross-dress as women or adopt flamboyant androgynous personae,” performing to predominantly female audiences (p. 310). Like Western bands of the 1980s, their outfits may include corsets, high heel boots, wigs, heavy make-up; inspiration is drawn from such artists and groups as David Bowie, New York Dolls, The Cure, Bauhaus, Hanoi Rocks, and many others.

Fan culture in this context is significant, pressuring band members to engage in such “fan service” as cross-dress same-sex physical demonstration of intimacy through kissing and hugging; fans themselves identify with their favorite artist, dressing and acting in imitation of them (McLeod 2013, p. 314). Visual kei and otaku fandom underscore the instability of gender.

Japanese fandom has its own subcultures, for instance, a genre called Yaoi, meaning “no climax, no point and no meaning,” which is significant among visual kei but also in the female Otaku culture. As Hashimoto (2007) explains, it

originated in the world of fanzines and is strongly influenced by the works of several early female comic artists such as Keiko Takemiya, Moto Hagio, Yumiko Ooshima and Ryoko Yamagishi. These comic artists were born around 1950 and became comic artists during the 70’s. This generation began to question traditional female stereotypes and therefore drew stories in which the main characters oftentimes were androgynous boys with whom girls could easily identify, thus offering a new self-image for girls […] for Yaoi sexual description is primarily essential. Many works of this genre could be described, even pornography.” (Hashimoto 2007, p. 91)

It seems quite evident, then, that although conventional gendered roles and expectations continue to be sustained in mainstream Japanese society, they no longer seem appealing, neither to men nor to women. New gender tropes that substitute the traditional “active male” and “passive female” include figures labeled the “herbivore-type man” (docile, non-aggressive man) and “carnivore-type woman” (proactive, voracious woman); the latter, it seems, often are determined to find a boyfriend, a potential husband (Endo 2019, p. 168, 173; for more about these terms and their use, see, for example, Endo 174–75). The type of men that most seem to attract (Japanese) women include sensitive men, kawaii and cool (kakkoii) men, in addition to the beautiful boys who are the protagonists of shōnen manga (boys’ comics) that became popular among female audiences. Examining these male figures and the “deliberately androgynous or ‘genderless’ kei (modes), where young men appear and dress in conventionally feminine ways,” Monden (2018) suggests, “is vital to form an accurate picture of male identity and gender as it is more broadly imagined in contemporary Japanese culture” (p. 72). In these instances, men can maintain their gender status while simultaneously embracing their femininity. The effeminate men can be perceived as non-threatening. Traditionally (in stereotypes) such attributes are associated with gay men, but heterosexual ciswomen, it seems, find such “effeminate,” non-aggressive men attractive and even sexually arousing.

Indeed, according to anthropologist Laura Miller (2006), Japanese women find a certain “boyishness” in men appealing (pp. 155–56). Moreover, the defenselessness and a sort of innocence associated with youth and cuteness seem to fascinate both men and women, who no longer appear willing to renounce their own sensitivity and vulnerability. When men and women dress as little girls, it seems to express a desire to remain children, a resistance to becoming adults, a refusal to assume the responsibilities of grown-ups, and perhaps a yearning for being taken care of and protected. The society that is dramatically changing in regard to employment, which no longer stands for a lifetime dedication to a career in one particular company, in particular, causes insecurity. As Monden (2018) suggests: “This uncertainty arguably makes it more and more difficult for young men to be defined by such conventionally masculine characteristics as the maturity of the salaryman in contemporary Japan” (p. 84).

The following chapters problematize gender by examining what it means to be “genderless” or “gender free” (jendau furii)Footnote 6 or for biological males to adopt female-coded clothing and gestures, as are done by jōso (male-to-female cross-dressing) and onnagata (assuming a woman’s form). Talking about gender diversity means breaking down gender binary;  this can be seen as a normalizing process that eventually, and hopefully, will lead to a more general acceptance of those presently perceived as deviating from the “norm” and who thus find themselves marginalized. Perhaps, the gender-polar structure as it is presently constructed and understood will eventually entirely collapse.

5 On Gender, Discrimination, Masculinities, and Femininities

Scholars tend to agree that there are various ways to express masculinities that have become the focus of a scholarly field of inquiry labeled Masculinity studies. The same principal applies to femininities, as testified by the following chapters in which femininities are explored as a male-related concept. Masculinities and maleness, furthermore, can intertwine with femininities and femaleness resulting in an androgynous gender identity that is particularly fluid and even transitional, as Michelle Ho points out in her chapter on dansō (female-to-male cross-dressing) and genderless joshi (girls). In Chapter 2, Ho investigates the potential of dansō and genderless for “generating new meanings,” encouraging us to rethink the stability of gender binary. Ho suggests that it could be replaced by, for example, with the concept of spectrum. The terms “genderless,” which would imply no gender, and “androgynous,” which stands for indeterminate sex are alternatives often used to replace identification with “male” or “female.” Potentially both “genderless” and “androgynous” contest gender understood in terms of hierarchy.

Rakugo theater performances, which are dominated by men, become sites of struggle and contestation where, however, discrimination of women continues. This means that often women are forced to work harder than their male peers, which is particularly true in situations where women somehow appear to be challenging existing gender ideologies, as Sarah Stark demonstrates in Chapter 3, discussing the misogyny of audiences and producers, and androcentricity of the rakugo story lines, performance conventions, and the community itself. Stark explains that in rakugo, gender difference is signaled by voice, gestures, and linguistic choices. The female characters in these performances seem to reflect mainstream expectations of what a woman should be: either elegant and sexy, associated with the pleasure quarters, which means that their task would be to please men aesthetically and sexually, or they are presented as desexualized mothers and daughters. Paradoxically, women portraying female characters tend to be criticized for appearing unnatural, as Stark observes. Such criticism evidently serves to discriminate against women who wish to enter a field that historically has been male-dominated.

Although progressive gender positions like those that Ho examines in her chapter are gradually moving into mainstream culture, conventional ideas about gender continue to resist such change. In Chapter 4, Yuko Itatsu looks at not only how femininity may be constructed but also what are the many challenges women still face in Japanese society. Itatsu analyzes Nike commercials, particularly their message-driven content series, treating them “as a microcosm among the debate on whether or not Japan is ready for a dialogue on diversity and inclusion.” Itatsu, whose study material includes “femvertising” (neologism for feminism and advertising), explores gender (in)equality, the cultural silencing of women, their fears, and “the stigma, discrimination and disadvantages a woman may experience in contemporary Japan.” She notes how in some of Nike’s advertisements, women’s femininity is constructed through depicting them as “delicate, elegant, feminine, gentle, modest, reserved, and submissive (see Chapter 4, pp. 100, 107, 110). However, young women are starting to contest these expectations, presenting themselves as sportive, working on their muscles, conducting their interviews in gyms rather than in spaces that could more easily be gendered female.

Ayumi Miyazaki (Chapter 5) continues this line of inquiry into how femininities and masculinities may be articulated by analyzing Japanese university josō (male-to-female cross-dressing) contests. At these events, as Miyazaki notes, participants “negotiate multitudes of masculinities and femininities through different gendered perceptions and ideologies” (see Chapter 5, p. 126). She underscores the problematic nature of terminology that is being used as it undermines non-binary gender constructs while simultaneously relying on the distinctiveness of male from female. In these contests, the impetus of josō practitioners vary, some of them clearly being motivated by their desire to fully express their femininities and masculinities. In many of the examples Miyazaki analyzes, it seems that what constitutes femininities is often taken for granted. Old-fashioned, conventional, stereotypical elements such as skirts, long hair, make-up, cuteness, beauty but also carefree fun and happiness are identified as easily recognizable signs of femininity. Women’s objectification and the false impression of their lack of responsibilities, women’s idealized child-like innocence, non-violence, and lack of competitiveness seem to permeate many of the discourses circulating around what it means to be a woman or being feminine. This would seem to imply a certain homogenization and simplification concerning femininities that, one would assume, can be manifested in more complex ways, similarly to masculinities. For example, short hair can be very feminine or large pants resembling the Japanese “hakama” can be mistaken for a skirt. These could be perceived as a mélange of masculinity and femininity codes that are intertwined so they become inseparable, impossible to distinguish one from the other. Should they then be defined as signals for masculinity or femininity or identified as masculinity codes that have become feminized or are they examples of femimasculinities (female-masculinities)? Or perhaps, there is no need to identify short hair or large skirt-like pants as signs of either femininity or masculinity; they can be neither or both.

Motherhood is one of those concepts associated with women but paradoxically not necessarily considered an expression of femininity. In dominant discourse, one of gender polarity’s aims has been to consolidate heterosexuality, which then would promote procreation, securing the formation of traditional family units. Presently, this seems a rather outdated idea. The idea of women’s natural tendency toward motherhood is widely contested as men choose to stay home with children while their spouses continue investing in their careers or as gay couples become the nurturing parents of adopted children. Gavin Furukawa, in Chapter 6, demonstrates the difficulties young Japanese men face when their life styles or desires fail to conform with conventional traditions. Furukawa’s chapter analyzes Japanese queer men’s coming out videos produced by vloggers. It becomes clear how traditional expectations concerning Japanese family structure, especially its continuation, appear to be more important than a person’s sexual preferences. Furukawa explores the importance of language, the process of naming and labeling, of pushing against tradition and conventionality. Coming out to one’s family is a sensitive issue, as Furukawa argues and as Emiko Nozawa points out in Chapter 7, recognizing it as one of the main topics of “Boys’ Love” (BL) manga in the 2000s-2010s.

In stereotypical images, queer men have often been perceived as crossing the line from emphasizing their masculinities to embodying, even overdoing, femininities. As pointed out earlier, effeminate men appeal to Japanese women who seem attracted to their sensitivities, as explained by Nozawa in the chapter that looks at Japanese manga. Scholars, as Nozawa notes, have argued that the effeminate beautiful boys who are the protagonists in Boys’ Love manga (BL) represent a third gender. This specific type of manga objectifies men and sexuality, but at the same time readers, who for the most part are ciswomen, are drawn to the male-male couples not only because of their effeminate appearance but also because their relationships are based on relatively equal power relations, something that Japanese women rarely experience in heterosexual relations, or in society at large, as also Itatsu argues in Chapter 4. And yet, as Nozawa explains, both men and women can be trapped in the oppression of patriarchy. Manga, and other popular media, serve to highlight the struggles of both genders. At the same time, they can function as social criticism and can push for change, for instance, by raising awareness of the discrimination in the existing legal system that fails to recognize same-sex marriage. Popular culture, in this case manga, can contribute to envisioning more progressive solutions, as Nozawa points out. Moreover, removing such labels as LGBT or BL, as is done by the movie director Isao Yukisada, contributes to the normalization of love stories as universal rather than related to specific gender relations. Thus, although the tendency is to search for definitions and label them, it is worth acknowledging that at the same time labels put us in cages or may cancel one’s individuality as the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard famously argued in 1849: “Once you label me you negate me.”

Nozawa’s discussion about effeminate men and their appeal to (Japanese) ciswomen is thought-provoking as it contests general assumptions concerning gender, sexuality, and physical as well as emotional attraction. In the following Chapter 8, Emerald King explores how gendering may be conflated into hyper-femininity and hyper-masculinity. King’s analyses focus on the ways in which cosplay costumes are created and what makes them hyper-feminine or hyper-masculine. In this context, King is less concerned with the inventories and scales that scholars have invented to identify, for instance, a “macho” masculinity, which includes “a callous sexual attitude towards women, a belief that violence is manly, and the experience of danger as exciting” (Mosher and Sirkin 1984); she rather focuses on the “hyper” character of masculinities and femininities that, according to King, in cosplay refers to “an idealized body type where, in most cases, hyper feminine bodies have slender limbs, small waists, and large breasts, and hyper masculine bodies have large muscles, square jawlines, and narrow hips” (see Chapter 8, p. 216). The stereotypical attributes become exaggerated in the cosplay costumes.

The sexualization of women dominates also in sexy cosplay that Lucy Glasspool examines in Chapter 9. Glasspool observers how the professional cosplayer Jessica Nigri demonstrates that eroticism sells. But dressing in the clothing of the opposite gender of one’s biological sex can also become a parody (especially in male-to-female cross-dressing), or it may provide a sense of liberty, or may entail identity-based meaning-making, as Glasspool points out. In this chapter, she looks at cosplay’s subgenres, such as cross-play, or what she calls “trans” cosplay, which “involves cosplay by fans who identify as transgender (though some fan definitions also include non-binary and other gender minority cosplayers).” The chapter elaborates on Glasspool’s argument that “cosplay can incorporate the deliberate politicizing of identity performance in a way that is intricately involved with social signification and meaning-making, and also be the site of affect-based, playful pleasures that have little to do with engaging with essentialist gender and sexual norms.” Glasspool notes that there are very few “macho” characters being performed but rather, cross-players seem to be drawn to “androgynous” or “tall and beautiful” male characters. The androgynous beauty seems appealing, and as Glasspool points out, “In many countries, including Japan, it is still considered more ‘deviant’ or ‘transgressive’ for men to cross the dominant gender binary by crossdressing (outside a comedy context) than for women” (see Chapter 9, pp. 243, 244, 248). As pointed out earlier, men with long hair, wearing make-up and high heels or (mini)skirts tend to become objects of curiosity in a way women in shorts or pants no longer are.

The chapters brought here together examine stigmatization, normativity, acceptability, and challenge dominant ideas about gender. The authors continue the already initiated conversation on gender-defying practices, stimulating contestation of gender discrimination. As the chapters point out, dressing up as man may include wearing a tie, suit, hat, suspenders, but male body parts are rarely exaggerated or such gender codes as clothing used for sexualization the same way as they are when dressing as women. Then attention is drawn to the bodies that become sexualized with lingerie (corsets, garters, stockings, bras) or body parts (enormous breasts, long hair) or with long nails, exaggerated make-up, and false eyelashes. Often women, indeed, seem to be reduced to big breasts and long nails.

Considering the discrimination against women and their (sexualized) objectification, it would seem counterintuitive for a man to desire to be a woman. What appears to attract men to such gender change are aspects related to what is perceived as (exaggerated) femininity: coyness, cuteness, innocence, vulnerability—and sexuality. What is at play here is hyper-feminization, the production of effeminized (male) bodies with highly exaggerated gendering of body parts. In contrast, in some other Japanese popular culture genres, such as manga, where sexuality may be centralized, more significant still seems to be an evident attraction to and idealization of “gender-neutral” youth. The young androgynous bodies that are not fully developed yet, with bodies of both male and female teenagers still without body hair, without fully developed breasts and hips, appear attractive, perhaps because they are perceived as less threatening. The following chapters address some paradoxes and controversies circulating around gendering practices, and tend to challenge the dominant gender polarity as well as ideas of norms and normativity as their authors instigate new conversations about gender, biological sex, and not only Japanese but also universal conceptualizations of masculinities and femininities.