ICC Collaborative Research Unit on Multiculturalism in Asian Societies presents a workshop on

Boundary Crossing - Sex & Gender in Context

(a follow-up to the workshop entitled "Sexual Boundary Crossings and Sexual Contact Zones in East Asia")

Dec 10, 2011 (Saturday) see below for a detailed schedule Room 301, 3F, Building 10, Sophia University

This workshop will examine issues of sexuality and gender in relation to situationality and boundary crossing. 'Boundary crossing' refers to the crossing of a border, be it one self-defined, legally-defined, socially perceived or institutionally prescribed.
Indeed, one goal of the workshop will be to describe the social construction of gendered and sexual boundaries, and their relation to other types of boundaries.

This workshop brings together sociologists exploring the politics of gender and sexual boundary crossing in various social and cultural contexts. Through examining the crossing of national borders, gender borders, as well as sexual borders, we hope to come to a greater understanding of the conflicts as well as societal underpinnings of gender and sexual categories. By looking at the question of borders, one is forced to question the construction of these boundaries and what happens when the line is crossed. This in turn leads us to the discussion of power inequality socially, as well as institutionally), normativity (as socially constructed), acceptability (legal permission, social inclusion), and intersectionality (the relation to other categories such as race, ethnicity and class). By bringing together these various issues we seek to examine the interactions of ethnicity, gender, nationality, and sexuality, as well as how these categories intersect and intertwine with each other in the transnational as well as local sphere.

This workshop is intended as a follow-up to the workshop entitled "Sexual Boundary Crossings and Sexual Contact Zones in East Asia", which was held in October 2010 and organized by the Institute of Comparative Culture (http://icc.fla.sophia.ac.jp/html/projects/sexuality_wo
rkshop.html). The workshop focused on specific cultural and historical contexts in East Asia, and looked at issues pertaining primarily to sexuality and the crossing of boundaries and interactions referring to the concept of "contact zone" (Mary Louise Pratt). This year's workshop seeks to extend some of the themes that were touched upon last year, and focuses not only on sexuality but more explicitly on gender. It also moves beyond the East Asian region to include other contexts.

Schedule

09:20 - Opening remarks (James Farrer)

09:40 - Sexual Capital, Sexual Commerce and Sexual Play in the Moral Regions of Urban Nightlife (James Farrer)

10:20 - The Business Trip: Sex and Romance in the Contact Zone (Jamie Paquin)

11:00 - Situational Sexuality Paradigm: An Examination of Male Heterosexual Sexual Preferred Acts and Attitudes and the Impact on Sexual Negotiations with Female Sex Workers in Tijuana, Mexico (Emily Prieto)

11:40 - Love and Chains: Filipino Women in Japan's Intimate Spheres (Suzuki Nobue)

12:20 - Lunch break

13:20 - Romancing the border: Implications of changing masculinity in post-handover Hong Kong (Ho Sik Ying)

14:00 - Empowered and Challenged Bodies: Japanese Women Professional Wrestlers' Embodied Experiences (Keiko
Aiba)

14:40 - M/F/X - Exploring the meanings of gender categories through the accounts of individuals who identify as 'x-jendaa" (SPF Dale)

15:20 - Tea break

15:40 - Identity Boundaries of Christian College Students in Same-Sex Relationships: Examining race, religion, and sexuality (Joshua Moon Johnson)

16:20 - Queer Generation 1: Older Gay Men's Boundary Crossing in Colonial Hong Kong (Travis Kong)

17:00 - Round-up, discussion

17:30 - Workshop close

Paper abstracts can be read online at ICC web (http://icc.fla.sophia.ac.jp/html/events/2011-2012/Boun
dary_Crossing_workshop.html)

No prior registration necessary
Language: English

Sophia University Institute of Comparative Culture