[Commlist] CFP: A Special Issue for QED: A Journal in GLBTQ Worldmaking

A Special Issue for QED: A Journal in GLBTQ Worldmaking

Re-examining Communication and Media Practices in/across Queer Asia

This is an open call to academics, educators, activists, public 
intellectuals, artists, policy and culture makers, and communication and 
media practitioners.

We have been witnessing ongoing academic concerns about Queer Asia in 
various academic disciplines (Luther & Ung Loh, 2019; Martin, Jackson, 
McLelland, & Yue, 2008; Spigel, Berry, Martin, & Yue, 2003), but these 
investigations have not received sufficient attention in the field of 
GLBTQ studies rooted in the Western academic tradition. Put simply, the 
academic discussions of Queer Asia are still underdeveloped. Research on 
Queer Asia lacks representation even though we increasingly witness the 
vibrancy of queer scenes in the region thanks to changing political 
situations, the rapid distribution of newer communication technology, 
and the increasing transnational exchanges in and across the region. 
Based on academic and non-academic concerns in queer issues that are 
geographically and culturally diverse, this special issue seeks to 
decolonize the Western-centric traditions of academic knowledge 
productions and initiate more conversations about Queer Asian issues.

Here, it is important to maintain that thinking about, examining, and 
conceptualizing Queer Asia is a rather challenging task. For example, 
Asia exhibits mixed modalities in many sectors: contradicting values 
such as 1) premodernity, modernity, and postmodernity; 2) Confucianism, 
Christianity, Buddhism, Muslim, and other indigenous beliefs; 3) 
monarchy, theocracy, communism, democracy, and other governmental 
systems; and 4) developed economies, middle-income economies, and 
developing economies. Indeed, Asia is an imagined region that reinforces 
the white, Western cartography of the globe. Asia encompasses cultures 
and nation-states that are vastly dissimilar and competitive in terms of 
political systems, religions, economic structures, societal norms, and 
cultural traditions. Hence, it is nearly impossible to uniformly apply 
established theories to this region and to formulate a theory or method 
that can explain Queer Asia. We better look into what is happening and 
enrich historically saturated and culturally specific queer practices, 
and thereby the discussion surrounding Queer Asia is not muffled by 
Western-dominated theorizings of queerness.

To engage in this special issue, we demonstrate Queer Asia as a 
theory/method. By this means, Queer Asia is a critical cultural theory 
and method that not only problematizes Asia as a region but also 
refashions Asia as an alternative lens for studying localized queer 
issues and concerns of sexual and gender minoritarians (e.g., Chiang & 
Wong, 2017; Yue, 2017). More specifically, Queer Asia troubles the ways 
in which the manifestations, representations, and performances of 
localized sexual and gender minoritarians reify and resist global, 
transnational flows of Western queer formations, including GLBTQ human 
rights. At the same time, Queer Asia reconsiders how 
intra/inter-regional cultural (dis)connectivities play into locally 
nuanced productions of sexual and gender minoritarian cultures. Queer 
Asia is about centralizing queerness to unsettle the ordinary 
cartography of Asia as a region in order to speak back to the 
Western-centric theorizing and paradigms of queerness (Luther & Ung Loh, 
2019). Hence, Queer Asia, which recognizes multiple convergences and 
divergences of queerness in and across Asia, is not an area study. It is 
about rewriting, remaking, and revising queer practices of Asia(nness) 
as a multiple, unfinalized, and dynamic conception that decolonizes the 
whiteness/Westernness of queer modernities as the global, transitional 
normativity.

Overall, this special issue aims to examine how historical 
particularities, contemporary sociopolitical events, and transregional 
connectivity create Queer Asian communicative cultures and productions 
in the proposed spaces in order to complicate Western-oriented queer 
studies. By revisiting and traveling around the multiple localities of 
Queer Asianness working with communication and media practices, we hope 
to maintain a futuristic space where scholars continue to discuss Queer 
Asia and contribute to building up Queer Asian studies further.

Contributors may submit an academic essay (6,000-7,000 including 
references) or a forum discussion (1,000-3,000 words) that responds to 
the following question for this issue: What’s happening in/across Queer 
Asia as a space, not geographically limited?We want to answer this 
question with a focus on communication and media practices in/across 
Asia. By communication and/or media practices, we mean ongoing processes 
and activities in which media technology, social institutions, and/or 
relational settings alter, shape, and reinforce situated meanings.We 
seek 250-500 word proposals that pay attention to underrepresented 
issues and concerns of cultures, groups, and traditions overlooked by 
the name of Queer Asia. Especially, we welcome essays from scholars, 
educators, activists, artists, policy and culture makers, and 
communication and media practitioners that disrupt and reshape existing 
cisgender/nontrans-centric queer Asia(s).

When you submit a proposal, please indicate the contribution type: 
academic essay or forum discussion.

Timeline:

250-500 word proposals due: February 28, 2022

Requests for full manuscripts: April 15, 2022

Full manuscripts due: August 15, 2022

Expected Publication: One of the 2023 issues


Please submit proposals to Jungmin Kwon ((jungmin.kwon /at/ pdx.edu) 
<mailto:(jungmin.kwon /at/ pdx.edu)>) and Shinsuke Eguchi ((seguchi /at/ unm.edu) 
<mailto:(seguchi /at/ unm.edu)>). Please feel safe and free to inquire with 
questions or concerns before deadlines.


***No article processing fees or submission charges


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