Queer Kinship and Family Change in Taiwan 9780813597645

Citation preview

Queer Kinship and ­Family Change in Taiwan

Families in Focus Series Editors Naomi R. Gerstel, University of Mas­sa­chu­setts, Amherst Karen V. Hansen, Brandeis University Rosanna Hertz, Wellesley College Nazli Kibria, Boston University Margaret K. Nelson, Middlebury College Katie L. Acosta, Amigas y Amantes: Sexually Nonconforming Latinas Negotiate ­Family Riché J. Daniel Barnes, Raising the Race: Black ­Career ­Women Redefine Marriage, Motherhood, and Community Ann V. Bell, Misconception: Social Class and Infertility in Amer­i­ca Amy Brainer, Queer Kinship and F ­ amily Change in Taiwan Mignon Duffy, Amy Armenia, and Clare L. Stacey, eds., Caring on the Clock: The Complexities and Contradictions of Paid Care Work Anita Ilta Garey and Karen V. Hansen, eds., At the Heart of Work and ­ amily: Engaging the Ideas of Arlie Hochschild F Heather Jacobson, L ­ abor of Love: Gestational Surrogacy and the Work of Making Babies Katrina Kimport, Queering Marriage: Challenging ­Family Formation in the United States Mary Ann Mason, Nicholas H. Wolfinger, and Marc Goulden, Do Babies ­ atter? Gender and F M ­ amily in the Ivory Tower Jamie L. Mullaney and Janet Hinson Shope, Paid to Party: Working Time and Emotion in Direct Home Sales Markella B. Rutherford, Adult Supervision Required: Private Freedom and ­ hildren Public Constraints for Parents and C Barbara Wells, D ­ aughters and Grand­daughters of Farmworkers: Emerging ­ abor from the Long Shadow of Farm L

Queer Kinship and ­ Family Change in Taiwan

AMY BRAINER

Rutgers University Press New Brunswick, Camden, and Newark, New Jersey, and London

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Brainer, Amy, author. Title: Queer kinship and family change in Taiwan / Amy Brainer. Description: New Brunswick : Rutgers University Press, [2018] | Series:   Families in focus | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2018012993| ISBN 9780813597614 (cloth) | ISBN   9780813597607 (pbk.) Subjects: LCSH: Transgender children—Taiwan—Family relationships. |   Sexual minority youth—Taiwan—Family relationships. Classification: LCC HQ77.95.T28 B73 2018 | DDC 306.7608350951249—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018012993 A British Cataloging-­in-­Publication rec­ord for this book is available from the British Library. Copyright © 2019 by Amy Brainer All rights reserved Portions of this work appeared previously in “New Identities or New Intimacies? Reframing ‘Coming Out’ in Taiwan through Cross-­Generational Ethnography,” Sexualities 21, no. 5–6 (2018): 914–931; “Patrilineal Kinship and Transgender Embodiment in Taiwan,” in Perverse Taiwan, ed. Howard Chiang and Yin Wang, 110–128 (New York: Routledge, 2017); “Materializing ‘­Family Pressure’ among Taiwanese Queer ­Women,” Feminist Formations 29, no. 3 (2017): 1–24; and “Mothering Gender and Sexually Nonconforming ­Children in Taiwan,” Journal of ­Family Issues 38, no. 7 (2017): 921–947. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. Please contact Rutgers University Press, 106 Somerset Street, New Brunswick, NJ 08901. The only exception to this prohibition is “fair use” as defined by U.S. copyright law. The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—­Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39​.­48​-­1992. www​.­r utgersuniversitypress​.­org Manufactured in the United States of Amer­i­ca

For Hotline

Contents 1

Introduction: Bringing Families of Origin into Focus

2

Meanings of Silence and Disclosure

19

3

(Queerly) Carrying on the F ­ amily

39

4

Gender and Power across Generations

59

5

Strategic Normativity: Sex, Politics, and Parents

81

6

Siblings and ­Family Work

95

Conclusion

1

112

Appendix A: Naming and Language 121 Appendix B: Interviewees 125 Acknowl­edgments 131 Notes 133 Index 149

vii

Queer Kinship and ­Family Change in Taiwan

1

Introduction Bringing Families of Origin into Focus On my way to an interview, I got off at the wrong train stop in between Kaoh­ siung and a small town in Pingtung, the southernmost county of Taiwan. I was in fact only one stop shy of the correct station, but I got off prematurely b­ ecause I had not seen a building for many kilo­meters and thought I must be headed the wrong way. In a flurry of texts and emojis, my host Coral Lu assured me that I was on the right track and that she was on her way to pick me up. She added that I might not recognize her b­ ecause she would have a masculine appearance (男性的樣子 nanxing de yangzi). When we met one another at a trans gathering in Taipei some weeks earlier, she wore a stylish dress, heels, and full makeup. Coral alternates her daily gender pre­sen­ta­tion, sometimes donning a masculine appearance as conventionally expected of her male sex but usually opting for the feminine appearance with which she feels especially happy and at ease. At the time of our interview, Coral was in her early forties and worked in the ­family business on the first floor of the home she shared with her parents. As it turned out, I had no trou­ble recognizing Coral, not only ­because hers was the lone car to pull into the station but also ­because she looked no dif­fer­ ent than any person might when changing clothes, her quiet elegance as per­ ceptible in jeans as in a dress. Coral drove me to her f­ amily home, and we

1

2  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

conducted our interview in the semiprivacy of her bedroom. The interview was punctuated by the arrival of her grade-­school-­age niece and nephew, who darted boisterously in and out of the room. At one point, her nephew climbed up on the arm of a chair and pointed out his own rooftop from Coral’s win­dow. I did not know how many members of the Lu f­ amily I would meet that day. In the end, I met her ­brother, her ­sister Fanyu (whom I also interviewed), her ­sister’s ­daughter and son, her ­mother, and several ­family friends. I canceled my plans for a return trip to Kaohsiung and spent the day with this f­ amily as they visited at home, walked together in a nearby park, posed for photos by a pond, teased Fanyu’s seven-­year-­old ­daughter about her funny haircut (she had recently earned herself the nickname “­little rooster” by cutting off a chunk of hair on the back of her head), and ate dinner in the food court of the local Carrefour. Our conversations about Coral’s gender mingled with other everyday topics, such as shopping for clothes and plans for an upcoming holiday. This sort of day was typical of my fieldwork with queer ­people and their families in Taiwan. A visit to interview one ­family member often spiraled into a whole-­family affair due to shared and closely proximate living arrangements. While some ­people chose to be interviewed at places and times that maximized their privacy, o­ thers welcomed f­ amily members to chime in or urged them to be interviewed too. Contrary to ste­reo­types about the relative conservatism of ­people in southern versus northern and rural versus urban Taiwan, I found ample variation among families across the region. Coral’s small town, south­ ern, lower-­middle-­class f­ amily is more comfortable with her gender fluidity than many of the urban, northern, upper-­class families of LGBT ­people in this research. While some of ­these presumably more cosmopolitan families worried about public perceptions and blocked mobility due to sexual impropriety, Coral’s ­family accepted her presence and her contributions to their small business with a quiet pragmatism. Coral’s elder b­ rother had two c­ hildren by marriage, one girl and one boy, and this eased the pressure on Coral (the sec­ ond son of the ­family) to give her f­ ather posterity by having sons of her own. Early in Coral’s life, her m ­ other sought advice from a spiritual advisor who told her that Coral would always be “this type of person” (這樣的人 zheyang de ren). This sense of determinism somewhat relieved Coral’s ­mother of the pressure to alter her child’s life path. In fact, Fanyu told me that their ­mother often picks up w ­ omen’s clothing and accessories for Coral to wear. “But,” she added with a chuckle, “Coral ­doesn’t like the ­things my ­mother buys ­because she says they are too mature-­looking.”1 In this moment, the issue Fanyu chose to highlight was not her m ­ other’s confirmation of Coral’s gender through the act of buying clothes but a common disagreement about fashion between two ­people of dif­fer­ent ages. This is not to say that gender is a nonissue for the Lu f­ amily or for Coral herself. In fact, Coral felt that her siblings sometimes downplayed gender too

Introduction • 3

much—­they did not acknowledge the significant challenges it had created in her life relative to theirs. For many families, silence is a way of coping with alter­ native genders and sexualities, but ­these silences mean dif­fer­ent ­things to ­people of dif­f er­ent ages, gender and sexual locations, and f­ amily roles. In other families, gender and sexuality are at the center of intense scrutiny and even daily conflicts. For the Lus, as for each of the families in this book, negotiations about gen­ der and sexuality take shape through the particularities of sex, birth order, social class, counsel received from spiritual advisors and other trusted sources, and everyday ways of relating to kin. My interviews with Coral, Fanyu, and other queer and straight in­for­mants provided impor­tant data for this analy­sis. But it was the interactions at unpredictable moments—­piled into a van driv­ ing to Carrefour, r­ unning into a cousin in a crowded night market, walking in the park with an el­derly parent, and ­children’s happy interruptions—­that added the texture and depth I hope to convey in a small mea­sure in t­ hese pages. Between August 2011 and January 2013, I conducted eighty interviews with queer ­people and heterosexual ­family members hailing from eleven of Taiwan’s thirteen counties. I interviewed ­people ranging in age from their twenties to their seventies, with experiences spanning a period of profound social and ­family change in Taiwan. I also looked across cohorts within families. Many ­people lived or had grown up in multigenerational h ­ ouse­holds, and their cross-­ generational relationships w ­ ere microcosms of larger changes taking place in the society. Sometimes this created frustration as ­people strug­gled to commu­ nicate with f­ amily members whose cultural reference points clashed with their own. But very few ­people walked away from ­these relationships. By choice, duty, necessity, or a combination of ­these, families retained a central place in ­people’s minds and often in their daily lives. The themes that I explore in this book are based on p­ eople’s thoughts, actions, and choices about how best to arrange and maintain their ­family rela­ tionships and ways that ­these choices are variously enabled and constrained. At its heart, the book is about f­ amily change and continuity as a gendered phe­ nomenon. I identify emerging and enduring ideas about parenthood, inter­ generational care, and the gendered division of f­ amily work and resources as key sites of negotiation for Taiwanese queers and their heterosexual kin. Studies of lesbian and gay (and, to a lesser extent, bisexual) families of ori­ gin often center on parental pathways to ac­cep­tance of their LGB c­ hildren and the impact of ac­cep­tance or lack thereof on ­children’s well-­being.2 Judeo-­ Christian and Anglophone Western contexts have received the most atten­ tion. ­These studies make valuable inroads to our understanding of the individual and interpersonal journeys of such parents and families. However, we still know very ­little about family-­of-­origin relationships among gender and sexually non­ conforming ­people in a majority of the world and about the structural and

4  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

historical forces that make dif­fer­ent kinds of relationships pos­si­ble. This book joins a small but growing number of studies that aim to fill this gap.3

The Setting: Queers and Their Families in Late Twentieth-­and Early Twenty-­First-­Century Taiwan The p­ eople whose stories populate t­ hese pages have birth years spanning from the 1940s to the 1990s. During this period, Taiwan transitioned from a primar­ ily rural, agrarian society to a highly urbanized and industrialized society with the features of late capitalism, accompanied by a tenfold increase in per capita income in constant dollars.4 My eldest in­for­mants w ­ ere ­children during the transfer of colonial power from Japan to the Kuomintang (KMT), or Nationalist Chinese Party, in the 1940s. The KMT violently suppressed the local population and imposed martial law from 1949 to 1987, then the longest period of martial law in world history. About half of the p­ eople in this research formed their sexual, ethnic, and national identities in this context. Some connected their con­temporary queer activism to earlier strug­gles for democ­ racy. Vibrant cultures of dissent, including Taiwan’s feminist and sex rights movements, took root ­under KMT repression and came to bloom in the period ­ ese movements critiqued and at times successfully trans­ ­after martial law.5 Th formed ­family laws, policies, and practices as part of their ongoing proj­ects of for­ mants inherited ­ these cultural and social transformation. Younger in­ efforts, coming of age in a flourishing multiparty democracy and civil society. Their ideas about f­ amily life and relationships are bound up with t­ hese social, economic, and po­liti­cal changes in ways that I explore throughout the book. ­Today’s queer youth have radically dif­fer­ent lives from their pre­de­ces­sors. For cohorts reaching adulthood in the second half of the twentieth c­ entury, early marriages arranged by parents rapidly gave way to ­later marriages and dating cultures as young ­people began to choose their own lovers and spouses.6 The total fertility rate peaked at 7 in the 1950s and then declined steeply to 2 by 1984 and to 0.895, among the lowest recorded in the world, by 2010. Changes in fertility ­were not merely a response to development but a po­liti­cal proj­ect, achieved through a comprehensive family-­planning campaign carried out with U.S. aid.7 Recent pronatalist initiatives have had a modest effect; as I write this introduction (in 2018), the fertility rate in Taiwan remains below replacement level.8 Opportunities for ­people to create lives outside the institution of mar­ riage have increased as well. The proportion of Taiwanese ­women ages thirty-­ five to thirty-­nine who have never married qua­dru­pled from 4 ­percent in 1980 to 16 ­percent in 2005, and research suggests that ­women who have not mar­ ried by their late thirties are unlikely to marry or become m ­ others.9 Between 1970 and 1990, the divorce rate tripled across all age groups, an increase produced in part by changes in ­women’s economic situation and greater

Introduction • 5

gender parity u­ nder the law.10 W ­ omen’s labor-­force participation ­rose steadily in the postwar period, and ­those born ­after 1950 have longer and more con­ tinuous working lives, with fewer interruptions precipitated by marriage and childbearing.11 Other aspects of gendered ­family life have changed comparatively ­little. Ten­ sions arise from the disconnect between w ­ omen’s growing opportunities out­ side the home and per­sis­tent subordination within it.12 W ­ omen continue to do the vast majority of the unpaid work, including cleaning, shopping, cooking, childcare, eldercare, and uncompensated ­labor in family-­run businesses.13 Men continue to receive a disproportionate share of f­ amily property and other assets and to hold more authority in f­amily decision making.14 W ­ omen are still expected to prioritize the needs of their husbands’ kin over t­ hose of their own parents and natal families.15 And while more ­people are delaying marriage or leaving unsatisfying marriages, t­ here has not been a concomitant rise in cohab­ itation or extramarital births. Emiko Ochiai writes in her analy­sis of this phe­ nomenon, “­There is still a very strong wall between marriage and other intimate relationships in East Asia.”16 This book examines the consequences of t­ hese changes and continuities on queer family-­of-­origin relationships. Bearing in mind that f­ amily change is a dialectical process—­families are not just receptacles but conduits of change in their own right—­I also discuss ways that queers and their heterosexual par­ ents, siblings, and grandparents participate in proj­ects of social and cultural transformation. The families in this study do not merely react but also resist, rework, and reimagine kinship and ­family structures and norms.

Outreach to Parents of LGBT ­Children In recent years, families of origin have gained visibility and voice in Taiwan’s sex rights movement and in public conversations about queer issues. Asia’s first organ­ization for parents of LGBT c­ hildren, Loving Parents of LGBT Taiwan (同志父母愛心協會 Tongzhi Fumu Aixin Xiehui), was officially registered in 2011 by the m ­ other of a transmasculine child. Other queer organ­izations have created programs for heterosexual f­ amily members as well. Core members of ­these groups work to educate and support families and to model parental ac­cep­ tance of lesbian and gay sexuality. Parent volunteers meet privately with other ­mothers and ­fathers, speak in schools and other public places, and appear in the media to share their stories. Some have been featured on popu­lar talk shows, profiled in magazines, and invited to give speeches at annual pride festivals and at fund-­raising galas hosted by queer groups. However, the public visibility I have described is still limited to quite a small group. It is often the same parents who participate in all ­these dif­fer­ent con­ texts. Most p­ eople with sexually nonconforming f­amily members are not connected to the LGBT movement and do not know other queer ­people or

6  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

families like theirs. Siblings and grandparents play a pivotal role in daily ­family life but are virtually invisible in queer spaces. In this regard, t­ here is still much work to do to engage families of origin, particularly t­ hose who are unlikely to seek community support or resonate personally with queer po­l iti­ cal organ­izing. Further, it is not only queer groups that reach out to parents of LGBT ­children in Taiwan. Conservative organ­izations, many of them affiliated with Christian churches, provide similar types of resources to parents, including books, websites, and events featuring counselors and psychiatrists who assure parents that, in most cases, a child’s heterosexuality and gender normativity can be restored. Less than 4 ­percent of the population of Taiwan is Christian. Most ­people affiliate with Buddhism (20%), Taoism (15%), and/or more loosely or­ga­ nized religious practices, often referred to in academic lit­er­a­ture as “Chinese folk religions” (45%), with another 15 ­percent reporting that they are nonreli­ gious.17 Buddhism, Taoism, and the more loosely or­ga­nized religious practices do not take an official stance against homo­sexuality. Thus, in Taiwan, objec­ tions to homo­sexuality have not focused on sin and morality in ways that are likely to be familiar to readers coming from a Christian, Muslim, or Jewish con­ text but rather on maintaining and reproducing the patrilineal f­amily and hierarchical gender relations. Yet despite their small numbers, Christian groups have identified social anx­i­eties about changes in gender and sexual be­hav­iors and have successfully or­ga­nized to direct ­these anx­i­eties into a variety of mea­ sures blocking sex-­positive and queer-­friendly legislation,18 as well as appealing to parents with promises of change that the LGBT groups do not offer. I also interviewed queer and queer-­affirming heterosexual Christians for this research. In fact, the number of Christians in my study is about 8 ­percent, exceeding their number in the general population. The antigay positions taken by certain groups surely do not represent the views of all Taiwanese Christians, including queers who find comfort and meaning in this spiritual tradition.

Transnational (Anti)Queer Organ­izing Taiwan is a small country geo­graph­i­cally with a high degree of transnational mobility, and indicators of this mobility w ­ ere pres­ent in my fieldwork.19 Some in­for­mants had lived, studied, or traveled abroad and acquired new perspec­ tives that they meshed with their existing ­family structures and values. O ­ thers maintained cross-­border and sometimes cross-­continent intimate relationships. ­Whether through Taiwanese gay men performing K-­pop dance routines in a nightclub, a trans w ­ oman traveling to Thailand for her surgery, or a young queer person choosing to study abroad, in part, to gain some distance from her hyper­ vigilant f­amily of origin (all phenomena I observed among my in­for­mants, which have been documented by other researchers as well), ­these transnational flows are an integral part of Taiwan’s queerscapes.20

Introduction • 7

Both queer and conservative parent groups draw on transnational discourses of ­family and sexuality to make their claims. Queer organ­izations seek fund­ ing from and collaboration with international bodies while also providing support to more nascent organ­izations in neighboring countries. Similarly, antigay groups acquire funding and other support from international (often U.S.-­based) churches and ministries.21 Global antigay organ­izing runs ­counter to the myth that transnational dis­ courses, especially t­ hose originating in the West, w ­ ill be ever more tolerant of lesbian and gay sexuality, while local discourses w ­ ill always be more conserva­ tive. In real­ity, p­ eople find in ­these discourses the means to both affirm and strongly oppose queer existence. For example, antigay protestors in Taiwan appropriated the slogan “one man + one w ­ oman” from the U.S. antigay move­ ment. This symbol was originally intended to represent a “traditional” f­ amily but in the context of Taiwan represents, instead, another kind of “modern” ­family departing from the intergenerational, ancestral, and extended ­family bonds that have been central to Taiwanese f­ amily structure and organ­ization. Through this slogan, the objection to homo­sexuality shifts from its threat to patrilineal reproduction and the consolidation of f­ amily power in the hands of se­nior males to emphasize, instead, its threat to a newly defined and vener­ ated nuclear-­family model based on heterosexual coupling. In this example, modernizing discourses and transnational organ­izing bolster hostility to queer movement goals, even as the goals themselves reflect the entanglement of local and global forces. The myth that the United States is uniquely progressive on LGBT issues—­ and Taiwan or “Asia” uniquely conservative—is widely espoused in both Tai­ wan and the U.S. As I prepared to do this research, many ­people told me that the proj­ect would be difficult to pull off ­because “Taiwan is so conservative.” Chong-­suk Han finds that white gay men in the United States use the notion that “Asians are homophobic” to justify their racism t­ oward Asians and Asian Americans in their own gay communities.22 More well-­meaning attempts to integrate Asian and Asian American queers are often complicit in this narra­ tive, characterizing Asian families as monolithically traditional and linking ­family rejection to cultural traits.23 On the other side of this same coin, international media have described Tai­ wan as a uniquely gay-­friendly destination in Asia. For example, the Gay Guide to Taipei 2018 calls Taipei “the San Francisco of the East” and promises Western visitors a city that is “vibrant, tolerant, and tropical.”24 This, too, is a ste­reo­type, using a U.S. city as a benchmark for tolerance and ignoring ways that Taiwanese queers continue to strug­g le against vari­ous forms of sexual oppression and persecution. I encountered this ste­reo­type in my fieldwork as well. On one such occasion, I was having a beer with a group of queer friends; all ­were Taiwanese except

8  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

myself and an Italian gay man who had lived in Taiwan for many years. The Italian, a l­ittle buzzed, declared with some passion that Taiwan is a gay para­ dise (同志天堂 tongzhi tiantang) compared to homophobic Italy. His declara­ tion landed a bit awkwardly on the group. A ­ fter a pause, one of the Taiwanese gay men said, “­There is still a lot of discrimination in society. With re­spect, it ­isn’t a gay paradise to me.” This conversation illustrates ways that homophobia may be misperceived in transnational contexts. P ­ eople tend to look for the homophobia they know. For our Italian friend, this was religious abuse and physical attacks; experiencing neither in Taiwan, he determined that it was not homophobic. Meanwhile, some Taiwanese friends living in the United States interpreted the lower pres­ sure to get heterosexually married and the lack of obligation many U.S.-­born ­people seemed to feel t­ oward their parents as evidence of diminished homo­ phobia ­there. In both cases, the individuals in question lived far from their own families of origin and thus managed to avoid, in their daily lives, the kinds of stresses and pressures around sexuality that they might other­wise endure. What it means to be homophobic varies from place to place, as does our proximity and vulnerability to institutions and interactions that we per­ sonally experience as homophobic. Taiwan is neither “so conservative” nor a “gay paradise”—­both ste­reo­types obscure its diversity and the passionate energies that Taiwanese dissidents, cultural critics, and activists have poured into the sex rights movement and other sexual and social strug­gles. This proj­ect is not transnational in the sense of engaging multiple research sites. I am interested in the rich variation that exists within Taiwan rather than how it is similar to or dif­fer­ent from other places. But in another sense, the proj­ect is transnational in the way queer studies are always already transnational—­ discourses of sexuality, gender, and f­ amily are not confined by national borders. Sexual cultures in Japan, southeast Asia, and other regional and global contexts intersect and interact with ­those my in­for­mants know intimately. Further, my presence in the field, affiliation with a North American university, and pre­sen­ ta­tion of the research to English-­speaking audiences is itself a part of the transnational circulation of knowledge about queer ­people and their families.

Coming to the Research Snowballing through Exes and Other Queer Ways of Finding Families I entered the field with many questions and hopes and some uncertainty about how to make it all happen. Much of the existing work on queer communities in Taiwan is grounded in activist networks in and around Taipei. While impor­tant, ­these voices are overrepresented in the lit­er­a­ture; many of the same ­people (including some of the activists in this study) have been interviewed repeatedly by dif­fer­ent researchers. I knew that I did not want to limit my

Introduction • 9

research to ­people who are po­liti­cally engaged or more highly vis­i­ble. But I was unsure how to find interviewees who are not “in the life,” or, as it is put in Taiwan, “in the circle”—­who do not show up to marches or spend time in queer spaces. It was my research assistant, a young T whom I ­will call Ray, who opened this door for me. Ray dated straight ­women almost exclusively. To protect her ­family’s reputation, she took care not to display her sexuality publicly and had not involved herself in any LGBT activism in Taiwan. While I could find queer organ­izations and activists relatively easily on my own, Ray introduced me to a dif­fer­ent kind of social network: ­people who lived and moved in almost entirely heterosexual worlds. Eventually I began to figure out ways to find t­ hese individuals through the other contacts I was forming. The classic snowball method would not work, since the ­people I wanted to meet w ­ ere not a part of queer networks. However, a modified method of snowballing through ex-­partners/lovers proved to be much more fruitful, as many ­people came into contact with the queer commu­ nity solely through their sexual and romantic partnerships. And while my in­for­mants tended to be friends with ­people like themselves—­a known prob­ lem of the snowball method—­many had slept with or dated ­people from whom they differed meaningfully. It was common, for instance, for activists to social­ ize with other po­liti­cally active friends but to be partnered with someone who was neither an activist nor openly gay in any part of their life. ­People whose same-­sex relationships had begun in high school (and this was a majority of the ­people in my sample) could point to former girlfriends and boyfriends who had continued on down widely divergent paths. Some had gotten heterosexually married while continuing to have same-­sex romances; o­ thers now felt them­ selves to be heterosexual; still o­ thers remained unmarried and involved in long-­ term same-­sex relationships that they did not name or categorize in any par­tic­u­lar way. In short, I found sexual networks to be significantly more diverse than friendship networks. At some point along the way, I began referring to this, tongue-­in-­cheek, as “the lesbian snowball method,” ­after a Taipei activist said approvingly, “Snowballing through exes . . . ​That is such a lesbian way to do research!” I used many strategies to continue expanding my sample. I joined dif­fer­ent types of organ­izations and frequented social venues that drew crowds of vary­ ing genders and ages. I kept a demographic spreadsheet of ­people I was meeting and interviewing and asked for help in filling the gaps that emerged. My inter­ viewees are diverse by age, birth order, gender, sexuality, education, income, and region of the country. I interviewed p­ eople whose entire families know that they are LGB and/or T and p­ eople who have not told a single f­ amily member and never plan to. To the extent pos­si­ble, I sought to reflect the heterogeneity of the queer and transgender communities I came to know. Inevitably, as in any

10  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

in-­depth study, ­there are many voices that have not made it to ­these pages. I hope that this book inspires o­ thers to identify and fill t­ hese gaps.

F­ amily History Interviews I interviewed forty-­seven queers ranging in age from their twenties to their sev­ enties and thirty-­three cisgender, heterosexual f­amily members, including eigh­teen parents and fifteen siblings.25 Appendix B contains a list of interview­ ees and what f­amily ties they have, if any, to other p­ eople in the research. I used a similar semistructured interview schedule for LGBT and cisgender, het­ erosexual interviewees, covering the same topics with dif­fer­ent members of the f­amily in order to clarify points of variance and convergence in f­amily members’ memories, perceptions, beliefs, and experiences. In adopting this method, I follow Elizabeth Tonkin in looking not for some “true” f­ amily his­ tory embedded within t­ hese multiple tellings26 but rather for how and why ­people remember the past differently and how divergent and sometimes con­ tradictory memories shape con­temporary ­family formations. Interviews focused on the nature and quality of parent-­child, sibling, and other significant kin relationships from ­peoples’ earliest recollections to the pres­ent. Many p­ eople also discussed their romantic relationships and marital families. The interviews lasted three hours on average, with the shortest lasting just one hour and the longest exceeding five hours. I conducted the interviews myself in Mandarin Chinese, with a research assistant pres­ent who spoke Chinese, Taiwanese, and En­g lish fluently. Many interviews involved code-­switching as p­ eople recalled f­ amily interactions and conversations in Chinese (國語 Guoyu, the official language, spoken by a majority of the population) and Taiwanese Hokkien (臺語 Taiyu, spoken by about 70% of the population).27 When I did not have a research assistant, such as in interviews that required extensive travel or an overnight stay, I hired a trilingual transcriptionist to double check my understanding of what had been said. I conducted a subset of eight inter­ views in En­glish at the in­for­mant’s request. In each case, the person who made this request had spent time living or studying abroad and spoke En­glish fluently. Th ­ ese English-­language interviews also included Chinese and Taiwanese words and phrases that came up as ­people recalled f­ amily conversations and other memories. Ethnography and Community To diversify the sample, I traveled to conduct interviews in cities, towns, and more rural areas throughout the country. In­for­mants often invited me to stay overnight with them while I was in town. On five separate occasions, I spent up to a week living together with one of my in­for­mants in their ­family home, observing everyday interactions among ­family members. I accompanied ­family members as they shopped, cooked, cared for ­children, visited relatives, took

Introduction • 11

grandparents to see the doctor, and carried out other daily activities and chores. ­These extended visits enabled me to get a feel for the rhythms of ­family life in ways that are not pos­si­ble in an interview setting. I also participated multiple times per week in more structured activities of relevance to queer p­ eople and their families. ­These included support group meetings for parents of LGBT ­children, informational sessions on how to come out to parents and other rela­ tives, educational lectures about homo­sexuality or­ga­nized and attended by parents, workshops put together by vari­ous organ­izations, po­liti­cal rallies and marches, and queer social gatherings. Field observations ­were especially impor­tant for learning about the f­ amily experiences of mid-­and later-­life queers, a population that is less vis­i­ble due to higher rates of heterosexual marriage. As part of my efforts to engage this pop­ ulation, I became a volunteer member of the LGBT Elders Working Group (老年同志小組 Laonian Tongzhi Xiaozu), a subcommittee of the Taiwan Tong­ zhi Hotline Association (台灣同志諮詢熱線協會 Taiwan Tongzhi Zixun Rexian Xiehui, hereafter Hotline). Founded in 1998, Hotline is the oldest and largest LGBT rights organ­ization in Taiwan. While I did not make Hotline the focus of my research, the organ­ization provided me with a queer home in Taipei, from which I derived many close friendships and a partner of five years. The hospitality, encouragement, advice, questions, and critique posed by t­ hese friends and fellow volunteers are integral to this proj­ect and among my warmest memories of the field. When I was not actively engaged in data collection, I spent time with friends and acquaintances in their homes, as well as in lesbian and gay bars, dance clubs, bookstores, and cafés. I immersed myself in queer spaces not only to meet in­for­ mants but also to create a community for myself during the year and a half that I lived in Taiwan. Having been somewhat alienated from queer commu­ nity and activist work during my years in gradu­ate school, I found the plunge back into ­these spaces to be deeply energizing.

Moving from Data Collection to Analy­sis The interviews and fieldwork generated a very large and at times overwhelm­ ing volume of data. I used several strategies to or­ga­nize the data in ways I could smoothly access and digest. I integrated the interview transcripts with my field notes to form one large data set that I analyzed line by line for themes, patterns, and inconsistencies. I situated core themes in relation to or against existing theories and my own developing arguments and then performed more focused coding for examples, counterexamples, and subthemes, juxtaposing t­ hese with in­for­mants’ demographic characteristics, such as generational cohort, gender, and ­family structure. As an additional strategy, I created a separate folder for each person interviewed, where I placed a copy of the interview transcript, my notes about the interview, and e­ very mention of the person that appeared in

12  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

my field notes. I then linked the folder to all interview transcripts and field notes pertaining to the person’s f­ amily members. In this way, I was able to read across individual lives and f­ amily units and also code for patterns and varia­ tion within and among ­these smaller groupings. ­Toward the end of the field period, I presented my research at three com­ munity forums attended by some of the study participants, as well as by social workers, teachers, parents of lesbian and gay ­children, and ­others with a per­ sonal or professional investment in queer ­family issues. ­These forums provided a bridge for moving from data collection to analy­sis, as I continued to learn from my in­for­mants at the same time that I shared my preliminary findings with them. In 2015, I returned to Taiwan to pres­ent my research to parents and activ­ ists in Kaohsiung and Taipei. The lively feedback I received on t­ hese occasions further informed my analy­sis of the data. In this way, the interplay between data collection and analy­sis remained an iterative pro­cess long a­ fter my depar­ ture from the field.

My Relationship to the Topic Race, Nationality, and Language My race, nationality, and language s­ haped this research in significant ways. I am a white American citizen and a native En­g lish speaker. I grew up in a transnationally mobile ­family, living in Ann Arbor, Michigan (my birth­ place and the birthplace of my first ­brother); Harbin, Heilongjiang (the birthplace of my only s­ ister); Fort Collins, Colorado; Changchun, Jilin; and Beijing (the birthplace of my second and third b­ rothers). My parents and two youn­gest siblings still lived in Beijing when I conducted this research, and I visited them t­ here during the field period, relishing the rare chance to arrive home without feeling jet-­lagged. Carrying out this proj­ect in Taiwan brought me closer to my f­ amily geo­graph­i­cally and also bridged disparate parts of my life: my academic training in the United States and my own coming of age and coming out to parents and siblings in China. At the same time, I had to be mindful of biases I might introduce based on my prior experiences in both the United States and mainland China to engage Taiwan fully on its own terms. As a result of spending part of my childhood and teen years in China, first moving ­there in 1986 when foreign families like mine ­were relatively few, I already had some sense of how my hypervisibility would shape the fieldwork. I knew, for example, that I would need to be cognizant of where my presence was and was not appropriate or easily explained. I opted not to attend cer­ tain gatherings for parents b­ ecause I knew that the presence of a white Ameri­ can researcher would be distracting and potentially disruptive to the comfortable and reassuring atmosphere that the hosts w ­ ere working hard to create.

Introduction • 13

At the same time that my status as an outsider curtailed my participation in certain events, it also positioned me as a guest in Taiwan in ways that facili­ tated the data-­gathering pro­cess. My in­for­mants recognized that I had no ­family in the country, so they invited me to join them for all kinds of special occasions, such as Chinese New Year, Tomb-­Sweeping Day, ­Mother’s Day, birthday cele­brations, and outings to scenic areas in Taiwan. They also recog­ nized that if I was ­going to properly understand and write about Taiwanese ­family life, I had better get some basic day-­to-­day experiences. For example, I often had ­people say to me, “You should come with us [to visit a new m ­ other, have hot pot together, ­etc.] to see what it is like in a Taiwanese ­family.” On one hand, I surely neglected to notice or ask about par­tic­u­lar aspects of ­family life or pick up on certain subtleties due to missed social cues. On the other hand, my in­for­mants, knowing this, took it upon themselves to educate me about the aspects of their lives that they deemed impor­tant. Issues of language arose frequently. Although I prepared my interview pro­ tocol in Chinese, I had to constantly tweak it as I came to realize that I was asking the wrong questions. For example, in the demographic portion of the interview, I asked my interviewees, “Do you have any religious beliefs? [你有 沒有宗教信仰 ni you meiyou zongjiao xinyang]”—to which nearly every­one, except a small number of Christians, said no. A ­ fter living in Taiwan for a few months, I realized that I needed to ask a dif­f er­ent set of questions, such as “Do you pray [你會不會拜拜 ni hui bu hui baibai]? Do you pray to/venerate your ancestors [拜祖先 bai zuxian]? How often do you go to the ­temple to pray?” Once I began asking ­these more specific questions, responses changed from a ­simple no to a richly detailed account of how p­ eople cared for their ancestors and consulted deities about vari­ous m ­ atters, including m ­ atters directly related to sexuality and gender, which I had conceptualized as “religion” but which my in­for­mants experienced as simply part of the fabric of daily life. My lack of knowledge leading me to ask the wrong questions was a limita­ tion, especially b­ ecause some of t­ hese discoveries took time, and I missed valu­ able information along the way. It was also an asset, inasmuch as my ­mistakes illuminated new knowledge systems that became integral to my analy­sis of the data and revealed areas where U.S.-­based models and theories fall short. ­These issues are embedded in academic institutions that systematically privilege cer­ tain theories, methods, and interpretations of data. Thus, while my misunder­ standings might feel like individual-­level ­mistakes or embarrassments, and while they also constitute impor­tant ethnographic learning opportunities, they become much more problematic if they are used to reinforce the prevailing Eurocentric model of LGBT f­ amily relations. To achieve the strong objectivity described by Sandra Harding and other standpoint theorists,28 it is necessary to continuously question and triangulate my analy­sis with the knowledge claims of scholars, activists, and community and ­family members in Taiwan,

14  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

including—­and perhaps especially—­the knowledge claims of ­those whose ideas are not yet well integrated with social-­science theory and research.

Femme Sexuality My sexuality deeply influenced the direction of this research and the relation­ ships I built with my in­for­mants. When I introduced myself to queer and trans organizers throughout Taiwan, our first meetings invariably included discussions about my relationship status, relationship history, and sexual pref­ erences, which served as a crucial basis of building rapport and also trust in my intentions and reasons for ­doing this research. My femme, or po, identity came into play meaningfully on numerous occasions. (In Taiwanese lesbian vernacular, “po” 婆 denotes a female-­assigned person whose gender is consis­ tent with cultural definitions of femininity; “T” 踢 denotes a female-­assigned person whose gender is consistent with cultural definitions of masculinity; and bu fen 不分 denotes a person who wishes not to be categorized as T or po. See appendix A, “Naming and Language,” for a more in-­depth discussion of queer terminologies used throughout this book.) As a femme whose sexual orientation is ­toward transmasculine, butch, and T partners, I was immediately and personally positioned in relation to a larger debate in both Taiwan and the United States about the politics and meanings of gender differentiation in same-­ sex relationships. As articulated through ­these debates, some ­people continue to view gender differentiation between same-­sex partners as less feminist, less queer, less enlightened, and less modern than other forms of same-­sex inti­ macy.29 Of course, such views are not limited to the Taiwan context. I have, for instance, had colleagues in the United States question my ability to think criti­ cally about gender as someone who is in a butch-­femme relationship. ­These col­ leagues believe that butch-­femme relationships are based on a binary and therefore are not as critical or radical as same-­gender relationships. As a result of my personal location in this community, I paid close atten­ tion to T and po ­family dynamics in my research. I also interviewed bu fen les­ bians and bisexual ­women. W ­ omen who did not identify as T or po often sought me out to discuss w ­ hether T-po exists in the U.S. In e­ very case, the person ask­ ing this question believed that it did not. (­Here, again, bu fen lesbianism is associated with a more cosmopolitan and T-po with a more “local” sexual­ ity.) As a result, ­these ­women expected me, as an American, to share an iden­ ­ ere bu fen myself, I could easily tity outside T-po gender designations. If I w have focused on ­these stories and missed impor­tant nuances in T and po ­family dynamics. ­Because my race and nationality already associated me with bu fen lesbianism in the Taiwan context, claiming a po identity (and having a T partner for the latter part of the field period) helped to counteract the ­underrepre­sen­ta­tion of T and po standpoints that might other­wise have occurred in my proj­ect.

Introduction • 15

Compassionate and careful research on butch-­femme and T-po communi­ ties is still done primarily by members of ­these communities. This is not to say that researchers who are neither butch, femme, T, nor po are precluded from ­doing this research well, and certainly some have. But without the personal con­ nection, a ­great deal of this research has perpetuated the lack of understand­ ing of gendered interactions (often characterized as “role-­play”), assumptions about how ­these interactions translate into social and sexual selves, and a reduc­ tion of female masculinity to more superficial symbols, such as clothing and haircuts. In this climate, I believe my erotic orientation t­ oward butches and T’s is as significant in shaping my standpoint relative to this research as is my orientation ­toward partners of my same sex.

My F­ amily Story ­Toward the end of the field period, I often joked that I had done eighty inter­ views and been interviewed eighty times. In fact, I had been interviewed far more than eighty times by ­people who ­were curious about my ­family story. As naïve as it appears to me in retrospect, I had not ­really prepared myself for the emotional impact of telling this story repeatedly. My coming out in my early twenties, combined with my parents’ deep Christian beliefs, set off waves of conflict and grief that reverberated through my ­family for many years. The intense closeness of my relationships with my parents and siblings (perhaps heightened by frequent transnational movement, in which the meaning of “home” became disassociated from any par­tic­u­lar country or place of belong­ ing and instead was entirely attached to the f­ amily unit) made the sense of loss especially unbearable. My parents sought support from groups like Exodus International, the Christian ex-­gay ministry, and met some m ­ others and ­fathers who had not seen their gay ­children in de­cades. Meanwhile, in the United States, where I had recently moved for college, I encountered a message from the other side of the same coin—­that I should give up closeness with my f­ amily in order to live openly and freely as a gay ­woman. Neither I nor my parents could imagine such a ­future. Through determination and love, my ­mother and I made it through years of heartache to build a relationship that ­today is based on mutual trust, patience, and giving each other the space to be ourselves—­what some ­people might call compromises but what I prefer to think of as building bridges ­toward each other. ­Today I consider my ­mother to be among my best friends, and I have shared ­every chapter of this work with her. My ­father and I have also built bridges but in a quieter way; like many f­ athers in this research, he has managed most of his thoughts and feelings about this internally. The pro­cess has been life changing for all, including my siblings, who took care of my parents during the most turbulent period. Telling the painful parts of this story over and over proved to be emotionally exhausting for me. I experienced a small

16  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

mea­sure of the vulnerability I was asking of my in­for­mants, in laying bare some of the most tender parts of my life and allowing ­people to probe for details. The act of sharing painful and tender feelings created a new dynamic between us—­one where my life became the subject of questions and open to analy­sis. In parent meetings, it positioned me as a ­daughter in need of advice, and I felt that some parents a­ dopted me as they wished another parent might do for their own lesbian or gay child who was studying or living abroad. My story also helped to dispel the myth that American families are monolithi­ cally more “open” compared to Taiwanese families. I was able to provide a win­dow into another Amer­i­ca—­the challenges that occur in many families of origin beyond the scenes of the sitcom Modern ­Family or pop songs about same love. As I worked to understand parents in general, I also began to change the strategies I had been using to understand my parents in par­tic­u­lar. I began to listen more carefully and openly to my parents and rid myself of assumptions about why they felt and acted as they did. Just as being a queer d­ aughter influ­ enced my experience of this ethnography, so did being an ethnographer begin to influence my actions and choices as a ­daughter. Undertaking this study proved to be good for my own ­family relationships, although I did not imag­ ine in the beginning that this would be an outcome of the proj­ect. As Shulamit Reinharz and other feminist scholars have noted, research is a multidirectional pro­cess: we mold our research, and it also molds our lives, often in ways we do not anticipate.30 By drawing attention to certain aspects of my social location, I do not wish to imply that other aspects, such as my age or social class, m ­ atter less. This is not a comprehensive standpoint analy­sis. Rather, it is a small part of a larger effort carried on throughout the book to acknowledge how standpoint informs the research pro­cess, creating specific opportunities and limitations in data collection and analy­sis. Ethnography is an intimate mode of inquiry in which the ethnographer is a primary tool of fieldwork. Thus, the reflexivity I have introduced ­here is not merely an intellectual exercise but, instead, represents a crucial component of the proj­ect and a foundation for the analy­sis to follow.

Plan of the Book Deciding how to arrange the empirical chapters was a difficult task. Each branch of the story is, arguably, the beginning, depending on where one sits in the f­ amily tree. I chose to begin in chapter 2 with the topic that my in­for­ mants themselves raised most often and asked me to address in my research—­ that is, the stark generational divide in queer ­family practices of silence and disclosure. Moving between ­family stories of younger and older queers, I argue

Introduction • 17

that the emergence of a coming-­out discourse in Taiwan does not cohere with popu­lar identity-­based models and theories. My findings point instead to changes in how p­ eople relate to one another within families, including shifts from structural interde­pen­dency to other forms of connectivity and care, as a catalyst for coming out or feeling closeted. Chapter 3 picks up another current ­running through a majority of my inter­ views and many of my field notes: a popu­lar belief that gay men face more ­family pressure than do lesbians in Taiwan b­ ecause as sons, they are responsi­ ble for carry­ing on the ­family name. Reading across gay, lesbian, and transgen­ der ­family stories, I argue that a culturalist (and, often, culturally essentialist) emphasis on filiality and posterity at the ideological level obscures the kinds of f­ amily pressures that ­matter most to queer w ­ omen and trans men raised as ­daughters. When we shift our focus from the cultural imperative to the daily work of carry­ing on the f­ amily, other forms of f­ amily pressure become vis­i­ble. Chapter 4 calls attention to gender and power in the lives of heterosexual parents and grandparents of LGBT c­ hildren. I analyze ways that new parent­ ing discourses map onto per­sis­tent gender asymmetry in childrearing, emotion work, and institutionalized accountability for child outcomes to structure cross-­generational relationships. I also discuss ways that constructions of filiality are queered in the con­temporary era. Chapter 5 turns to issues of normativity and class mobility that parents raise frequently and that activists strug­g le to square with their own queer ethics. Research on parents of LGBT ­children and resources for ­these parents often focus on addressing parents’ moral and religious concerns about homo­sexuality. But many parents in this research raised economic concerns, such as ­whether it is pos­si­ble for a gay or lesbian person to be successful in life and how discrimi­ nation might impede economic and social mobility. I argue that effective outreach to parents must attend to the class and status dimensions of this par­ enting logic and to the broader normative frameworks that or­ga­nize parent­ ing practices. Chapter 6 belongs to the siblings in the study. It touches on many earlier themes of the book, including care work, emotion work, and pressure to carry on the paternal line, this time from the perspective of siblings who share in this work. Sibling ties are significant not only to queer ­people but also to hetero­ sexual parents who must decide w ­ hether and how to talk about sexuality with their own adult s­ isters and b­ rothers. Even l­ ater in life, having achieved a degree of in­de­pen­dence from the f­ amily, many p­ eople care deeply about what their siblings think and count on them for help. The concluding chapter reflects on changes that have occurred in the period between data collection (2011–2013) and publication of this book five years ­later. I identify a small number of the directions one might take to improve

18  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

and extend this work. I also give my in­for­mants a last word in the text by pre­ senting some of their reasons for being in the study and hopes for what research on this topic might accomplish. When I returned to Kaohsiung in 2015, I prepared a short talk about my research for the parents with whom I planned to meet. I assumed that they would want to know how their experiences ­were similar to and dif­fer­ent from ­those of other parents of LGBT ­children. However, the parents (all ­mothers) who attended seemed to tolerate this talk out of courtesy more than personal interest. They transitioned quickly to telling their own stories and spent the bulk of our time together ­doing so one by one, in a manner very similar to the parent support groups that I attended as part of my fieldwork. Listening to them, I realized that the proj­ect was most useful to t­ hese m ­ others when it posi­ tioned them as experts on their own stories. ­There are certainly some parents who are interested in larger patterns and so­cio­log­i­cal connections. But t­ here are many o­ thers who are not concerned with w ­ hether their experience is shared, so much as how to frame, understand, and navigate that experience in its spec­ ificity. I have tried in this book to strike a balance between the big picture of social and f­ amily change and the specific, grounded, and often unique experi­ ences through which t­ hose changes materialize in p­ eople’s lives.

2

Meanings of Silence and Disclosure

As a humid October after­noon turned to a cool eve­ning in Taipei, I sat on the pavement in front of the Presidential Palace, watching the speeches and per­ for­mances that capped off the city’s ninth annual Pride March. Together with some 50,000 other Pride goers, I cheered as Guo Mama, the founder of Asia’s first organ­ization for parents of LGBT ­children, mounted the stage to deliver her annual charge. Consistent with the message she shared at smaller and more intimate gatherings that I attended monthly, Guo Mama stressed parents’ love and support for their c­ hildren and encouraged c­ hildren who had not yet “come out” (出櫃 chugui) to draw on the resources of her organ­ization in order to do so, with a goal of attending next year’s march together with their parents. Three young ­women seated on the ground in front of me immediately turned and pointed to a friend of theirs, who just as quickly pointed back at one of them while pushing their hands out of her face, in a kind of hot potato game with Guo Mama’s challenge to chugui: no one wanted the challenge to land in her own lap. Yet this act of refusal also served as an acknowl­edgment of the challenge—of the possibility of coming out—­which now hung in the air around us as surely as the ­women’s ner­vous laughter. Watching them, I was reminded of my conversation with an elder gay man at a social gathering in the southern city of Kaohsiung a few weeks earlier. “Many of ­these younger tongzhi ­haven’t come out yet, but ­they’re planning to do it once they get an education, find a job, and are financially in­de­pen­dent

19

20  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

from their parents,” he said. “We [elder tongzhi] already have all ­those ­things, but we still ­don’t come out.” I asked him ­whether he thought this was connected to generation or age. As they grow up and as their priorities shift, ­will younger tongzhi decide not to come out a­ fter all? “Oh, that’s the difference between younger and elder tongzhi,” he replied. “You see, we never planned to come out.” When I arrived in Taiwan to conduct fieldwork with gender and sexually nonconforming ­people and their families, I did not intend to study coming out. In fact, I was actively looking for ways not to study coming out, a construct that is widely critiqued for its Eurocentrism and reproduction of linear and essen­ tialist models of sexuality.1 Yet I could not ignore the discourse of chugui, bub­ bling up in casual conversations and semi­structured interviews, in magazine articles, on popu­lar talk shows, in how ­people introduced themselves at the LGBT f­ amily groups that I attended: “I’m so-­and-so, and I’ve been out for ten months,” “I’m so-­and-so, and I’m not out yet, but I’m planning to come out one day.” Some Taiwanese activists introduced me as “a researcher who studies coming out”—­knowing that I study sexuality and ­family relationships, they assumed that coming out must be my focus. Similarly, when a local radio station invited me to be interviewed about my research, nearly all of the questions they asked concerned coming out, and I strug­gled to pull the conversation in other directions. Coming out clearly resonated with ­people in ways I had not expected. Yet its resonance was unevenly distributed through the queer community. As my Kaohsiung acquaintance predicted, I found coming out to be as absent in con­ cept and practice among midlife queers (­those with birth years in the 1960s and earlier) as it was pervasive among their younger counter­parts. And although few midlife queers had considered coming out to their families, they did not appear to be “closeted” in the ways their younger counter­parts described. ­People born in the 1970s and ­later volunteered information about which ­family members they had told and which they had not, as well as reasons for why certain ­family members did not or should not know that they are LGB and/or T. More often than not, they attached deep meanings and emotions to ­these decisions. When I asked midlife queers if they had discussed their sexuality with anyone in the f­ amily, the question itself seemed odd. Usually it was met ­ ouldn’t ask [他們不會問 tamen bu hui with a pause, followed by, “They w wen]”—­a detour in conversation from which we found our way back to other, more relevant aspects of their ­family story. In the final month of my fieldwork, I presented t­ hese findings to a room filled with activists of dif­fer­ent ages. I said that midlife queers are neither “out” nor “closeted,” and I mentioned that such individuals are unlikely to be asked invasive questions about their sexuality by ­family members. A lesbian activist in her twenties called out from the back of the room, “But what if they ask?”—­referring ­here to f­amily members asking directly about one’s sexual

Meanings of Silence and Disclosure • 21

orientation. “They ­won’t ask,” I said in unison with a silver-­haired gay man in the front row. She pressed: “But what if they do ask?” “They w ­ on’t ask,” he responded, in a tone suggesting that this should ­settle the m ­ atter. As the two of them continued to volley this question back and forth, both growing more perplexed, I saw the same generation gap I was describing in my talk material­ ize before my eyes. Which part of this story is surprising and in­ter­est­ing ­will largely depend on the social location of the reader. I have found, for example, that Eu­ro­pean American audiences are often surprised by the irrelevance of coming out in some queer family-­of-­origin relationships, while Taiwanese and Taiwanese American audiences are often surprised by the salience of this concept for younger queers in Taiwan. This chapter addresses questions rooted in both per­ spectives: How and why is coming out relevant to ­those growing up in and ­a fter the 1970s? How and why is it irrelevant to ­those growing up in earlier periods?

Gender and Visibility ­ ere are many ways to understand coming out in relation to visibility and rec­ Th ognition in the broader culture.2 This book takes the f­amily of origin as its primary site of inquiry. Thus, I analyze the discourse of chugui in the specific context of the ­family and home. The stories I relay in this chapter include ­those of T’s from three dif­fer­ent generational cohorts, each of whom spotlights gen­ der nonconformity as a crucial dimension of silence and disclosure in the f­ amily context. Significant numbers of my in­for­mants had, from childhood, a gender essence (deeper and predating any kind of gender identity) that drew ­family censure and that marked them as, somehow, not like ­others. Among younger cohorts, many masculine T’s and other gender nonconforming p­ eople described themselves as “not out” to their families or in their workplaces, even as they constantly navigated public (mis)perceptions of their gender. For ­these in­for­ mants, the discourse of chugui is not about revealing one’s difference, as it might be for a cisgender person. Rather, it is about putting a name to that difference and having it acknowledged and understood to some degree by o­ thers. In this way, coming out intersects with but is distinct from other kinds of visibility and difference inscribed on the body.

From Identity Politics to ­Family Theory: Finding a New Lens On its face, the answer to my questions might seem obvious. As fewer queer ­people get heterosexually married, surely disclosure becomes more likely, more necessary. Early psychological models connected coming out to pro­cesses of sexual identity development and integration, and this view remains quite

22  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

popu­lar.3 In this vein, we might attribute coming out to an emerging identity politics embedded in Taiwan’s LGBT rights movement, transnational coming out discourses, and increasing queer visibility—­and t­ hese are all ­factors to a certain extent. But, as is often true in field research, the most obvious expla­ nations did not fully hold. Neither marital status nor identity (认同 rentong, 身分 shenfen) predicted coming out to f­amily among my in­for­mants. I inter­ viewed midlife queers with robust sexual and gender identities, po­liti­cal activ­ ists who had never married and never considered coming out to their families of origin. I interviewed young adults in same-­sex relationships who ­were not LGBT-­or tongzhi-­identified, who did not participate in the movement or feel a connection to transnational queer politics, but nevertheless felt pressure to tell their parents about their partners. Over time, I came to understand coming out not solely as a form of identity work but, instead, as a relational strategy connected to larger shifts in ­people’s ­family lives. As her pride speech illustrates, Guo Mama’s work is couched in parenting discourses that emphasize love, communication, and mutual under­ standing between parents and their c­ hildren. This is a relatively new way of framing parent-­child relationships, with numerous implications for queers and their families. On one hand, understanding and love are staples of a bourgeon­ ing social movement to support Taiwanese parents of LGBT ­children. At the same time, ­these discourses can be a thinly veiled mechanism of parental sur­ veillance and control, as parents demand more access to their ­children’s inner worlds. I heard many parents advise queer young ­people to “let mom and dad get to know you” (讓爸爸媽媽認識你 rang baba mama renshi ni) in order to smooth the coming out pro­cess. Some ­people used this approach successfully, while ­others found that letting parents “know” them resulted in more ­family pressure and conflict and impeded on their ability to embody their genders and conduct their relationships as they desired. To complicate m ­ atters further, new parenting discourses that emphasize close monitoring of c­ hildren’s bodies and be­hav­iors have made coming out not only pos­si­ble but in some cases unavoid­ able, often through invasive questioning or direct confrontations initiated by parents.4 ­These experiences depart meaningfully from the tacit gestures and strategic silences that characterized kin relations for previous generations of queers. During the same period, such economic trends as rising unemployment among young ­people, an increasing need for higher education to secure even an entry-­level job, and soaring housing prices have contributed to a prolonged transition to adulthood across socioeconomic groups.5 As a result, the flow of resources between ­children and parents is shifting ­later in life, with many ­children remaining dependent on their parents through their twenties and into their thirties. As more ­people postpone marriage and parenthood, some lesbi­ ans and gays find it easier to blend in with their heterosexual peers, using their

Meanings of Silence and Disclosure • 23

prolonged educational trajectories to deflect f­ amily pressure. For o­ thers, the pressure is heightened by financial dependence and increased parental involve­ ment in their daily activities, including parents who have “forced” them out of the closet in a manner that earlier cohorts did not experience. Midlife queers reported significant f­ amily pressure in their early lives, and many ­were compelled to get heterosexually married. However, they did not directly connect this pressure to f­ amily members’ views about their sexuality. Young ­people interpreted ­family questions about marriage as also being about sexuality and strug­gled with how to answer, feeling that they ­were “hiding” or being dishonest if they “pretended” to be heterosexual. Issues of hiding and pretending did not come up among midlife queers, who w ­ ere, as a group, more likely to recognize their non-­love-­based marriages as legitimate—­undesirable perhaps, even painful, but not “fake” (假結婚 jia jiehun, as younger queers sometimes put it). ­A fter all, if few ­people chose their spouses based on roman­ tic love or sexual attraction, what made one marriage “fake” and another “real”? Changes in f­ amily relationships and norms make silence and disclosure about sexuality a qualitatively dif­f er­ent experience across generations. Rather than universalizing the subjective experience of the closet, assuming, for example, that all married tongzhi are closeted, it is crucial to consider the context and meanings attached to t­hese ­unions and the tools available to sexually and gender nonconforming p­ eople as they navigate f­amily systems in dif­fer­ent historical moments.

Tacit Subjects in the Taiwan Context Carlos Decena introduced the meta­phor of “tacit subjects” in his analy­sis of same-­sex desire among Dominican immigrant men in New York.6 In Spanish grammar, the tacit subject is not spoken but is ascertained through the ­conjugation of the verb used in the sentence. Extending this princi­ple to sexuality, Decena defined the tacit sexual subject as neither secret nor ­silent but intu­ ited. Many in­for­mants who did not speak about sexuality with their families of origin recognized that their f­amily members sensed, intuited, and knew that they loved men. To engage more fully with their stories, Decena shifted the focus of analy­sis from disclosure and confession to the asymmetrical power relations that structure negotiations of masculinity and sexuality within families. Applications and variations of the tacit subject have informed studies of LGBT ­family life in many parts of the world.7 Writing about Asian American families, Gust Yep and his colleagues describe communication as “character­ ized by dialectical tensions of autonomy and connection, secrecy and openness, and certainty and unpredictability.”8 Th ­ ese authors draw from a variety of studies and memoirs to establish what is unsaid as a form of communication among f­amily members.9 In her analy­sis of “tactical masking,” the public

24  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

donning of masks by Taiwan tongzhi activists in the 1990s, Fran Martin locates the trope of the mask at “the dynamic border state animated by the movement between yin (concealment) and xiang (disclosure)” and the visual alternation between darkness and light in the cultural production of tongxinglian (homo­sexuality).10 The mask interpenetrates but is analytically dis­ tinct from the Anglophone Western construction of the “closet.” Like Decena’s meta­phor of the tacit subject, Martin’s reading of the mask points to impor­tant variation in the visibility politics associated with the out/closeted typology circulating globally. It is this “dynamic border state” and tacit negotiations, rather than a com­ ing out discourse, that formed the currents flowing through the f­ amily stories of midlife queers in this research. The f­ amily issues they raised did not concern self-­revelations or being “known” by kin. Their narratives focused instead on complex interdependencies and lifelong care work, woven in and through the sexual and relational dimensions of their lives. To unpack ­these findings, I pres­ ent five case studies involving six queer in­for­mants. Each illustrates a core component of the generation gap I observed in the larger sample. I include older and younger queers who are heterosexually married and unmarried, as well as ­those who strongly identify and do not identify as tongzhi, in order to address assumptions about the role of marriage and identity in constructing “out” and “closeted” sexual subjects. I begin with the ­family stories of Hong, a hetero­ sexually married gay man in his fifties; Jiang Mama, a widowed T in her seven­ ties; and Jiang Mama’s ­daughter LJ, who is also a T and has never married. Their stories invite us to examine a social world in which gender, desire, love, and power are part of the heartbeat of daily life, neither spoken aloud nor actively hidden from view. “My boyfriend encouraged me to marry my wife”: Hong (age 53, born in 1959). I first knew Hong as a vivacious tongzhi who loves raunchy humor and dreams of being a ­woman in the next life so that he can properly marry his boyfriend and lifelong sweetheart. Over time, I also came to know him as a heterosexually married ­father of four ­children and a devoted son to his widowed ­mother. Hong got married in the late 1970s, an era of “nearly universal marriage” in Taiwan by conventional demographic standards.11 He never characterized his marriage as “fake,” although he did not feel love or desire for his wife and com­ plained bitterly of his misfortune in marrying a ­woman with a high sex drive. His boyfriend encouraged him to persist and even gave him ­bottles of lube to help sex with his wife go more smoothly. Hong described this to me as a touching demonstration of his boyfriend’s love for him and care for his ­family. This attitude t­ oward heterosexual marriage departs significantly from that of many younger lesbians and gays and from the mainstream media in Taiwan, which has come to depict such marriages as dishonest.

Meanings of Silence and Disclosure • 25

At a particularly tumultuous point in their marriage, Hong’s wife took a boyfriend of her own. This turn of events angered Hong ­because “in Taiwan it is not acceptable for a w ­ oman [to have sex outside of marriage], absolutely not!” He gradually calmed down ­after some gay friends pointed out that Hong does not like heterosexual intercourse and should thank the person who is taking care of this for him. Extramarital sex is not a gender-­neutral concept but is con­ nected to control of ­women’s fertility within families; often men who have affairs do not tolerate similar be­hav­iors in their wives. In this case, it was friends in the gay community who helped Hong to develop a more egalitarian viewpoint. Hong entered and remained in his marriage for complex reasons, most sig­ nificantly to provide for his m ­ other, who became a w ­ idow in her twenties and faced strong pressure to remain permanently single, devoting her l­abor and income to her marital f­ amily. Her in-­laws withheld their assets from Hong, their eldest male grand­child and heir, u­ ntil they w ­ ere certain that his ­mother would not take another husband. Hong recalled that in the years following his ­father’s death, his ­mother often cried herself to sleep. In one especially poignant conversation, she said to him, “You must quickly grow up, get married, and have ­children; watching over you is all I have in this life [你要趕快長大，長大結 婚生小孩子，我這輩子就守著你 ni yao gankuai zhangda, zhangda jiehun sheng xiao haizi, wo zhe beizi jiu shouzhe ni].” From childhood, Hong under­ stood that his ­mother’s well-­being depended upon his establishment of a het­ erosexual h ­ ouse­hold. As a result, his marriage and his sexual orientation ­were two separate ­matters; they r­ eally had nothing to do with each other. Hong never considered opting out of marriage, not b­ ecause he was closeted but b­ ecause his gay sexuality did not diminish his responsibility to provide for his ­mother by getting married and fathering c­ hildren. Hong spoke vividly of the hardships his m ­ other faced. She did all the ­house­work, as well as the bookkeeping for her in-­laws’ business, growing thin ­under the weight of the ­family pressure. One day, Hong told me, she overheard him on the telephone with his boyfriend. He did not realize she was listening and expressed his affection freely, saying t­ hings like, “Honey, I miss you so much.” His ­mother did not say anything at the time. She brought it up only ­ ere watching TV together and saw once, much l­ater, when the two of them w the news about a foreigner getting deported from Taiwan ­because he had AIDS. Then she said to Hong, “You must be careful.” Hong’s ­mother never touched the subject again. “But,” Hong added, “she still insisted on me getting married. My boyfriend also encouraged me to marry my wife. He said, ‘No, you have to do this; your m ­ other has had a very tough life since she was young. You have to get married.’ ” ­ hether Hong produced this story in response to a question I asked, about w his ­mother knows the nature of his relationship with his boyfriend (知道你們

26  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

之間的關係 zhidao nimen zhijian de guanxi). In this way, Hong moved the conversation beyond my somewhat simplistic frame of “knowing,” to re-­center a dif­fer­ent kind of f­ amily intimacy, that of interconnectedness within the socio-­ familial system. Now in his fifties, Hong’s focus is not on sexual disclosure or on ­whether his ­mother can accept him as a gay man but on how to care prop­ erly for all of his ­family members, including his ­children, ­mother, wife, and boy­ friend. He plans to care for his ­mother u­ ntil her death and then move in with and care for his boyfriend, who is eight years his se­nior and has several health issues that Hong worries about constantly (while at the same time continuing to provide financially for his wife). He hopes one of his adult c­ hildren w ­ ill agree to live with and care for his boyfriend in the meantime. Hong has also looked for ways to bring his boyfriend into his ­family at the end of their lives and in the next life he hopes they ­will share together. He has purchased columbarium niches for his boyfriend, m ­ other, and wife and is making arrangements for his boyfriend’s ashes to be placed with his own and his ­mother’s, while his wife’s niche is on another floor of the same columbarium tower. Hong may not be out to his ­mother, but neither is he closeted. His ­mother is aware of his boyfriend and has not interfered with Hong’s quite radical plan of having the three of them ­housed together in the columbarium. The ­family issues that ­matter most to Hong and his ­mother concern larger systems of in­equality; they cannot be reduced to his m ­ other’s response to finding out that her child is gay. Approaches to LGBT family-­of-­origin relationships that focus disproportionately on sexual identity and disclosure flatten the experiences of families like Hong’s, for whom coming out is not the most salient or pressing issue. To fully engage Hong’s story, we must grapple with ­women’s subordination embodied in the figure of his ­mother and, to a lesser degree, his wife. Hong is cognizant of his role in ensuring that his ­mother’s l­ abor and sacrifices are not in vain. Pressure to carry on the paternal line is among the most cited and dis­ cussed reasons for Taiwanese gay men’s entrance into heterosexual marriage (a topic I explore in depth in chapter 3). Yet it was not duty to their f­ athers and ­ others—­another paternal ancestors but rather the suffering endured by their m dimension of the same patrilineal system—­that gay in­for­mants pointed to as an explanation for why they had married. Many gay men still feel pressure to participate in a system that ties not only their ­fathers’ name but also their ­mothers’ material well-­being to their per­for­mance of heterosexuality. For this reason, improvements in ­women’s f­ amily status and in­de­pen­dence are likely to improve the lives and increase the choices available to gay and bisexual men as well. “They accompanied me silently”: Jiang Mama (age 72, born in 1940) and LJ (age 51, born in 1961). My first “field note” about LJ is a scribbled conversation

Meanings of Silence and Disclosure • 27

between my research assistant and me during a symposium on sexuality, which LJ happened to attend. In between my notes on the symposium, my RA scrawled: “You should go talk to that older T.”12 I wrote in response: “I know! But she’s so handsome, I feel shy.” (“She gets that a lot,” our mutual friends said, when I told them this story some months ­later—­with her salt-­and-­pepper hair and T swagger, LJ is never lacking for ­women’s attention.) In fact, I did not approach LJ ­until the second day of the symposium, when I worked up the nerve to sit beside her on the bench where she was eating her pork chop lunch­ box. LJ spoke only a few sentences to me, allowing her companion—­a lesbian ­woman in her fifties, whom I guessed to be LJ’s partner but turned out to be only an acquaintance—to do most of the small talk. However, upon learning about my proj­ect, LJ announced that she would help and did so in numerous ways in the year that followed. She introduced me to lesbians of her generation and mine (at thirty, I was already older than the average demographic at many queer gatherings in Taiwan) and arranged for me to interview three ­people, including herself. As a co-­member of the LGBT Elders Working Group, which I ­later joined, LJ always greeted me warmly, asked about my research, and looked out for me as we worked and sometimes traveled together. In addition to her reputation as a shuai (handsome) T, LJ is known for her efforts to bring older lesbians to events dominated by young ­people and by men and for her unique f­amily background—­specifically, for having a T ­mother in her seventies, whom I w ­ ill call Jiang Mama.13 Jiang Mama is somewhat legendary among the circle of LGBT friends with whom LJ socializes. On multiple occasions, I was among a group of a dozen or so ­people regaled with an enactment of Jiang Mama’s gendered be­hav­ior: how she sits and smokes with her legs wide apart, shoulders thrust forward, and chin tucked in a cool and aloof posture. The enactment was usually performed by a gay man and drew admiring exclamations: “Oh, how manly!” Based on the photos she shared with us and LJ’s recollection, Jiang Mama has worn her ­ hole of her life. As the story goes, she dared the masculinity proudly for the w man who would become her husband to marry her so that he would stop pur­ suing her girlfriend, managing to turn even her heterosexual marriage into an act of masculine bravado. Of her parents’ relationship, LJ said, “In my f­ ather’s mind, t­ here are just two kinds of ­people in the world, men and ­women. So my ­father ­didn’t r­ eally care what my m ­ other did with w ­ omen.” When I pressed for details about her ­mother’s natal f­ amily, LJ said something similar: “They felt their child [LJ’s ­mother] is a bit dif­f er­ent [這個小孩子不太一樣 zhege xiao haizi bu tai yiyang]. But they ­didn’t have that . . . ​that knowledge [他們也沒有那種  . . . ​那種知識吧 tamen ye meiyou na zhong . . . ​na zhong zhishi ba].” However I put the ques­ tion, LJ’s answer remained firm: it would be impossible for her ­mother’s ­family to comprehend or comment on this aspect of her life.

28  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

But some months ­later, as I was chatting with LJ and a mutual friend, a gay man in his forties, LJ mentioned an interaction between her ­mother and her aunt, which suggested a more tacit knowledge and communication between them. When LJ’s aunt got married, she asked LJ’s ­mother (her ­sister) not to be at home when the bridegroom and wedding party arrived on her wedding day. She did not want her f­ uture in-­laws to see her s­ ister and think that t­ here was something odd or unnatural about their f­ amily. I wondered aloud w ­ hether Jiang Mama had any par­tic­u ­lar feeling (感覺 ganjue) about this incident. “I  don’t think she has any feelings now,” LJ responded. At this point our gay friend chimed in: “She remembers. That’s your answer. LJ’s ­mother remembers this incident.” His point is well taken. For Jiang Mama, the act of remem­ bering is its own kind of feeling; no further emotional display or statement about the incident is necessary to confirm its significance. Just as LJ’s aunt tacitly censured Jiang Mama, so Jiang Mama tacitly sup­ ported LJ. She did not pressure LJ to get married and served as a buffer between LJ and potential suitors, turning down invitations on her behalf. LJ could think of only one conversation in which her m ­ other said something direct about their respective relationships with w ­ omen. “In the past,” Jiang Mama said, “we d­ idn’t spend so much money on our girlfriends.” Jiang Mama did not specify whom she meant by “we”; LJ understood this to mean T’s in the vernacular of her gen­ eration. Jiang Mama went on to say that the w ­ omen she knew in her youth gave her money and did not expect dinner or gifts in return. LJ described this conversation as her m ­ other “boasting about her glory days” (豐功偉業 feng gong wei ye). Among her grander boasts was that she supposedly kept eigh­teen girl­ friends in dif­fer­ent cities, writing to and visiting each one at her con­ve­nience. The challenges Jiang Mama has faced in her life are undeniable, among them, poverty and raising three ­children by herself ­a fter the death of her husband when she was still a young person, as well as living through the intense po­liti­ cal oppression of martial law.14 At the same time, she “boasts about her glory days” and compares t­ hese days favorably to the lives of T’s her d­ aughter’s age and younger. It would be inappropriate to characterize Jiang Mama as closeted, pre-­liberated, or secretive ­because she never “came out” by declaring herself to be T or tongzhi or by talking about her sexual exploits with her kin. Her tacit support for LJ is an impor­tant reason why LJ was able to remain unmarried while most of her peers entered heterosexual marriages. In this and other ways, Jiang Mama created space for T masculinity and sexuality within their f­ amily. ­Later in this book, I argue that kinship-­based gender disparities continue to pose major obstacles for lesbians in Taiwan and that ­these m ­ atter as much or more than any identity-­based politics of sexual self-­reference. Given such, Jiang Mama’s protection of LJ from marriage is a more revolutionary gesture than simply naming and verbally affirming her sexual orientation.

Meanings of Silence and Disclosure • 29

In addition to tacit negotiations like t­ hose presented above, LJ described silence, or not asking about one’s sexual orientation, as a meaningful form of support that she had received at vari­ous points in her life. One such instance occurred a­ fter her first breakup. Her girlfriend was getting married to a man, and LJ grew thin with sorrow as the wedding day approached. She spent her time off from work having coffee and chatting with ­women from the Chris­ tian church she had begun attending as a teenager. ­These ­women kept her com­ pany as she mended from the blow. Did they know the reason for her sadness? “They d­ idn’t ask me to explain what was ­going on with me,” LJ replied when I brought up this question. Her tone let me know that to ask would be troublesome, intrusive. “They accom­ panied me silently [她們默默陪著我 tamen momo peizhe wo]. I’ve been OK ­because my church ­doesn’t r­ eally discuss tongzhi issues. If they hold anti-­tongzhi views, they ­don’t express them openly. ­There are other tongzhi in our congre­ gation, but they a­ ren’t obvious [明顯 mingxian]. I mean, you d­ on’t come out and say that ­you’re tongzhi. At our church, you w ­ ouldn’t say, ‘I had intimate relations with this w ­ oman.’ ” In this case, LJ is not talking about gender, as she herself is unmistakably T and arguably quite “obvious” to the casual observer. But no one put LJ in the difficult position of having to articulate her relationship as an intimate one, and as a result, she felt comfortable recovering from her breakup and, l­ ater, bring­ ing her new girlfriend to church. Many older tongzhi likewise felt comfortable bringing their partners home b­ ecause their f­ amily members did not comment on the relationship, even ­a fter the two of them had lived together for many years. ­These tacit negotiations and strategic silences have not dis­appeared among the younger generations. But younger queers are more likely to interpret silence as a lack of understanding or support and describe it as exacting an emotional toll. This shift is not entirely away from Decena’s “tacit subjects” or from the kinds of ­family issues that I have identified as impor­tant. Rather, it is a shift ­toward a complex landscape in which tacit negotiations coexist with expecta­ tions for more direct interpersonal sharing among ­family members.

The Turn ­toward Coming Out New ideals for the parent-­child relationship emerged in Taiwan in the late 1980s and early 1990s.15 During this period, Pei-­Chia Lan writes, the concept of “parent education” was widely disseminated through Taiwanese society. Expert opin­ ions, often translated from the West, urged parents to attend to their ­children’s needs and emotions and promoted such concepts as “understanding your child” and “keeping your child com­pany.”16 Lan notes that this was double edged, enabling parents to form emotional bonds with their ­children

30  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

that most had not enjoyed with their own parents, while intensifying the ­mental and physical demands of parental ­labor. ­These changes shape the ways that ­people understand and enact their ­family relationships. The Taiwan Social Change Survey shows an increased value of emotional reciprocity between parents and their ­children, where the variable of emotional reciprocity is constructed from questions about how often c­ hildren listen to parents’ ideas and share emotions and vice versa.17 Chin-­Chun Yi and Ju-­Ping Lin predict that f­ uture intergenerational relations in Taiwan w ­ ill retain a strong normative ideal in addition to “an impor­tant affectual component not emphasized in the culture before.”18 Ju-­Ping Lin and her colleagues find that sharing “intergenerational affection” with an adult child improves the life satisfaction of middle-­aged Taiwanese w ­ omen,19 and Yih-­Lan Liu finds that parental intimacy, including emotional warmth, empathy, and closeness, decreases depressive symptoms in Taiwanese young p­ eople.20 Th ­ ese studies let us know that something significant is happening with regard to the norms and expectations that surround Taiwanese parent-­child relationships. Norma­ tive obligations and care structures increasingly intermingle with new expres­ sive ideals, and parents and ­children alike report that ­these ideals ­matter to them. In my interviews and fieldwork, p­ eople frequently framed coming out in the language of emotions and interpersonal sharing, which comprised a new mea­sure of quality in their relationships. Intimacy and affection certainly existed among prior generations of Taiwan­ ese parents and their c­ hildren. As Hong’s story demonstrates, grown c­ hildren often structured their lives around care for their elder f­ amily members and ancestors, continuing parent-­child intimacy even a­ fter death. To suggest that ­these relationships lacked emotional intimacy would be to narrowly and problematically define emotions and intimacy in terms of a friendship-­style dynamic, which does not capture the complexity of intimacy in most Taiwan­ ese families.21 The turn ­toward parental knowledge of the child as an individ­ ual, ­either through disclosure or through parents’ pursuit of information about the child’s personality, tastes, preferences, and daily activities, is a change not in the existence of intimacy but in its forms—in how bonds are forged and closeness sustained (or resisted) in con­temporary families. This transformation of intimacy has economic roots as well. Interde­pen­ dency within families has shifted, as many parents now support their ­children financially through early adulthood. Hong and LJ are typical of their cohort in that neither of their parents had more than a grade-­school education. They and many of their peers started working immediately a­ fter high school in order to contribute to the h ­ ouse­hold income. In contrast, many young adult in­for­ mants had college educations paid for by their parents, and some had or planned to pursue gradu­ate degrees. Among ­those ­under thirty, only a small number

Meanings of Silence and Disclosure • 31

had given any money to their parents, and most ­were still receiving money from their parents on a regular basis. In the early twenty-­first c­ entury, Taiwan experienced an economic decline and rising unemployment that was particularly hard hitting among younger workers. The unemployment rate exceeded 10 ­percent for young adults ages twenty to twenty-­four in 2002 (twice that of the general population) and con­ tinued to rise.22 While unemployment in the general population dipped modestly to just over 4 ­percent in 2013, it saw a year-­to-­year increase to 13 ­percent for the twenty-­to-­twenty-­four age bracket.23 Lang-­Wen Huang finds that Taiwanese young p­ eople (up to age twenty-­four) and their parents anticipate a prolonged transition to adulthood and that parents of all socioeconomic groups are generally permissive about continuing to provide financial support during this life stage.24 ­These parents view higher education as the primary pathway to their ­children’s financial security and eventual (heterosexual) ­family formation. New parenting logics that emphasize parental attentiveness and affectual bonds combine with smaller f­ amily sizes and a prolonged transition to adult­ hood to shape the exchanges among heterosexual parents and LGBT (adult) ­children in this study. Many young adult queers live with parents who are actively monitoring their bodies, be­hav­iors, and choices. In this context, some ­people go to ­great lengths to deflect questions about their sexuality, while for ­others (particularly t­ hose who do not conform to gender norms) questions and comments are unavoidable. Insistence of elder queers that f­ amily members “­won’t ask” is increasingly unrealistic for younger cohorts. A desire for open communication about sexuality and gender has taken root as well, newly tied to ideas of intimacy and mutual understanding. As a portrait of this turn t­ oward coming out, I draw from the life stories of Bing, a gay man in his mid-­thirties; Skye, a T in her early twenties; and Leila, a conventionally feminine young ­woman, also in her twenties. Bing’s story fore­ grounds familial expectations and desires that encompass both normative obligations and affective bonds, while Skye’s story reveals the potential for mis­ communication across generations. Leila’s story shows how ­these emerging forms of sociality and relationality create gendered pathways to sexual disclo­ sure even in the absence of a lesbian or gay identity. Collectively, their stories point to new forms of intimacy among ­family members as one impor­tant impe­ tus for coming out or feeling closeted. “A h­ ouse without win­dows”: Bing (age 35, born in 1977). Bing is a single gay man and the doting ­father of twins whom he had with the help of assisted repro­ ductive technology (ART). As ART is only available to married c­ ouples in Taiwan, Bing went through the marriage procedures with a mainland Chinese

32  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

­ oman introduced to him by a Taiwanese marriage agency.25 Bing compen­ w sated the w ­ oman financially for her reproductive l­abor and retained sole custody of the twins when they separated. He did not attach any par­tic­u ­lar label to this arrangement, noting that its validity “depends on your defini­ tion of marriage.” Indeed, with increased state scrutiny and anxiety about “sham marriages” across the strait,26 the authenticity of this u­ nion could be challenged on the basis of both Bing’s sexual orientation and its transac­ tional purpose. Bing’s pathway to parenthood peels back multiple layers of the con­temporary ideal of marriage as an institution grounded in hetero­ sexual desire and normative gender relations, without any further material considerations. We might expect someone like Bing, who has been married and fathered ­children, to feel that coming out is not necessary since he is unlikely to receive marriage pressure from his parents in the ­future. But Bing spoke eloquently and at length about why coming out mattered to him. He described a feeling of being locked ­behind a wall, severed emotionally from his ­family. “In the end,” Bing said, “it was not a wall anymore; it became a ­house without win­dows. My marriage plus the birth of my ­children put me ­under im­mense pressure. Yes. Very, very strong emotional pressure [情緒上的壓力 qingxu shang de yali].” ­A fter coming out, Bing went home e­ very day for a month and got down on his knees to beg his parents’ forgiveness for not giving them the life he felt he owed them—­marriage, ­children, and a wife to care for them. He did fulfill the crucial imperative of continuing the paternal line, as one of his ­children is a boy. But ­these normative obligations ­were not Bing’s sole concern. He also felt a power­f ul emotional pressure connected to his sense of isolation from his parents and f­ amily. He chose to come out b­ ecause he did not want to “act in this play” any longer (再演這一齣戲 zai yan zhe yi chu xi). This is a new kind of language for talking about f­ amily relationships, very dif­fer­ent from the language used by Hong, Jiang Mama, and LJ. For LJ and ­others of her cohort, silence could signal tacit ac­cep­tance or even support. In contrast, for Bing, silence was part of the “burden” (負擔 fudan), “distance” (距離 juli), and ­ fter an initial difficult “wall” (牆 qiang) that separated him from his ­family. A period following his disclosure, Bing was able to achieve the closeness he desired with his parents and siblings. Upon telling his younger ­sister, their relationship got better, much better, he said, “­because now she knows what is in my heart [因為她會知道我心裡的事情 yinwei ta hui zhidao wo xinli de shiqing].” Not all queer young p­ eople come out or desire to do so. Many young in­for­ mants continued to use tacit negotiations as their primary mode of communi­ cation with parents, grandparents, and other intergenerational kin.27 But t­ hose who did come out (about one-­third of the sample, with another third planning to come out one day) did so for reasons similar to Bing’s and reported having conversations or writing letters in which they detailed their inner thoughts and

Meanings of Silence and Disclosure • 33

emotions as part of the coming out pro­cess. For example, Edward, a twenty-­ six-­year-­old gay man who came out to his ­father in person and then by writing a letter, said he hoped that, in response, his ­father would stop hiding ­matters in his heart and instead “speak out every­thing on his mind [所有想法講出來 suoyou xiangfa jiang chulai].” Edward saw this as potentially improving their relationship in the long run. Hong, Jiang Mama, and LJ did not evaluate the closeness or quality of their ­family relationships by their ability to share what was on their minds and hearts with their f­ amily members. A ­family relationship could be understood as very close and mutually satisfying without this aspect. Midlife queers faced enor­ mous pressures from their families, but they did not worry about (and few had experienced) direct confrontations about their sexuality. In contrast, such con­ frontations ­were commonplace among young adults. For some, this created a kind of coming out crisis, in which the possibility of being outed tinged every­ day interactions. “Of course you’ll remember when and where you came out”: Skye (age 22, born in 1990). I was buying a snack in the night market when Skye phoned me to talk about her most recent experience ­going home. Her frustration was palpable through the phone line. “Last night I was eating dinner with my parents, and my mom kept asking me all ­these questions. She even asked me what kind of boys I like. Come on. I look like this, and you ask me what kind of boys I like?” Skye groaned—­referring ­here to her cute boyish/androgynous appear­ ance, which has won her many admirers at the same time that it has been the source of constant conflict with her ­mother. In the course of the research, I got to know many of Skye’s ­family members, including her siblings, cousins, and parents, as well as two girlfriends whom she had consecutively during ­those sixteen months. Skye’s story is reflective of the kinds of worries about coming out that seemed to constantly surface for my youn­gest in­for­mants. ­These conversations frustrated Skye not only ­because they required her to make up answers but also b­ ecause she perceived an intentionality b­ ehind them, that is, her ­mother’s insistence on pressing a sore topic. Skye’s masculinity and sexuality have been the subjects of heated discussion among her f­ amily mem­ bers over a period of many years. When Skye was in high school, her m ­ other confronted her directly about dating a girl, even slapping her face as they argued about this. This story was recounted to me by both Skye and her s­ ister, who witnessed the argument and shed tears as she told me about her m ­ other’s harsh words. Nevertheless, Skye considers herself “not yet out” (還沒出櫃 hai mei chugui) ­because her m ­ other refuses to acknowledge her T sexuality and con­ tinues to pester her about getting a boyfriend. Skye and her b­ rother, Tim, separately recalled a conversation in which their ­father asked Tim ­whether Skye likes girls. Caught off guard by this question,

34  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

Tim replied, “Maybe,” prompting Skye to exclaim: “Are you kidding me, you told dad maybe? Cuz maybe is like, sure!” Skye’s f­ ather also discussed the issue with his elder ­sister, Skye’s aunt (hereafter Ako). Skye was startled to learn of this, as she had not yet come out to her aunt when the conversation occurred. Ako claimed that Skye had told her the year before. “But if I came out to her, of course I would know!” Skye declared. “It’s such a big t­hing” (emphasis mine). She conceded that the two of them may have talked about “some issues around it.” “But you know,” she said, “if y­ ou’re coming out to one of your ­family members, of course you’ll remember when and where you came out to that person. So I was like, last year, what?” “What did you talk about that made her think you came out?” I asked. “I d­ on’t know. I d­ idn’t ask her. That’s just my guess. I r­ eally ­don’t know why she thinks this.” From this brief exchange, we learn a number of ­things about coming out as conceptualized by Skye and o­ thers of her cohort: coming out is big and mem­ orable; it occurs in a specific place and time and potentially marks an impor­ tant turning point in a relationship. Moreover, the intention to come out should be clearly understood by all parties, and conversations that only hint at the topic may not count as coming out. This is a significant departure from the f­ amily stories of midlife queers, who presented hints and implications as defining moments in and of themselves. Thus for Ako, who is in her fifties, talking about “some issues around it” may be the equivalent of Skye declaring that she is a lesbian, whereas for Skye, this was merely a precursor to the more intentional and explicit conversation she planned to have ­later that year. Not long ­after this conversation with Skye, I attended a pre­sen­ta­tion by Guo Mama, the founder of Loving Parents of LGBT Taiwan, to a queer student group at a university. Guo Mama urged the students to pick a good time and place to come out to their parents. To illustrate the importance of d­ oing so, she told a story about someone who attempted to tell his ­mother that he is gay while she was engrossed in a tele­vi­sion program. His m ­ other absently said, “Mmm, uh huh,” and never mentioned the topic again. In Guo Mama’s rendition of this ­ other deliberately story, the gay son d­ idn’t know what to do next. Was his m avoiding the topic, or had she failed to hear him clearly? “Be sure to let your parents know that you have something impor­tant to tell them,” Guo Mama concluded. Her advice is consistent with Skye’s wish for coming out to be a planned conversation, not something that one accomplishes through inferences or talking around the issue. At a workshop on how to come out, sponsored by a dif­fer­ent organ­ization, the gay male host recommended using the book Dear Mom and Dad, I’m Gay (親愛的爸媽，我是同志 qin’ai de ba ma, wo shi tongzhi). “But d­ on’t use this book to come out by just tossing it on your parents’ bed and then ­r unning away!” he quipped, and laughed together with the audience of mostly

Meanings of Silence and Disclosure • 35

twenty-­something queers. I also chuckled while adding this to my field notes, as two of my interviewees had come out in almost exactly this manner. Many young ­people are still trying to come out through indirect methods, but increasingly, this is framed as less than ideal in the resources that are circulated in the LGBT community. The advice above is a case in point: better to have a planned conversation where you discuss the content of the book, rather than ­running away and letting the book speak for itself. LGBT organ­izations and community spaces are clearly significant in shap­ ing the coming out discourse. But it is not only queer spaces where such ideas have taken root. In fact, young p­ eople with few ties to the queer com­ munity w ­ ere just as likely to bring up disclosure to parents as a possibility, desire, or risk. “We have to take care of our parents as much as we can”: Leila (age 26, born in 1986). Leila is one of several young ­women in this research who maintained a long-­term same-­sex relationship without forming an identity on this basis. ­These ­women described themselves variously as “straight,” “liking guys,” “unde­ cided,” or as having no par­tic­u­lar/fixed sexual identity or orientation. Leila articulated this to me by relaying a conversation between her m ­ other and ­sister, in which her ­mother asked ­whether Leila likes girls. Her ­sister said, “Maybe.” (As evinced by Leila’s ­sister and Skye’s b­ rother Tim, “maybe” was a favorite response of siblings put in this predicament.) Laughing, Leila added, “I think that’s OK. I never ­really felt that I like boys or girls. For me the ‘being together’ feeling [在一起感覺 zai yiqi ganjue] is about feeling happy with a par­tic­u­lar person, not about that person’s gender.” It is this transformation of intimacy, of reasons for and ways of being together, rather than a fixed sexual identity that Leila anticipated one day addressing with her parents. When I met Leila, she was in a monogamous cohabiting relationship with her female classmate. Her siblings and cousins knew that this classmate was Leila’s girlfriend, and Leila planned to tell her parents if the relationship proved to be a stable one. She deci­ded to slowly introduce her girlfriend into the ­family by emphasizing their compatibility and her girlfriend’s positive qualities. In the ­ other might “come right out and ask me if I meantime, she worried that her m like girls,” a conversation she hoped to avoid for the time being. In contrast to her queer elders, who believed it would be impossible for their families to ask such a direct question, Leila regarded this as a likely prospect. The chance of discovery was heightened by the fact that Leila’s parents expected her to live with them during school breaks. They did not know about her cohabiting rela­ tionship as Leila led them to believe that she stayed in the dormitory of her college. This required some finesse, such as leaving certain belongings in the dorm so that she would not be given away by an unexpected visit. For queers of Leila’s generation, parents are just as likely as their c­hildren to initiate

36  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

conversations about sexuality, and some parents go to g­ reat lengths to get to the bottom of ­things. Given her intention to come out eventually, why did Leila subject herself to the stress of hiding her relationship from her m ­ other’s watchful eye? To explain, Leila, like Bing, invoked interlocking notions of love, affection, and normative ­family roles. She emphasized the importance of love between parents and ­daughters in par­tic­u­lar, since the relationship is not buoyed by patrilineal repro­ duction as it would be for sons. Since w ­ e’re d­ aughters, even if we have kids in the f­ uture, their f­ amily name w ­ on’t be ours; it ­will be our husband’s name. So ­we’re ­under less pressure to have kids. But actually b­ ecause of that, b­ ecause we have d­ on’t have this issue of passing on the ­family name [傳宗接代的問題 chuanzongjiedai de wenti], we have to take care of our parents as much as we can. I ­really ­don’t want to disappoint my mom and dad. If they know that I’m with a ­woman and I ­won’t have a normal ­family in the ­f uture, it ­will be such a disappointment to them.

The prospect of her parents’ disappointment did not deter Leila from her long-­ term goal of acclimating them to her relationship. But it did shape her approach of letting them know gradually and attempting to stabilize and nor­ malize the relationship as much as pos­si­ble before coming out. Leila’s comments reveal that pressure may stem not only from filial respon­ sibility but, in this case, from ­daughters’ inability to perform filiality in the manner available to sons. Her story also demonstrates that changing notions of intimacy and disclosure can occur, for some, in ways that do not rely upon or reproduce identity categories. This is not to say that all or even a majority of young Taiwanese queers have rejected an identitarian model of sexuality. How­ ever, this model should not be taken as the de facto reason for rising concerns about sexual disclosure in the f­ amily context. It is also notable that themes of interpersonal sharing/knowing foregrounded in this chapter do not require a fixed identity and may be just as relevant to more fluid or transient personal and relational qualities.

Beyond the Out/Closeted Dichotomy: Changing Forms of ­Family Intimacy The ­people whose stories I have shared hold some ­things in common. As indi­ viduals and collectively, they are confident in their nonnormative genders and intimate relationships and find plea­sure in t­ hese aspects of their lives. Like other midlife queers, Hong, LJ, and Jiang Mama have not discussed ­these t­ hings with their kin and do not anticipate wanting or needing to do so. In contrast, Bing felt strongly that he must disclose this part of his life in order to maintain a

Meanings of Silence and Disclosure • 37

good relationship with his f­ amily members, and a majority of younger queer in­for­mants had at least considered coming out even if they ultimately rejected this idea. Many, like Leila, chose indirect and gradual methods, but they nev­ ertheless saw full disclosure as their eventual and perhaps inevitable destina­ tion. JhuCin Jhang calls this approach “scaffolding”—­coming out as a pro­cess of reconciling the discrepancy in parents’ and ­children’s expectations and moving back and forth across “the blurred line between knowing and not knowing.”28 While previous generations practiced tacit negotiations without the expectation of eventual disclosure, younger queers combined this tactic with desires for self-­revelation, an act that they associated with intimacy and love. For their elders, love and intimacy materialized in other ways, such as making major life decisions that prioritized support for parents (Hong) or shielding a child from hetero-­marital pressure in an era of nearly universal marriage (Jiang Mama). ­These generational differences propel us beyond developmental models of coming out and the out/closeted dichotomy, ­toward a more situated approach to coming out as a discourse that is gaining resonance in Taiwan at this historical moment. Gender and sexually nonconforming ­people who grew up in the mid-­t wentieth ­century are often caring for el­derly parents and in-­ laws. ­Those whose parents and in-­laws have passed on are likely to have man­ aged care for their bodies and spirits in and ­after death. In many ways, the intimacy of ­these deep ties exceeds the expressive intimacy of sharing personal information. But for younger queers, t­ hese ties are complicated by a growing desire or, just as often, a growing pressure to allow ­family members to know (認識 renshi) and understand (了解 liaojie) them. The desire/pressure to con­ nect with parents in this way has combined with other economic and social changes, such as smaller ­family sizes and a prolonged transition to adulthood, to transform not only the functions but also the meanings of silence, disclo­ sure, and intimacy. The continued salience but changing function of tacit negotiations—­from a primary mode of communication to part of a gradual proj­ect of self-­ revelation—is bound up with other changes and continuities in f­amily life. Some feminist groups have marshaled notions of intimacy and the sharing of “inner emotional qualities” to promote more egalitarian relationships between husbands and wives and between parents and their c­ hildren.29 At the same time, parents’ love and wishes for their ­children to be “happy” (幸福 xingfu, 快樂 kuaile) are often used to buttress normative and class-­specific ideas about what constitutes happiness, a topic I return to ­later in the book. Across the five vignettes, dances between silence and disclosure evoke the ongoing complexity of sexual subjectivity and visibility within families. Silence is a versatile tool that can provide support (particularly for elder gen­ erations) or create feelings of distance and loneliness (particularly for younger

38  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

generations). The fact that parents are just as likely as their young adult ­children to break from the tacit approach and adopt a more confrontational strategy—­and the fact that this possibility generates considerable anxiety among some younger queers—­suggests that the tacit does not only serve to protect the heterosexual, cisgender members of the ­family. It also provides a liminal space in which queer subjects can occupy kinship and f­ amily structures. The new cultural intelligibility of coming out to ­family and the generation gap among Taiwanese queers are not wholly explained by sexual identity politics. Instead, they are part of a broader shift in how ­people construct inti­ macy and or­ga­nize their f­ amily lives. With many social and cultural cues in flux, coming out is both a byproduct of and a catalyst for changes in how parents and c­ hildren relate to one another and what p­ eople expect and desire from ­those with whom they share families and homes.

3

(Queerly) Carrying on the ­Family

Twice a year, the Taiwan Tongzhi Hotline Association organizes a daylong sightseeing trip for queer elders and younger ­people who want to build cross-­ generational friendships. I attended weekly meetings of the LGBT Elders Working Group to plan and debrief from t­ hese excursions in 2011 and 2012. During one such meeting, our conversation drifted to the disproportionate number of gay participants. Th ­ ere are usually two buses, one and a half popu­ lated by gay men and half a bus populated by lesbian and bisexual w ­ omen, T’s, and trans p­ eople (the latter group being smallest of all in number). Why should this be? The sightseeing trip is promoted to p­ eople of all genders. A young gay man produced one of the more popu­lar explanations. “Gays like to go out and play, while lesbians like to stay home, cuddle, and watch movies with their partners,” he said. The other gay men nodded and chuckled appre­ ciatively while the small number of w ­ omen in the room rolled their eyes. Per­ haps the ­women’s affable silence was due, in part, to frustration with lesbians who do ­couple up and drop out of the scene. In any case, none of us objected to this explanation and its assumptions about lesbian domesticity and monog­ amy relative to gay men. We soon moved on to other topics. But of course, ­there are alternative ways to explain ­women’s underrepre­sen­ ta­tion on a daylong sightseeing trip. (Without a doubt, many Elders Working Group members know this, including some who absorbed the cuddling com­ ment in good fun.) Many queer elders are or have been heterosexually married.

39

40  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

They may share their homes with ­children, grandchildren, spouses, and extended kin and have ­family responsibilities that differ markedly for ­women and men. Generally speaking, it is not so difficult for a man to slip away from his f­ amily for an entire day. ­Women are more likely to have dependents in their care and to be held accountable for their time. Th ­ ose who are divorced or unmarried often have more financial pressures than do men in similar circumstances. The topic of “­family pressure” (家庭壓力 jiating yali) came up often in my fieldwork. Activists spoke of it frequently, and on occasion w ­ hole workshops ­were or­ga­nized around the topic. Interviewees used this concept to frame large portions of their stories. Parents and (adult) ­children alike recognized the pres­ sure to carry on the ­family name (傳宗接代 ­chuan zong jie dai) as a critical area of strug­gle for queers. In nearly all cases, p­ eople viewed this strug­gle as the birthright of gay men in their role as sons. In­for­mants told me that gay men face more pressure than do lesbians in Taiwan b­ ecause of the imperative to ­chuan zong jie dai. Academic lit­er­a­ture on this topic has, historically, centered on men as well. As a femme researcher, this piqued my interest. I wanted to know more about the pressures placed on d­ aughters and why t­ hese w ­ ere less vis­i­ble than t­ hose placed on sons. In fact, the reproduction of the patrilineal ­family m ­ atters a ­great deal for queer ­people of all genders. The sightseeing trip is a small clue, a glimpse of this pressure as it materializes differently for lesbian and gay elders. It is men whose seed establishes a patriline. But it is ­women who do the daily work of carry­ing on the f­ amily—­who birth and raise heirs, care for the aging and sick, and make the preparations to observe ­family rituals, honor the dead, and mark special days. Yenning Chao has critiqued studies that overemphasize “face” (面子 mianzi) and “marriage u­ nder f­ amily pressure so as to continue one’s patriline” without paying adequate attention to the material base of social security in con­temporary Chinese socie­ties.1 For example, scholars have explained entrance into marriage in terms of pressure to continue the patriline without consider­ ing the importance of marriage for obtaining property in a competitive housing market and other material needs. From a materialist standpoint, one that recognizes the material relations and ­labor that make patrilineal kinship, ­women are central actors, comprising a circulatory system through which the male bloodline flows. Feminist scholars have extensively analyzed ways that patrilineal reproduc­ tion structures w ­ omen’s lives in Taiwan and in many other parts of the world.2 A small number of studies explic­itly address the impact of t­ hese structures on lesbian identification and practice.3 From t­ hese works, glimmers of a transgen­ der analy­sis also emerge. Patrilineal and patriarchal roles are sites of ongoing negotiation for trans family-­of-­origin relationships. Put simply, if a person tran­ sitions from male to female, does she also transition from son to d­ aughter,

(Queerly) Carrying on the ­Family • 41

with all that entails for lineage, locality, inheritance, care work, and relation to ancestors and descendants, as well as living kin? Individualist notions like “gender identity” and “gender expression” do not prepare us to answer such questions. Our evolving vocabulary and knowledge of transgender issues must encompass gender nonconforming p­ eople who live within patrilineal, virilo­ cal, and patriarchal f­ amily systems—­still among the most common f­ amily systems in the world.4

Material Dimensions of Patrilineal Kinship ­ nder patrilineality as it has materialized historically and continues to shape U social relations in Taiwan t­ oday, titles, properties, and inheritance are primar­ ily allocated to men, who are expected to produce descendants and care for their ancestors through gendered rituals of ancestor veneration.5 Although the Republican Civil Code granted inheritance rights to ­women as early as 19306 (the civil code was then imported to Taiwan by the Nationalist Chinese government in 1949), a majority of Taiwanese families continue to distribute their resources along patrilineal lines. Between 1999 and 2003, 73 ­percent of ­family asset transfers in Taiwan ­were shared among sons only. Another 10  ­percent ­were shared inequitably among sons and ­daughters, with sons receiving a greater share.7 While ­women are now protected by law, they con­ tinue to face pressure to cede their inheritance to male ­family members.8 The Ministry of Finance reports that ­women are more likely than men to formally renounce their inheritance rights.9 ­These actions and choices by families con­ tribute to higher rates of home owner­ship among men and housing insecurity among ­women.10 ­There is also the question of housing ­after death, as families bear the respon­ sibility for ensuring a proper and peaceful afterlife. Religious scholars describe ancestor veneration in Taiwan as “almost universal,” and nearly 90 ­percent of Taiwanese ­people report that they pray to ancestral spirits.11 Ancestral status is contingent on marriage and having male heirs. Unmarried and childless ­women and men violate the conditions that constitute a “good death” provid­ ing a pathway to this permanent place within the f­ amily. However, rituals exist to reincorporate men into the ancestral line.12 No such rituals exist for ­women, who can never become members of their ­fathers’ h ­ ouse­holds. In con­temporary Taiwan, an unmarried, childless w ­ oman may be placed in a t­ emple that her ­family members can visit but that allocates her primary afterlife care to strang­ ers.13 In contrast, an unmarried man can be buried with his natal f­ amily and his spirit cared for by his own kin. ­These decisions have an emotional impact even on p­ eople who do not consider themselves to be traditionally minded or place much stock in rituals. I spoke to several queer w ­ omen whose friends and lovers had experienced this, and each relayed it as a b­ itter injustice.

42  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

Collectively, practices related to inheritance, property and other assets, and end-­of-­life and afterlife care attach a steep price tag to w ­ omen’s marriage re­sis­ tance. Strong normative pressure to marry is compounded by financial burdens and other practical considerations. W ­ omen who do marry must navigate a com­ plex system of ­family obligations that touches all aspects of their lives, includ­ ing where and with whom they live. Patrilocal residence (living together with the husband’s parents) remains common for Taiwanese married ­couples, and research shows that ­women who live with their husband’s parents have an increased workload and decreased decision-­making power.14 Th ­ ere are no com­ parable penalties for men who live with their parents (as about 40% of married men do) or in-­laws (as about 4% of married men do). Even when ­couples opt out of co-­residence, they often live close to the husband’s parents and provide similar types of care.15 And what­ever the f­ amily structure, w ­ omen do nearly all of the unpaid work. This gender imbalance is resilient over time, with some data suggesting that the wife’s relative h ­ ouse­work burden is actually greater in younger cohorts.16 Against this backdrop, queer ­women’s ostensible failure to go out and play (the topic of discussion at our Elders Working Group meeting) reflects gender differences in home life and their implications for queer practice. The absence of ­women is, from this view, less about a penchant for cuddling and more about a variety of pressures stemming from the same patrilineal kinship system that gay men strug­gle with socially and internally.

Gay Identity in a ­Family That ­Favors Boys: Edward and Fei Men and ­women in this research spoke candidly about the prob­lem of son pref­ erence and its impact on their lives. Most could point to families or specific ­family members that they described as valuing boys over girls (重男輕女 zhong nan qing nv), and they recognized gay men in such families as facing especially strong pressure to give their ­fathers posterity. This was the ­family situation described by Edward, the ­middle child and only son of a southern Taiwanese ­family. (While most pseudonyms in this research are random, I began to call this in­for­mant “Edward” in my field notes ­after Edward Cullen from the Twilight films popu­lar at the time. His cool good looks reminded me of the char­ acter and the actor who played him.) For as long as he could remember, Edward had felt an im­mense pressure to carry on the f­ amily name. I asked him for exam­ ples of this pressure: Where did it come from? How did he develop such a deep feeling? “When you look at soap operas, information around us, the books we study, such as the Confucian Analects, all tell us that men should carry on the ­family line,” he said. “Since I am the only son, I have a responsibility to carry on the next generation for my dad.” That Edward includes soap operas and the Confucian Analects in the same breath is itself a commentary on how this

(Queerly) Carrying on the ­Family • 43

concept has endured and evolved over centuries and the ways that t­ hese centu­ ries of knowledge are now compressed and packaged for young ­people like Edward. Edward did not plan to get heterosexually married. I asked him ­whether he had considered fatherhood, and he said that he would be open to it if he could find a stable partner and a surrogate ­mother in another country (gestational surrogacy, while sometimes practiced, is prohibited in Taiwan).17 The way he spoke about this felt hy­po­thet­i­cal, prompted by my question more than a specific dream or plan of his own. To resolve the issue of patrilineal continuity, his male partner would have to agree to rear a child belonging to his husband’s bloodline, relinquishing this responsibility to his own f­ amily of origin, and both sets of grandparents would have to agree to see it this way—­many moving parts to consider. Meanwhile, Edward occupied an elevated status as the only son in a ­family that ­favors boys over girls and as the first person in this ­family to gradu­ate from high school, a source of ­great pride to his parents. His younger ­sister Fei sur­ veyed this with jealousy; at least, this is how Edward took it and what she peri­ odically expressed. Fei thought it unfair that Edward had nicer ­things, that he ­didn’t have to do chores, and that her parents expected her to take care of him, for example, by preparing snacks for him to eat while he studied. They did not give her studies the same priority. At the time, Edward d­ idn’t care. He admit­ ted that he picked on Fei ­because he knew that he could get away with it. But by the time I interviewed him, his perspective had changed completely. He had a more critical view of gender and a more nuanced understanding of his own gendered relationships. To illustrate, Edward told me about a conflict with Fei that occurred when he revealed his gay identity on social media. Ner­vously, determinedly, Edward opened up this part of his life to his friends. He described coming out to his ­father and expressed gratitude for his ­father’s kindness. Many friends showed their support by liking the post. Fei did not like the post. She had witnessed another part of the story—­her ­father’s tears, the worry he carried ­under that kindness—­and she admonished Edward for being selfish and careless. At the time, Edward said, “I was sad ­because I took a big step. It was difficult to come out to my friends and my dad. I was feeling vulnerable and needed encourage­ ment . . . ​So I scolded her, saying that she did not consider my feelings and had no idea how brave I was to take this step.” Gradually his sadness subsided, and Edward began to feel empathy for his ­sister. He placed her words and actions in the context of the gender asymme­ try in their ­family and found a dif­fer­ent way to understand her negative emo­ tions: “She grew up in an environment where boys ­were more impor­tant than girls. As a result, she thought that I was always self-­centered and d­ idn’t care if I hurt my parents.” Although I did not have the opportunity to interview Fei,

44  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

I did interview other heterosexual s­ isters who voiced similar feelings. Some saw their b­ rothers’ gay sexuality as yet another expression of their privilege, the free­ dom to do as they pleased without concern for o­ thers. Edward is not alone in his growing awareness of gender disparities in soci­ ety and in his own ­family. Many gay in­for­mants ­were openly critical of the treatment endured by the ­women in their lives. At the same time, nearly all of the men I spoke to, including Edward, believe that gay men face more f­ amily pressure than do lesbians in Taiwan. As Edward explained, “I think it’s harder for gays b­ ecause Asian socie­ties place a strong value on continuing the f­ amily line and have higher expectations for men. The society still has some chauvin­ istic ele­ments [大男人主義 da nanren zhuyi], so it might be hard to accept two men d­ oing t­ hings like that, you know, a man being penetrated by another man.” About half of the gay men I interviewed brought up the social status of ­women and girls at some point during the interview. As one man said, “If a ­woman c­ an’t find a suitable husband, the f­ amily w ­ ill be like, ‘It’s OK, d­ on’t worry; we’d rather you be single and happy and have a good job than marry into a f­ amily where you have to work very hard and have a more difficult life.’ ” Or as another put it: “Men are ­under more pressure to get married than ­women ­ omen have more power than they are. Especially now, b­ ecause of feminism, w used to. They can work and support themselves, and society can accept this. So ­they’re not ­under so much pressure to get married.” In the first instance, the interviewee believes that ­women face less pressure ­because they have less power within their marital families; as a result, families of origin are reluctant to push them into a potentially unhappy or exploitative marriage. In the second instance, the interviewee believes that w ­ omen face less pressure b­ ecause they have more power due to feminist gains. What­ever reasons they pointed to, they agreed that gay men face “more pressure” b­ ecause their families expect them to marry and continue the paternal line. ­ other of Heterosexual parents made similar comments. For example, the m a bu fen lesbian said, “Chinese parents place more responsibilities on boys, so they are stricter with boys. Boys have pressure to carry on the ­family; girls have less pressure. So I think it is easier for lesbians than for gay men.” ­ hether gay men or lesbi­ My interview did not include a question about w ans face more pressure. All of t­ hese statements, and many more like them, arose organically from p­ eople’s reflections on their families and other questions and topics in the interview. This was something they felt it was impor­tant to tell me. I came away from t­ hese interviews with a clear picture of patrilineal conti­ nuity as a source of pressure for gay and bisexual men. The hetero-­marital ­family remains the vital engine through which men honor and provide for their par­ ents and venerate their ancestors.18 ­These responsibilities cut to the heart of what it means to be a son, husband, ­father, and man in society. At the same

(Queerly) Carrying on the ­Family • 45

time, this picture is incomplete without w ­ omen, who are instrumental to the ­whole pro­cess of succession and to maintenance of the f­ amily and home. On a very basic level, the expectations that Edward ­will carry on the ­family, that he is therefore entitled to what­ever resources the f­ amily can muster, and that Fei ­will join another ­family and find her security ­there (limiting her contribution and thus increasing her indebtedness to her parents) are sources of pressure for ­sister and b­ rother alike. In ­these economic and pragmatic terms, lesbian ­daughters occupy a precarious position, no less significant—­though decidedly dif­fer­ent—­from the one occupied by gay sons.

“The ­daughter is too overbearing; she c­ an’t have every­thing!”: Peishan I met Peishan at a small lunch gathering of friends at a café owned by a T. Peis­ han is herself a confident and very masculine T from central Taiwan and the eldest of two ­daughters and one son. Upon learning about my research, she insisted that she be interviewed at once. I had learned to have my consent forms and recording device always on hand, but still I hesitated, saying that the inter­ view takes a long time and might eat up the after­noon. (Looking back, the ethnographer in me is dismayed that I would give up any chance to do an inter­ view, but at that point interviews ­were coming hard and fast, and in any case my demurring seemed to only encourage Peishan more.) She rejoined, “Well, let’s see how far we get.” In the end, we did the ­whole interview before ­going our respective ways, Peishan to her ­mother’s ­house and I to the high-­speed rail. Or, to be more precise, Peishan went to the ­house in which her ­mother lives. It is not r­ eally her ­mother’s h ­ ouse. Originally the h ­ ouse belonged to her ­father, who passed some years ago very suddenly. At that time, the ­family had to make a quick and unexpected decision about what to do with the property. Peishan knew that her ­brother had gambling debts, so she offered to put the deed in her name, “to keep it for him.” Peishan had no plans to take the h ­ ouse, only to protect it from debt collectors. Her m ­ other consulted her s­ isters, Peishan’s maternal aunts, who disapproved loudly, declaring, “No! How can it be given to the ­daughter and not the son?” “But the truth is,” Peishan said, “when my f­ amily bought the ­house, I was nineteen and had started working. I helped pay for the h ­ ouse, while my b­ rother never brought a penny home. Honestly speaking, the h ­ ouse was rightfully mine; it ­wasn’t too much to ask at all. But my m ­ other said no. What she said was unacceptable to me. It was the biggest conflict I had with her in my life. She said, ‘No, the ­daughter is too overbearing. She c­ an’t have every­thing [女兒 太霸氣了，要全部不行 nv’er tai baqile, yao quanbu bu xing]!’ ” It is telling that Peishan identified the housing issue as the biggest conflict she had with her ­mother. When I asked about memorable ­family conflicts,

46  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

lesbians w ­ ere more likely to bring up t­ hese sorts of disparities and insults than to describe an inflammatory coming out incident, although ­those had also taken place in some of their lives. Peishan, for her part, did not worry too much about how her obvious and lifelong T-­ness landed on t­ hose around her. Her ­mother did not press her to marry, although she did encourage Peishan to be faithful and not a player. When Peishan introduced her current partner as “your daughter-­in-­law, my wife,” her ­mother quipped, “­every ­woman you bring home, you call her your wife!” Peishan told me this with a twinkle in her eye, though she hastened to say that, of course, the latest “wife” was dif­fer­ent, more special. Peishan made me smile often during the interview and, ­later, as I read and reread the transcript. She is a good storyteller and a jovial person, who describes her f­ amily life with warmth. Of all my in­for­mants, she is among t­ hose who experienced the least pressure to marry. Her f­ ather said that he would be more concerned about a gay son than a lesbian ­daughter ­because a son needs to carry on the ­family name. To be sure, ­there is a lack of angst in Peishan’s ­family story that many queers anywhere in the world would envy. At the same time, this story involves a dif­fer­ent kind of f­ amily pressure, one that has received less attention in the areas of lesbian, gay, and queer ­family studies. Peishan does not have a personal responsibility to carry on the patri­ line. But the subsequent routing of f­ amily resources to boys and men impinges upon her life in other ways. In addition to helping to pay for the h ­ ouse, Peis­ han used her own money to s­ ettle her b­ rother’s gambling debts on two occa­ sions. She is not exceptional in this regard. Her actions are consistent with a pattern in my fieldwork and with a body of research showing that ­women often subsidize men’s accumulation of wealth. Rapid economic development in late twentieth c­ entury Taiwan was made pos­si­ble, in part, by f­ amily firms that w ­ ere owned by men and capitalized on w ­ omen’s unpaid ­labor.19 In con­ temporary Taiwan, firstborn sons continue to receive a disproportionate share of f­amily resources, while firstborn ­daughters are expected to sacrifice and care for other ­family members.20 Leta Hong Fincher found that in mainland ­ omen have invested their personal savings in China, significant numbers of w homes that have only a man’s name on the deed.21 Th ­ ese men are usually, but not always, their husbands or fiancés; in one case that Fincher describes, a ­woman experienced ­family pressure and ultimately agreed to help purchase a home for her male cousin.22 Housing issues are pertinent in Taiwan as well. Since the mid-1980s, Tai­ wan has suffered a housing affordability crisis compounded by economic restructuring and rising in­equality. ­These conditions contribute to a para­ ­ omen are in a better position to divorce or delay doxical climate in which w marriage, yet housing costs severely curtail the possibilities of living alone, and ­house­holds headed by ­women are more likely to be poor.23 In fact, of all

(Queerly) Carrying on the ­Family • 47

the f­ amily issues raised by queer ­women in my fieldwork, housing was among the most urgent, a result I had not anticipated and did not even ask about directly ­until several w ­ omen brought it up unprompted. Some, like Peishan, faced housing issues as singles, ­others considered housing as they deci­ded ­whether to marry or divorce, and ­those who did divorce faced some of the most difficult circumstances of all—an issue I ­will circle back to in the story I tell next.

“If I d­ idn’t walk into married life . . .”: Yijun Yijun is a T from northern Taiwan and the m ­ other of a gay son. I came to know her as she was approaching her fiftieth birthday, a significant milestone as Yijun had previously planned to end her life at age fifty (a plan she did not carry out). As much as Peishan’s interview makes me smile, Yijun’s interview leaves me even ­today with bittersweet feelings. In my photos of Yijun, her body is tense and tight; one can see that she f­ aces the world with a hard shell. Yet she brought me into her home and her life with unrestrained generosity. I learned quickly to be careful what I said around Yijun; on my first night in her home, I com­ plimented her tea set, and she ­rose early the next morning to buy me an identi­ cal set. From that moment, I was never careless in her presence with a word or a look. She was quiet and very observant. Like Peishan, Yijun had masculine qualities that w ­ ere impossible to hide from early childhood. The similarity in their stories ends t­ here. In contrast to the warmth and closeness Peishan experienced, Yijun grew up feeling like an outcast in her ­family. She connected her early awareness of difference (­later developing into a sense of herself as a lesbian and a T) to vivid memories of neglect. For example, Yijun recalled that her parents never took her to the doctor or offered medicine when she was sick, although they did t­ hese t­ hings for her siblings. Their rejection became a part of her self-­concept and view of the world. Eventually Yijun managed to leave her natal ­family by getting married to a man. By this time, she had already fallen in love with a w ­ oman, and she brought this ­woman into her marital home as a “friend” who co-­resided with Yijun and her husband for the duration of their twenty-­year marriage. Over a period of two de­cades, Yijun made six dif­f er­ent attempts to run away with her girlfriend, Ming. The first took place when she was four months preg­ nant with her son. However, due to complications with her pregnancy, she had to deliver the baby by C-­section. At that time, the C-­section procedure required a husband’s signature. As a result, her husband learned of her where­ abouts, and he came to the hospital along with his w ­ hole f­ amily to collect his wife and child. At this point, Yijun checked herself out of the hospital intend­ ing to run away again. But she could not bring herself to leave her son b­ ehind. She had neither the ­legal standing nor the economic and social stability to

48  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

raise her son on her own, so for the sake of this child, she went back into her married life. The years that followed ­were extremely laborious for Yijun, and her weight dropped rapidly from fifty to forty kilograms (about eighty-­eight pounds). “In ­those years, we fought a lot,” Yijun recalled, “­because ­those two, my husband and my girlfriend, they both pulled for my attention, and the child needed me also.” B ­ ecause Yijun could not satisfy Ming’s request for “a life with just the two of us,” and ­because she feared that Ming would leave her to marry a man, Yijun cared for her girlfriend in e­ very way she knew. She shopped for and pre­ pared all their meals, even returning home on her lunch break to cook for the ­family. She bought, washed, mended, ironed, and laid out Ming’s clothes each day. She indulged her whims and anticipated her desires while shutting her eyes to perceived and a­ ctual infidelities. At the same time, she felt guilty for her inability to give her husband a normal marriage and did what she could to make it up to him as well. She even submitted to her sexual “duty as a wife,” although she described this to me as a feeling of being raped. This was a power­ful state­ ment for Yijun to make, especially given that she, like other T’s of her genera­ tion, avoided speaking openly of sex in her conversations with me. Yijun wanted to give her son a stable home and a good f­ uture, all the more so b­ ecause of her own ongoing ­battle with depression. She expressed to me numerous times that she had found the community “too late,” having already experienced crushing sorrows, but that her son had a chance to build a stable life with his boyfriend and find real happiness. Yijun sacrificed many years of her life for her girlfriend, husband, and son, whom she loved and cared for in dif­fer­ent ways. Ultimately Ming did leave her to marry a man. Yijun fi­nally divorced her husband and broke ties with her marital and natal families. When I met her, she described herself to me as a person without a home. In my outsider’s impression, Yijun had a harmoni­ ous home with her son, with whom she enjoyed an im­mensely close and affectionate relationship. However, for Yijun, this was not a true home and ­family, and although she accepted this for herself, she wanted something dif­ fer­ent for her son. What do ­these glimpses of Yijun’s story reveal to us about ­family pressure ­under patrilineality? For Yijun, “­family pressure” took multiple forms, from devaluation within her natal f­ amily on the basis of her female sex and mascu­ line gender to forced dependence on her husband (e.g., the fact that she could not get a C-­section without his signature), to the pressure she felt in balancing her competing commitments to her husband and girlfriend, while also striv­ ing to be an attentive ­mother to her son. Yijun acknowledged that some p­ eople look down on her for entering a heterosexual marriage. “But,” she added, “if I ­didn’t walk into married life, how could I get such a sweet and close friend— my son?” Yijun used heterosexual marriage strategically to leave her ­father’s

(Queerly) Carrying on the ­Family • 49

­ ouse­hold and create a life with her girlfriend that would have been impossi­ h ble other­wise. A variety of social and ­legal forces contributed to the longevity of Yijun’s marriage. For several de­cades prior to 1996, the courts upheld a tradition of paternal custody and awarded child custody to f­ athers in 80–90 ­percent of all cases.24 This is the ­legal climate in which Yijun lived when she first ran away and then returned to her marriage. Following the “best interests of the child” standard for custody cases promulgated in 1996, the courts have favored m ­ others in custody decisions. However, if a ­mother’s lesbian sexuality is known or her masculinity vis­i­ble, the court may view her care as incommensurate with the child’s “best interests” as subjectively determined by the judge’s personal values and biases.25 Once custody is granted, single ­fathers are more likely to receive support from their families of origin and to use home owner­ship and remar­ riage as a path to upward mobility. Single m ­ others are more likely to be dis­ placed from their homes and to endure financial hardship.26 For Yijun, as for many single ­mothers, this entails frequent moving. In total, she has moved ten times in her son’s twenty-­one years. Her son, a sweet-­tempered boy who is always looking out for his m ­ other’s well-­being, says he d­ oesn’t mind moving; he is used to it. This only deepens Yijun’s heartache that she cannot give him a more stable home. Writing about postwar T-po communities, Yenning Chao situates the fre­ quency with which T’s “move ­house” in the context of their broader economic and social precarity. The word jia (家), si­mul­ta­neously connoting one’s ­house or dwelling place, ­family, and home, represents a concrete form of social secu­ rity, a productive and self-­replicating f­ amily life, and “a specific form of mate­ rial base on which a legitimate patrilineal h ­ ouse­hold can be founded.”27 From this view, Yijun’s description of herself as a person without a home refers not only to her constantly changing place of residence but also to her lack of social and familial security in a broader sense. Chao locates the “closet” for Taiwanese lesbians in patrilineal obligation to maternal productivity.28 Even when lesbians do manage to meet this obligation, the closet or confinement can be difficult to bear. Yijun starkly embodies this obligation in her weight loss and physical decline, revealing its toll on her body and life. Indeed, the emphasis on f­ amily pressure (壓力 yali) may at times cover over the depth of f­amily oppression (壓迫 yapo) that has characterized the lives of many queer ­women and T’s. Yijun negotiated the terms of her patrilineal obligation by bringing her w ­ oman partner into her marital home and, ­later in life, by fi­nally divorcing her husband. Her story is a searing indict­ ment of the system that failed her, from which she desires to ­free her only child, ­ omen and T’s who carry out and a testimony to the creative determination of w the daily work of patrilineal reproduction while making space for queer inti­ macy within their heterosexual ­house­holds.

50  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

“Can you imagine the amount of pressure you’d be ­under if you had to go and live with another ­family?”: Lu, Betty, and Henry To deal with the kinds of f­ amily pressure I have been describing, an increasing number of lesbians and gay men are turning to marriages with each other.29 Arrangements within t­ hese marriages vary but usually involve a public display of coupledom for the families and private maintenance of lesbian and gay rela­ tionships. Both partners are released from expectations for heterosexual con­ summation and, ostensibly, enjoy freedom to cultivate their primary same-­sex relationships ­under the protective cover of marriage. In many other re­spects, however, Taiwanese lesbians who marry gay men and bear c­ hildren in t­ hese ­unions face similar pressures to lesbians who marry straight men, particularly surrounding f­ amily work and pressure from in-­laws.30 This was the situation facing Betty, a po in her thirties married to a gay man and partnered with a T, Lu, whom I got to know over a period of several months. At the time of our interview, Lu and Betty had been together for sixteen years. Five years into their relationship, Betty married a gay man, Henry, and had three c­ hildren with him through in vitro fertilization, a method that is only available to heterosexually married c­ ouples in Taiwan. Lu explained to me that they did this to be filial and to carry on Henry’s ­family name. In retrospect, she did not think this was a very good idea, “­because getting married is not just two p­ eople’s business. It involves two families! What you need to do is more than you expect. It’s so much trou­ble.” At first, she said, Betty’s husband did a good job. He visited Betty’s f­ amily on holidays and made it appear as if they ­were a normal ­couple. But this arrangement did not last long: “He ­couldn’t stand it very quickly. He was like, ‘Why do I have to deal with your parents?’ His tolerance for pressure is very low, you know. I said, ‘My girlfriend has to live with your parents! Have you ever thought about that? Can you imag­ ine the amount of pressure you’d be u­ nder if you had to go and live with another ­family? Y ­ ou’ve never lived with her parents!’ He merely visited them on ­Father’s Day, ­Mother’s Day, and Chinese New Year, and that’s it! And he ­couldn’t stand it!” For Henry, the pressure reached a boiling point in the year of his f­ ather’s death. In a series of volatile incidents, he outed all three of them to his ­family and asked Betty’s parents to pick her up. Seeing my astonishment in hearing of this turn of events, Lu explained, [Henry] felt like he had fulfilled his responsibilities. He had paid his dues to his ­father by giving his ­father posterity. That’s when he had a big fight with my girl­ friend and said he wanted a divorce . . . ​I was very angry when I heard about it. I called him and said, “Why did you do this ­thing? Now that you have told your parents, should we carry on this act? You s­ hould’ve at least let me know first!”

(Queerly) Carrying on the ­Family • 51

He said, “This is our business; you have no right to get involved [你沒有資格管 這件事 ni meiyou zige guan zhe jian shi].” I got so angry that I went over to his ­house immediately. He just hid upstairs and was too scared to come down to talk to me. I was like, “You chicken shit!”

In months of knowing Lu, this was the only time I saw a disturbance in her good-­natured demeanor and even temper. Her eyes flashed, and she pounded the ­table with her fist, as she repeated, in a tone of rage and disbelief, “No right!” It is no won­der she was so angry—­despite the agreements they had made at the outset of the marriage, Henry had used Lu’s ­legal and social vulnerability to position her as a nonmember of the f­ amily. A ­ fter a few moments, she calmed down and continued with her story. Betty’s ­father announced that he would take his ­daughter home but that he ­wouldn’t take the kids. At this point, Betty was crying ­because she d­ idn’t want to leave her c­ hildren, and Henry was terrified of caring for them by him­ self. In the midst of this chaotic scene, Henry relented, saying, “­We’ll just keep ­things the way they are.” The conflict ended with no vis­i­ble change in the ­family structure. But relationships among the f­ amily members would never be the same. Before this incident, Henry’s ­mother had welcomed Lu as an attentive friend to her daughter-­in-­law and helpmate in rearing the ­children. Now she disapproved of Lu’s presence in their lives. This was especially hurt­ ful coming from someone Lu knew well, someone who had praised and thanked her for the very same be­hav­iors that she now condemned. “Of course it makes me feel sad; it’s a terrible feeling,” Lu said. “All the good ­things about me suddenly dis­appeared . . . ​When she ­didn’t know, every­thing about me was positive; now every­thing she thinks and says about me is bad. She ­doesn’t want me to be in touch with her ­daughter or her grandchildren . . . ​I ­can’t ­really say anything ­because ­a fter all, she is my partner’s mother-­in-­law, and Betty is very filial to her.” This new development has put a tremendous strain on Lu, Betty, and the ­children. They have to meet discreetly, away from home; the rhythm of their daily lives has entirely changed. Although they did not discuss the situation openly with the ­children, Lu said, “Kids know. The l­ ittle girl is so smart; some­ times she tells me, [whispers] ‘I am coming to stay at your place secretly on ­ on’t tell their f­ ather, e­ ither. All three of them are like that. Monday.’ The kids w They are very sweet. This relationship has lasted for a long time; our bond is strong.” Henry continues to date men, but his ­mother, b­ rothers, and ­children have never met a boyfriend or lover. In this regard, Henry is similar to other gay men in this research who balanced their gay relationships and ­family lives by draw­ ing a firm boundary between them. Betty’s daily f­ amily responsibilities make this kind of compartmentalization impossible. Like many married w ­ omen in

52  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

Taiwan, she lives with her husband’s f­ amily and provides the bulk of the child­ care, eldercare, and other domestic work for her marital f­ amily, including her husband’s ­brother and his b­ rother’s c­ hildren. When I asked about Henry’s con­ tribution to the day-­to-­day work of raising ­children, Lu chuckled. “A gay man is still a man,” she said. “In this way, he is no dif­fer­ent from any other husband.” Betty and Henry’s marriage provides a clear picture of ­family pressure as a gendered phenomenon. A ­ fter the kids ­were born, Henry felt that he had ful­ filled his obligations to his parents. He did not view rearing the c­ hildren as part of his duty to carry on the f­ amily name; for him, getting married and produc­ ing ge­ne­tic offspring was the culmination of filiality. In contrast, Betty’s f­ amily obligations did not culminate but rather proliferated with her marriage and the birth of her c­ hildren. As a result, she had limited time to cultivate extramari­ tal relationships. Like Yijun, Betty resolved this by incorporating her lesbian partner into her marital f­ amily structure, identifying Lu as a co-­parent and merging families. For example, on the Chinese New Year holiday, Betty visits Henry’s relatives, Lu’s parents, and her own parents on designated days. But ­because the bulk of her time is spent with her ­children and in-­laws and ­because the families have become uneasy about their relationship, Lu and Betty are not able to be together as often as they would like. Meanwhile, Henry has fewer constraints on his time and mobility, and his intimate relationships are not subject to the same level of scrutiny. The pressure Henry f­ aces is heavy, so heavy that he tried to break the f­ amily apart to relieve it. My argument should not suggest that Henry is ­free to sim­ ply live as he pleases with no real cost to himself. Indeed, he carries the finan­ cial pressure of supporting a ­family, and this surely drains his time, just as Betty’s unpaid and paid work drain hers. In one of the first published accounts of gay-­ lesbian contract marriage, John Cho identified dif­fer­ent kinds of risk among his South Korean in­for­mants, requiring high levels of intimacy and trust in their partners or prospective partners. W ­ omen risked exploitation in a patriar­ chal institution, while men risked their financial investments in the marriage.31 ­ ere Writing about heterosexual men’s experiences of fatherhood (and relevant h to Henry’s experience), Pei-­Chia Lan describes the economic burden on working-­class and middle-­class ­fathers in Taiwan as they try to balance bread­ winning with new ideals of involved fatherhood.32 On top of this, t­ here is the emotional toll of trying to keep every­thing compartmentalized. Recall Bing, the gay man in chapter 2 who described this as a kind of suffocation, “a ­house without win­dows.” Perhaps this is the feeling Henry tried to relieve by reveal­ ing every­thing to his parents. The pressure on Betty is heavy also. She is responsible for Henry’s parents, ­ omen for the c­ hildren, and for somehow incorporating Lu (whom both w describe as the ­children’s second m ­ other) without disturbing the peace in her

(Queerly) Carrying on the ­Family • 53

home. Th ­ ese days the f­ amily pays heightened attention to where she goes and with whom. That Lu is my key in­for­mant in this ­family is no accident. Betty did not have an uninterrupted period of f­ ree time to do the interview. Last of all, and perhaps most hidden from view, is the pressure on Lu. She must share the ­woman she loves with a l­ egal husband and in-­laws, nurture her ­children from afar, and do her best to maintain goodwill so that she does not lose access to her f­ amily entirely. She experiences the weight of the f­ amily system through her connection to Betty and in her public life as a single ­woman. Lu has three b­ rothers, all of whom have c­ hildren. She is exempt from pressure to carry on the ­family name and even from the pressure to provide her parents with grandchildren, although they do pester her about getting married. But her joys and sorrows are tangled up in ­these very issues. Henry’s responsibility to give his ­father posterity, his low tolerance for pressure, Betty’s reproductive ­labor, and her desire to be filial—­these are Lu’s business too, even as she fights the suggestion that she has “no right” to be involved. Read together, the narratives belonging to Peishan, Yijun, Betty, and Lu reveal a diversity of ways that queer ­women subsidize and participate in the reproduction of the patrilineal h ­ ouse­hold. Their strug­gles to secure housing, to secure rights to their c­ hildren, to resist marriage or endure marriage, are among the ­family issues that they experience as most pressing.

“Transing” the Patriline: Zhixiong Up to this point, I have analyzed f­ amily pressure u­ nder patrilineality without querying the biologized conception of men’s and w ­ omen’s f­ amily roles on which the ­whole system is based. Although within-­sex gender differences ­matter in ­these stories—­masculinity for Peishan, Yijun, and Lu and femininity for Betty have meaningful impacts on ­family life—­all have acted in the role of ­daughters. Peishan describes her girlfriend as her wife, but she does not perceive herself (nor is she perceived by her f­ amily) as her m ­ other’s son. That Peishan cannot lay claim to f­ amily assets like the h ­ ouse is as much a part of this construction of being a d­ aughter as is her sexed body. At the outset of this research, I expected trans in­for­mants to negotiate patrilineal reproduction primarily in relation to the sex assigned to them at birth, even if some families made space for gender fluidity in their interactions. I anticipated, for example, that trans w ­ omen would remain accountable for giving their f­ athers posterity, while trans men would share with lesbians the pressures of compulsory reproductive ­labor and cumulative material disadvantages within their families. ­There is certainly a degree of overlap between the experiences of lesbians of all genders, including very masculine T’s, and the experiences of ­people who distinguish themselves from female masculinity on the basis of their more intrinsic maleness. However, my interviews with transgender

54  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

in­for­mants and my participation in trans spaces soon disrupted my assumptions about the singular authority of birth sex in determining a person’s place in the patriline. It is true that many trans men are treated as ­daughters and trans ­women as sons of their families. Yet I also found that changing laws, policies, and practices surrounding sex and gender designation, as well as the produc­ tion of gender through daily ­family roles and rituals, had in fact altered some in­for­mants’ obligations to their parents and relations to their ancestors. This came through clearly in my interview with Zhixiong, a straight man in his forties who was assigned female at birth and identified as a T for a large part of his life. Beginning from age thirty-­six, he had top and bottom surger­ ies,33 began regular testosterone injections, and changed his l­egal gender from female to male. Zhixiong lives in close proximity to his aging m ­ other, for whom he is the primary caregiver. His ­father has passed away. He is the eldest child (now becoming the eldest son) of five siblings, having three younger ­brothers and one younger ­sister. Zhixiong’s surgical operations and subsequent ­legal transition seven years prior to our first meeting marked an impor­tant set of changes in his ­family and personal life. However, becoming a man did not, for Zhixiong, begin or cul­ minate with surgery or with the receipt of his new ID card. The f­ amily roles and rituals he performed w ­ ere just as impor­tant in constructing his maleness and communicating to Zhixiong’s ­family that he is not a ­woman. For exam­ ple, Zhixiong has always been the one to burn incense and pray to his paternal ancestors, a task ordinarily reserved for men. He took on the role of a son during the funeral of his maternal u­ ncle, among kin who (in Zhixiong’s estimation) had no knowledge of “gender transition” as a l­egal or medical construct. This was among the first stories he told when we sat down for his recorded interview. In his usual animated manner, Zhixiong explained the significance of this event: “If you are a ­woman, the rituals you perform [at a funeral] are less com­ plicated. They would just say, ‘Oh, you are the d­ aughter of so-­and-so,’ and then they would give the incense to pray, and that’s it. But if ­you’re a man, the ritu­ als you have to perform and how you are treated is all very dif­fer­ent. Like for some procedures in a funeral, b­ ecause a ­woman is viewed as unclean [不潔 bu jie], they w ­ ouldn’t let a w ­ oman take part in t­ hose t­ hings. For men, they d­ on’t have this concern. I went to my ­uncle’s funeral as a son of my f­ amily.” Some of the relatives in attendance knew but d­ idn’t say anything about it. Most d­ idn’t know. His m ­ other introduced him as one of her sons. As ­there are many sons in the f­ amily, Zhixiong said, “they had no idea which son I was.” Zhixiong’s experience at the funeral is impor­tant for several reasons. First, this occasion illustrates how gendered ­family roles may be negotiated, in this ­ other, who chose case, by relatives who knew but ­didn’t object, and by his m to pres­ent Zhixiong as a son rather than a ­daughter. In this moment, the ­family acted cooperatively to place Zhixiong in the position of a son for the

(Queerly) Carrying on the ­Family • 55

purpose of the funeral rites. This occasion also illustrates how f­ amily rituals create gender. Stepping into this role made Zhixiong a man as much as his masculinity made this role accessible to him. Acting as a son at the funeral was not about “gender identity” at the individual level but about Zhixiong’s social-­structural ­family position and his relationship to his ­uncle, ­mother, and ­brothers. ­These ritual and relational components are part of a collective transition in which all members of the ­family adjust their roles relative to one another. Susan Stryker, Paisley Currah, and Lisa Jean Moore describe “transing” as “a practice that takes place within, as well as across or between, gendered spaces. It is a practice that assem­bles gender into contingent structures of association with other attributes of bodily being, and that allows for their reassembly.”34 This notion of transing highlights the permeability and border-­crossing nature of multiple social relations and “spatial territories.” Stryker and colleagues invite us to examine “trans-” not only as a horizontal movement between gendered spaces but also as movement on a vertical axis, beyond the “concrete biomate­ riality of individual living.”35 ­Here imagining the patriline as a vertical axis, “trans-” for Zhixiong is a journey to a dif­fer­ent point on this axis as much as it is a personal or individual journey of self-­actualization and bodily integrity. His presence in the highly gender-­scripted funeral, as well as in performing the ­family prayers, entails a relocation on multiple planes: physical (quite literally, where he stands, how he occupies space), relational, and ancestral. In becoming a son, Zhixiong symbolically moves into his f­ ather’s h ­ ouse­hold. Yet his place in this h ­ ouse­hold remains contingent on the actions and choices of other ­family members. For example, how ­will Zhixiong be positioned at the end of his life and ­after—as a man who is also a ­daughter or with the full ­family membership and privileges of a son? It is one t­ hing to assume an ambiguous stance as one of “many sons,” leaving the question of “which son” to onlookers’ discernment, and quite another to be officially and ritually recognized as such. The fluidity between “­daughter” and “son” is another means of transing the patriline, crossing and re-­crossing its gendered borders.

“It’s like the questions you would get as a heterosexual!”: Zhixiong and Amei Zhixiong recognizes himself as the eldest son of the ­family and, as such, feels a special responsibility for his ­mother’s welfare. He performs tasks that are ste­ reo­t ypically masculine, such as providing for his ­mother financially, and ste­reo­typically feminine, such as d­ oing her grocery shopping, taking her to the doctor, and administering her medicine. ­A fter I asked him a long string of ques­ tions about who does this or that for his ­mother, Zhixiong summed it up by saying emphatically: “Me, me, me—­it’s all me!” He explained that ­because his

56  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

siblings have families of their own, “it is undoubtedly me who w ­ ill take on the responsibility for my m ­ other as she ages. That’s how I’ve always felt.” While Zhixiong has always felt this way, he senses that his m ­ other’s feelings have changed as she increasingly comes to perceive him as a son. Prior to his transition, she felt uncomfortable with the care arrangement. “But now,” he said, “she feels that it’s right, like ‘I am being supported by my son, not my ­daughter [我是給兒子養，不是給女兒養 wo shi gei erzi yang, bu shi gei nv’er yang],’ and no one can say anything about it.” His ­mother also changed her attitude ­toward the w ­ omen that Zhixiong brings home. ­A fter surgery, he said, “She started asking all kinds of questions, like, ‘That girl you brought home the other day, when are you g­ oing to marry her? ­Will the two of you live at home a­ fter getting married?’ It’s like the ques­ tions you would get as a heterosexual!” This was a new source of pressure not only for Zhixiong but also for his girl­ friend, Amei, who previously enjoyed the status of a friend and a guest in his ­mother’s home. As their relationship became increasingly intelligible as a hetero­ sexual partnership and as Zhixiong gradually assumed the role of a son to his ­mother, Amei also began to transition in terms of her place in the ­family, from that of a ­daughter’s friend to that of a son’s partner and (in this ­mother’s mind) a prospective daughter-­in-­law. This created unexpected prob­lems for the ­couple. Amei resisted the obliga­ tions of her new role. She did not want to move in with Zhixiong’s m ­ other or take on additional ­house­work. Zhixiong was willing to compromise in some ways but not ­others. “If we get married, my ­mother is ­going to have expectations of you,” he said. “It w ­ on’t be the same as when you w ­ ere just my girlfriend. You w ­ ill be her daughter-­in-­law; that’s a dif­fer­ent role. Traditional or not, that’s just how it is . . . ​You ­don’t have to do it now ­because you are my girlfriend; you h ­ aven’t entered my f­ amily yet [妳還沒進我家門 ni hai mei jin wo jia men].” Zhixiong was comfortable being a man in his own mind and body and in daily social interactions. He shared that he was less prepared for the transfor­ mation of his f­ amily gender—­the possibility of bringing a wife into his f­ amily as a daughter-­in-­law and becoming the head of a h ­ ouse­hold. He continued, “Now that my ­mother sees me as a man, she gives me the same pressure as a man . . . ​You w ­ ere used to being someone’s boyfriend, but now you could be someone’s husband and then a child’s ­father! You could become a ­family [你會變成一個家庭ni hui biancheng yige jiating].” In this case, to “become a ­family” refers not merely to individual commitments or state recognition of the conjugal unit but, in a larger sense, to assimilation into the hierarchical ­family structure and reciprocal kin obligations that Zhixiong and Amei had managed to evade when they w ­ ere perceived as a same-­sex c­ ouple. In the end, both deci­ded that they ­were not ready for heterosexual marriage, and eventually

(Queerly) Carrying on the ­Family • 57

they broke up. Zhixiong is, in his own words, “not against marriage,” but he thinks it ­will be some time before he is ready to take on all that it entails. Gender transition is a f­ amily pro­cess, a recalibration of multiple intersect­ ing familial roles. Even as Zhixiong steps out of the category “­woman,” he makes new space for a daughter-­in-­law to enter the ­family and care for his ­mother in ways traditionally expected of a son’s wife. On one hand, t­ hese new possibili­ ties for ­family formation are defined in explic­itly heterosexual and male-­ centered terms. Yet in other ways, Zhixiong’s new role in the ­family trou­bles the very system it appears to reinforce. It is impossible for Zhixiong to have bio­ logical ­children, having had his reproductive organs removed as part of his surgeries; thus, he cannot continue the ­family line in a conventional manner.36 Nevertheless, he imagines stepping into shoes usually filled by a patrilineal successor. As a caregiver to his ­mother, Zhixiong performs both convention­ ally masculine and conventionally feminine tasks, such as preparing food and caring for her physical body, as well as offering her material provision. In this way, Zhixiong is redefining what it means to be a son, husband, and ­father, even as he grapples with the profound changes this transition holds for him­ self and potentially for his partner. ­There is a large body of research on ways that sex and gender operate as sys­ tems of privilege and distribution within families. But we know very l­ittle about how t­ hese systems intersect with pro­cesses of gender transition and changes in gendered embodiment. Zhixiong’s story also raises a ­great number of questions that my data cannot answer. The perspectives of transwomen and other transfeminine p­ eople are particularly pertinent to this discussion. I offer some preliminary ideas about this in a separate publication, but my data are limited in this regard.37 We still have much to learn about trans experiences of patrilineal and patrilocal ­family arrangements and much to gain by looking at ­these arrangements through the clarifying lens of queer and transgender lives.

Conclusion: What Is Queer about Carrying on the ­Family? In 1972, Margery Wolf analyzed Taiwanese kinship from ­women’s point of view and argued that ­women experience f­ amily continuity in ways that differ pro­ foundly from men, whose accounts, at the time, dominated the anthropologi­ cal lit­er­a­ture. For men, ­family was permanent, linking ancestors to descendants in an unbroken chain, and their place within it secure. For w ­ omen, f­ amily was contingent, “a con­temporary group that comes into existence out of one ­woman’s need and is held together insofar as she has the strength to do so.”38 Wolf used w ­ omen’s perspective to improve on male-­centric and thus partial understandings of agnatic kinship. In the nearly fifty years between the publi­ cation of Wolf ’s monograph and this one, kinship and ­family studies have become much more deeply attuned to ­women’s lives. Queer theories of kinship

58  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

have also emerged. Like feminist interventions, queer approaches ask us to reconsider the naturalness of kinship and ­family constructs and how they are taken for granted. As the field develops, it has become increasingly attentive to the ways that queers both (and at times si­mul­ta­neously) disrupt and occupy normative and hegemonic kinship structures.39 The stories I have presented in this chapter are a part of this larger proj­ect. Collectively they point to the con­ structedness of patrilineal succession, its embodied and material anchors, its enduring power, and the complicated strategies that ­people use to live within and outside of its pull. Carrying on the f­ amily is, without question, a tremendous source of pres­ sure for queer sons, including gay and bisexual men and transfeminine ­people raised as boys in their families. The attention given to this issue reflects the deep, felt concerns and strug­gles of many ­people. Lesbians have neither the respon­ sibility nor the social capacity to give their ­fathers posterity. Yet they, too, do the work of carry­ing on the f­ amily with their bodies and with their paid and unpaid l­ abor, through supporting their b­ rothers and husbands, raising their ­children, and caring for their parents and in-­laws. They strug­gle with the pro­ duction of gendered ­family roles and the allocation of ­family responsibilities and privileges. Gendered roles and responsibilities are also tools for some, like Zhixiong, to carve out spaces of authenticity and recognition within their families. In the case described, recognition came with a price—­becoming a son in his ­mother’s eyes created new pressures for Zhixiong and his girlfriend, Amei. Ultimately Amei made the choice to leave a relationship that was no longer acceptable to her. For t­ hose who do not perceive themselves as able to make such a choice, or who delay it for many years as Yijun did, the price may be higher still. As t­ hese stories remind us, ­family life is a confluence of lived realities and can never be fully seen from a single location; what is good, even liberating, for one ­family member may be constraining for another. Heterosexual f­amily members appear in this chapter as significant but supporting characters: Edward’s s­ister, Peishan’s and Zhixiong’s ­mothers, even Betty’s f­ ather, drawn momentarily into the falling out of the coopera­ tive marriage. How might this story unfold if we followed it through their eyes? Taking this shift of perspective, I turn next to ways that many of the issues raised in this chapter, including patrilineal succession and gendered ­labor, have mattered to the heterosexual members of ­these families.

4

Gender and Power across Generations

One of the most exhausting days of my fieldwork was also among the most piv­ otal. Around noon, I wrapped up an emotionally absorbing interview with the ­mother of a gay son, and the two of us walked to a nearby support-­group meeting for parents of LGBT c­ hildren. On that day we welcomed a new parent, Bai Mama, who had only recently learned that her son is gay. Her son brought her to the meeting and then politely excused himself so that his m ­ other could express her feelings more freely. Bai Mama sat near the door with her hands tightly folded in her lap. As the meeting progressed, she became more and more agitated, ultimately bursting into tears. Through sobs that shook her small frame, she poured out her painful feelings: “Raising my ­children was extremely difficult for me. Their ­father was away all the time; my ­mother died; I was r­ eally all alone. It was just me; I did every­thing for them. How could it turn out this way?” Other parents worked to console her, sharing fragments of their own stories in the pro­cess. But this was not a wave of sadness that would pass quickly; it was a deep well, coming up from the depths of her being. Something about Bai Mama reminded me of my own ­mother: her size and appearance, her body language, the way she shook when she cried as my ­mother once did, struggling to absorb, on a visceral level, the loss of the dreams she had labored and sacrificed to realize for her child. I was well practiced in steeling myself emotionally to make it through t­ hese encounters. But as an ethnogra­ pher, I had committed to being pres­ent—no walls, no steel. So on that day,

59

60  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

I forced myself to sit, to listen, to hear and feel without filter an outpouring of grief that went on for half an hour, each new expression of disappointment slamming through my ears and into my heart. ­A fter the meeting, I went straight home, typed up my field notes, and, although it was only five o­ ’clock in the after­ noon, went to bed. Perhaps ­until that moment I was not ready to go as deeply as I needed to into my m ­ other’s grief and into the grief of t­ hese m ­ others whose stories I was audacious enough to try to tell. (“How can you claim to understand us?” my ­mother asked once, very near the beginning, a question for any ethnographer who writes about a pain that is not her own. That t­ oday my m ­ other ­will read this book and talk openly with me about ­every part, even this one, is the result of a committed vulnerability on both her part and mine.) What Bai Mama expressed and the place and manner in which she shared ­these ­things compel us to look longer and harder at motherhood and loss and at loss as a gendered phenomenon. In the previous chapter, I analyzed ways that w ­ omen’s cumula­ tive material disadvantages shape gay, lesbian, and transgender lives. ­These forces also structure the lives of the heterosexual and cisgender members of ­these families. Like other ­mothers, Bai Mama had made enormous personal sacrifices to rear her ­children in ways that would fortify their ­f utures and her own social security. Yet ­after all this, she would not see the fruits of her ­labor in the concrete form of her son’s marriage and the help of a daughter-­in-­ law to carry on the f­ amily work that had been compulsory for w ­ omen of her generation. Bai Mama had lost her last vestige of any “patriarchal bargain,” and as Deniz Kandiyoti predicted, she experienced this as a genuine personal tragedy.1 Gender and power are primary analytic frames within queer and transgen­ der studies, yet they remain underutilized in research on straight, cis f­ amily members of LGBT p­ eople. Often we engage t­ hese f­ amily members solely in rela­ ­ hole of their tion to their views about sexuality, rather than considering the w lives and the ways in which they, too, experience in­equality and construct gen­ dered selves. This chapter follows parents and grandparents of LGBT (adult) ­children as they navigate the rapid social changes and per­sis­tent inequalities that characterize con­temporary ­family life in Taiwan. The setting in which Bai Mama expressed her disappointment is also sig­ ­ ill explore. Support groups are part of a new industry around nificant in ways I w parent education, which has had class-­and gender-­specific effects on the ­mothers and ­fathers of LGBT ­children in Taiwan.2 Few educational resources or groups target grandparents, although they also are involved in bringing up ­children and in ­family decision-­making. Paternal grandparents often live with or near their queer grandchildren and play an influential role in the lives of sons and daughters-­in-­law who, like Bai Mama, are struggling to make sense of a new real­ity. That Bai Mama brought up her own ­mother’s death, connecting

Gender and Power across Generations • 61

this sorrow to her loneliness as a parent and her anguish about having a gay son, speaks to the importance of ­women’s natal families and maternal grandparents as well.

Sampling and Social Class The chapter analy­sis draws from in-­depth interviews with twelve heterosexual ­mothers and six heterosexual f­ athers, as well as interviews with queer and trans ­people talking about their parents, field observations at bimonthly support-­ group meetings for parents of LGBT ­children, workshops on LGBT ­family issues, lectures on homo­sexuality or­ga­nized and attended by parents, and visits in ­family homes. Grandparent stories are based entirely on ethnographic fieldwork and second­hand accounts. Thus, my research speaks more to queer and trans experiences and perceptions of grandparenting than to grandparents’ own views. (Most p­ eople w ­ ere not officially out to their grandparents, making interview requests a bit tricky. However, ­these grandparents surely have much to say about their ­family lives, and I hope that in the ­future researchers ­will find ways to involve them more directly.) Parent interviewees ranged in age from fifty-­three to seventy (birth years 1942 to 1959) and had LGBT c­ hildren ages twenty-­one to forty-­five at the time of interview. Th ­ ese parents differ from my larger sample of queer and trans interviewees in that they are less diverse by social class. All of the ­fathers in the study have college or gradu­ate degrees and hold professional or white-­collar jobs, such as teacher, businessman, or professor. All but one of the ­mothers in the study finished high school, and some have college degrees; one is a business­ woman, four are retired teachers, and the o­ thers are ­house­wives or retired from vari­ous pink-­collar jobs. ­These parents constitute a distinctive group, hail­ ing from upwardly mobile families that benefited from Taiwan’s rapid eco­ nomic growth in the second half of the twentieth ­century. Many recalled poverty as a major characteristic of their childhoods, and a majority of their own parents, especially their ­mothers, had limited or no formal education. In contrast, the parents I interviewed had achieved middle-­class lifestyles, replete with travel and leisure activities, pensions upon retirement, and reserves to support their c­ hildren through a prolonged transition to adulthood. I also interviewed queer and trans ­people from less eco­nom­ically and edu­ cationally privileged families, and I spent time with some of ­these in­for­mants in their ­family homes. ­These parents welcomed me into their homes as a guest. However, they did not take much interest in my research or see it as being con­ nected to their lives. It was mainly middle-­and upper-­class parents who agreed to be interviewed, e­ ither ­because they wanted to put their grievances on rec­ord or ­because they believed academic research on this topic might help other parents like themselves, and ­because they had the ­free time to do so.

62  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

This pattern in participation did not reflect a greater discomfort with the topic among working-­class parents, many of whom ­were tolerant or simply not fixated on their child’s sexuality or gender to the same degree. Some integrated the child’s same-­sex partner into their lives ­because this partner contributed to the pool of f­ amily resources, for example, helping to staff the f­ amily’s food stall over a busy holiday weekend. T’s faced less discrimination in blue-­collar or service-­class jobs than in white-­collar jobs that often pressured them to fem­ inize themselves at work; as a result, parents perceived their masculinity as less of a barrier to their livelihood (a topic I return to in chapter 5). Participation instead reflected practical constraints that prevented working-­class parents from attending the support-­group meetings and other events for families; a lack of personal connection to work conducted by a foreign researcher to be writ­ ten up in En­glish (Yiping Shih describes “internationalization” as a pursuit of Taiwanese upper-­class parents;3 this pursuit may help to explain the interest in my study taken by some parents in the sample); and a preference for commu­ nicating about this issue in ways not captured by the support-­group/self-­help style of the organ­izations or my recorded-­interview approach. ­Because my interview data overrepresent Taiwanese middle-­and upper-­ class parents, I relied more heavi­ly on queer and trans narratives about working-­ class ­mothers and ­fathers, just as I did for grandparents. It is impor­tant for readers to recognize that my arguments in this chapter and the next contribute primarily to our knowledge of middle-­class and newly middle-­class families. Further research is needed to center the experiences and perspectives of working-­ class and impoverished parents and grandparents of LGBT p­ eople in Taiwan.

Compressed Modernity and Intergenerational Relationships The sociologist Kyung-­Sup Chang defines compressed modernity as “a civili­ zational condition in which economic, po­liti­cal, social, and/or cultural changes occur in an extremely condensed manner in re­spect to both time and space, and in which the dynamic coexistence of mutually disparate historical and social ele­ments leads to the construction and reconstruction of a highly com­ plex and fluid social system.”4 Demographic changes that unfolded over two centuries in Eu­rope and North Amer­i­ca occurred in a quarter of that time in the rapidly developing economies of East and Southeast Asia.5 Cross-­ generational relationships are a lightning rod for many of t­ hese changes, draw­ ing ­people into communication across the “mutually disparate historical and social ele­ments” that Chang describes. Many of ­today’s Taiwanese ­mothers and ­fathers have ­adopted parenting styles that differ appreciably from ­those of their own parents, who, as grand­ parents, are also often caregivers of ­children with a say in how ­those ­children should be reared.6 At the same time, as they grow up, ­children themselves

Gender and Power across Generations • 63

develop f­ amily values and preferences often departing from the worldview of earlier generations.7 In a period characterized by longer life expectancies, declin­ ing birth rates, more ­women ­doing paid work that is not anchored in the home and f­ amily, and the privatization of care globally, grandparents play pivotal roles as both providers and recipients of care.8 Grandparents and especially grand­ mothers find themselves tasked with transmitting values and rearing ­children in a world utterly transformed from the one they knew as parents and as c­ hildren themselves. The effects of compressed modernity on parenting and cross-­generational relationships differ for ­women and men. In chapter 2, I wrote about new par­ enting discourses that emphasize parental attentiveness to ­children’s needs and emotions and parents’ “duty and ability to control and shape the lives of their ­children to a very fine degree.”9 It is generally ­mothers who feel this duty most keenly and who perform attentiveness as part of their daily work. F ­ athers are more involved now than in the past, but m ­ others continue to serve as the major caregivers for their families, and global pressures have largely magnified this gendered division of l­ abor.10 Meanwhile, ­women’s labor-­force participation has increased steadily, nearly doubling for m ­ others of preschool-­aged ­children between 1983 and 2006.11 The simultaneous increase in ­women’s earning poten­ tial, labor-­force participation, and a discourse of intensive mothering, without a commensurate increase in men’s help with h ­ ouse­work, contributes to the challenge of balancing work and f­ amily for ­mothers in Taiwan.12 Structural barriers to more involved fathering, including workplace and travel demands, stagnant mobility, and the absence of role models for the “new f­ ather” ideal (a ­father who is still the breadwinner but also emotionally and physically involved in his ­children’s upbringing), have led to feelings of ambivalence and inadequacy for some men.13 Yu-­Han Jao and Jui-­Chang Allen Li find that husbands’ earning poten­ tial tempers the work commitments of ­mothers with young ­children—­that is, ­women whose husbands’ earnings are higher are less likely to work com­ pared to ­women whose husbands’ earnings are lower, pointing to the class privilege of certain mothering styles.14 New parenting discourses hold up as “modern” and superior a child-­centered, hands-on parenting approach that advantages middle-­class families with full-­time homemakers and access to supplementary educational tools.15 Pei-­Chia Lan identifies a host of ways that Taiwanese state-­sponsored institutions, media, schools, and other author­ ities mea­sure working-­class parents against the ideals of emotional sensitiv­ ity, expressive communication, and cultural and educational cultivation and find them wanting.16 ­These same ideals (emotional sensitivity, expressive communication) largely drive the support ser­vices available to parents of queer and transgender chil­ dren. Even ser­vices that strive to be inclusive often inadvertently alienate

64  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

working-­class parents. In one story recounted to me, a working-­class c­ ouple traveled a long distance by bus from their rural community to attend a meet­ ing for parents of LGBT c­ hildren in Taipei. Keen to stay in touch while also protecting their privacy, the meeting or­ga­nizer asked for their cell phone numbers since landlines may be intercepted by other ­house­hold members. The parents did not have cell phones; they did not leave any number and never returned to the group. Another volunteer who was pres­ent at the meeting felt that the organ­ization had failed to connect meaningfully with t­hese par­ ents. She acknowledged that making such a connection would require more than a warm welcome and good intentions; the organ­ization would need to adjust its communication style and its assumptions about parents’ needs, priorities, and resources, including their access to private spaces and control over their own time. As this story illustrates, outreach to parents of queer and transgender ­children must be intersectional if it is to be successful. Class-­and gender-­ “neutral” approaches typically presume a middle-­class f­amily with shared points of reference and ways of thinking and acting. This is true in other social and cultural contexts as well. In the United States, for example, K. L. Broad and colleagues find that both gay-­affirming organ­izations (e.g., PFLAG) and Christian conferences emboldening parents to protect their ­children from homo­sexuality (e.g., Focus on the ­Family’s Love Won Out) rely on middle-­class constructions of ­family and valorize white, middle-­class parenting styles.17 Overlaid with traditional notions of gender and f­ amily work, t­ hese approaches also catapult m ­ others into more labor-­intensive roles.

Gender Variation in Parenting a Queer Child Han Mama is a high-­school-­educated w ­ oman from southern Taiwan; she is married to an entrepreneur and the ­mother of three ­children, including Skye, the young T introduced in chapter 2. Like many middle-­class ­mothers, she is deeply absorbed in her c­ hildren’s lives. She became concerned about Skye’s sexuality in ­middle school and confirmed her hunches by reading Skye’s diary and letters to her girlfriend—­a fairly common strategy among the parents in my research. While most parents, including f­ athers, perceived reading a letter or diary as a reasonable way to get to know one’s child, it was typically ­mothers who took it upon themselves to gather such personal information. ­Mothers spent more time with their ­children on average and ­were more likely to uncover diaries and letters as part of their routine ­house­work. ­A fter that, Han Mama took Skye to many dif­fer­ent Taoist t­ emples to have the impure spirits exorcized, as well as to hospitals for psychiatric evaluations. Her combined use of resources with deep history (such as Taoist spiritual practice) and t­ hose that are relatively new and largely imported (such as the

Gender and Power across Generations • 65

psychiatric treatment of sexuality) reflect the hybridized parenting climate of the early 2000s, when this occurred. Han Mama performed all of t­ hese tasks without involving her husband, who was frequently away on business. It was common for m ­ others to do this type of work entirely on their own. Often they did not tell other ­family members, and some took active mea­sures to prevent their husbands and in-­laws from finding out. When I got to know the Hans in 2011, this had been g­ oing on for twelve years and showed no signs of letting up. Han Mama also heightened her sur­ veillance of Skye’s physical person, resulting in numerous confrontations like the one Skye recalls h ­ ere: [My mom] started picking on my dressing and all that. I remember one time I was wearing a polo . . . ​I r­ eally ­didn’t notice the button part of a ­women’s polo and men’s polo is on the opposite side. You ­didn’t know that ­either right? [Amy: No.] Yeah, on pants it’s like that too; the button is on the opposite side. You know, I always buy guys’ clothes. But this is just two buttons; I ­really ­d idn’t think she would care! And she had a prob­lem with the polo. At that time, I was in her room, and Tim [Skye’s elder ­brother] was also t­ here, and he supported me. Tim said, “I ­don’t think ­there’s anything wrong with the polo. Why make a big deal out of such a small t­ hing?” And my mom said, “Ask your s­ ister if she is biantai [變態, a freak or pervert].”

Han Mama’s level of attention to Skye’s clothing, even noticing when the but­ tonhole is on the “wrong” side of a polo shirt, is remarkable but not unusual. A majority of the m ­ others I interviewed had devoted enormous quantities of time to studying their ­children and managing even the smallest details of their lives. The parenting discourses analyzed by Lan of “understanding your child” and “keeping your child com­pany”18 contributed to a heightened surveillance, which for LGBT young p­ eople and T’s in par­tic­u­lar often translated into a continu­ ous gender harassment in their homes. Many T’s in this research reported a period of daily gender-­related conflicts with their m ­ others. None reported the same level of conflict with their f­ athers, not ­because f­athers w ­ ere necessarily more tolerant but b­ ecause most ­fathers ­were not paying such close attention to their bodily comportment, clothing, hairstyles, the tenor of their voices (i.e., dropping their voices into a lower reg­ ister), masculine accessorizing (buying and using products such as bags, phone cases, watches, e­ tc. marketed to men), or other characteristics that their ­mothers deemed insufficiently feminine. In many cases, their ­fathers had simply not figured out that they ­were T and that they had girlfriends, while their ­mothers had connected the dots long ago. I did collect second­hand stories of ­fathers regulating their T d­ aughters’ gen­ der. In one case, a ­father and ­mother acted together to confiscate and destroy

66  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

their T ­daughter’s chest ­binders. They ­later came to Hotline feeling uncertain about what to do next, as their ­daughter had slipped into a deep depression. Ultimately t­ hese parents deci­ded to permit their ­daughter to bind her chest rather than risk the deterioration of her ­mental health. The ­father in this story is typical in that he took ­these steps (destroying the ­binders and then coming to Hotline to seek counsel) together with the child’s ­mother. Whereas ­mothers often acted alone to regulate T masculinity, f­ athers acted primarily in concert with ­mothers and at ­mothers’ initiative. ­Mothers retained responsibility for col­ lecting information and determining a course of action even as they drew on ­fathers’ help and authority to carry it out. Interactions around gender and clothing ­were also a way for ­mothers to communicate support to their c­ hildren. The owner of a shop selling chest ­binders shared that ­mothers and ­daughters ­will sometimes come in to purchase ­binders together, a gesture the owner found especially heartwarming. Pur­ chases of gender-­appropriate clothing sent a meaningful signal to T’s, trans ­people, and cisgender siblings, who pointed to such actions as evidence of their ­mothers’ affirmation of their own or their siblings’ embodied gender. T and trans in­for­mants could often recall the first time their ­mothers made such a purchase, suggesting that it held a special significance in their memories. Nobody recalled their f­ather d­ oing the same. Again, this was not b­ ecause ­fathers w ­ ere necessarily more rejecting but b­ ecause f­athers generally did not shop for, wash, mend, or iron their clothes and ­were less in tune with the types of clothing their c­ hildren liked to wear. For the largely middle-­class parents in my sample, new parenting discourses that emphasize intensive, hands-on micromanagement of c­ hildren’s activities and bodies allocate a disproportionate amount of this work to ­mothers. This in turn shapes the ways that ­mothers and f­ athers relate to their LGBT ­children, placing m ­ others on the front lines of ­family negotiations about sexuality ­ athers in this research occupied a more authoritative but also a and gender. F more distant role. They weighed in on educational and c­ areer choices and other major decisions, while m ­ others managed the more ongoing aspects of their ­children’s development and lives.

A ­Labor of Love? Against the backdrop of the emerging parenting discourses analyzed by Lan19 and increased emotional exchanges described by Chin-­Chun Yi and Ju-­Ping Lin,20 new ideals of parents who love (愛 ai), know (認識 renshi), and accept (接受 jieshou) their c­ hildren permeated the meetings and workshops I attended for parents of LGBT ­children. This was part of a clear messaging strategy by parents (both ­mothers and ­fathers but disproportionately m ­ others) who ­adopted activist-­educator roles in reaching out to other parents and families. Love, knowledge, and ac­cep­tance formed a template for coping with gender and

Gender and Power across Generations • 67

sexual nonnormativity that centralized the emotive aspects of the parent-­child relationship and promoted a more egalitarian communication style between the generations. Organizers framed the love between parents and c­ hildren as a natu­ral and gender-­neutral concept. M ­ others and ­fathers alike ­were exhorted to draw on their natu­ral love for their LGBT ­children in order to accept them; sons and ­daughters ­were encouraged to trust in this love in order to take the emotional risk of coming out to their parents. But in their own homes, p­ eople enacted and experienced love in distinctly gendered ways. Speaking to a roomful of queer young ­people, Tsai Baba, the f­ ather of a gay son, offered this explanation for why Taiwanese m ­ others share a particularly close bond with their c­ hildren and are (perceived to be) less rejecting of lesbian and gay sexuality than are ­fathers: “­Because your ­mother gave birth to you, b­ ecause you came from her body, she feels that you are a part of her. No ­matter how old you are, you w ­ ill always be her child and a part of her.” The ­mothers on ­either side of him and the young gay moderator of the panel nodded their heads in agreement. They resonated with this notion of m ­ others being uniquely connected to their ­children through gestation and childbirth and thus better prepared to accept a child who is lesbian or gay. Queer in­for­mants also spoke of their m ­ others’ love in the language of sac­ rifice and care work, as B ­ ubble, a self-­described soft T, describes h ­ ere: “She’s a ­great mom. She always takes care of us. She cleans our desks, makes our beds; she’s a perfect mom. But she ­doesn’t r­ eally have power. Once ­things happen, then she ­will just step aside. I think b­ ecause my dad is stronger, so she w ­ ill just give up. But since I was a kid up to now, I’ve always known that she loves me very much . . . ​She cooks for me, asks me what I need, and she gets me what­ ever I need . . . ​A nd ­she’ll say, ‘You need to keep warm; ­don’t get cold.’ You can just feel that she loves you and cares about you so much; she ­will do every­thing for you ­because you are her child.” Writing about mothering as an arena of po­liti­cal strug­gle, Evelyn Nakano Glenn notes, “­Because motherhood is often romanticized as a l­ abor of love, issues of power are often deemed irrelevant or ­ ubble’s account is typical in its depiction of m ­ others’ l­ abor made invisible.”21 B and unique in that she acknowledges power dynamics as well as love—­that is, she recognizes not only her ­mother’s ongoing l­ abor of love but also her ­mother’s lack of power in the f­ amily context. Power is especially salient as Taiwanese ­mothers’ ­labor, which has traditionally been wholly appropriated by the patrilineal f­ amily system, is reframed as a voluntary expression of maternal love. Within this new ideological framework, the logic of love becomes a con­temporary explanation for w ­ omen’s continued sacrifice and ser­vice to the ­family. In contrast, paternal love came up most often in relation to f­ athers’ high hopes and expectations for their ­children. Many ­people cited f­ athers’ love as a

68  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

reason to be more discreet about their sexuality. Liang Mama, for instance, learned of her son’s gay sexuality in his second year of college and has helped him to keep this information from his f­ ather for a de­cade, even as her son, Peter, has gone to work full-­time for a queer organ­ization.22 Liang Mama and her hus­ band share a close relationship and talk about “every­thing” except this, so her silence has required an enormous effort. If she attends a gay event, she has to invent a story about where she is g­ oing and with whom. She tries to normalize the relationship between Peter and his boyfriend and pres­ents vari­ous reasons for why Peter is not yet married. Liang Baba knows that their son gives lectures in public schools, so she tells him that Peter works for a foundation mentoring youth. If a gay-­related topic comes on TV, she quickly changes the channel. When the Pride March happens once a year, she feels ner­vous that her hus­ band might see Peter or his boyfriend on the news. Relating all this, Liang Mama said, “It’s very difficult. I’m ­under ­great pressure. When I go to Hotline, I sometimes see parents who attend together. I wish it could be this way for our ­family. I wish his ­father would accompany me to Hotline . . . ​I ­really want him to know, to participate with me in this activity. But I’m afraid this would disappoint him and ruin the harmony in our f­amily. B ­ ecause I know he has such high expectations and love for our kids. So, it’s a dilemma. I d­ on’t want him to be hurt and disappointed, but I ­really want him to know!” (italics added). Liang Mama spoke of this dilemma on numerous occasions; it was constantly on her mind. She recognized Liang Baba as a loving parent and connected this quality to his high expectations and vulnerability to the hurt and disappoint­ ment from which she strove to protect him. Many p­ eople said such t­hings about their husbands and ­fathers. For example, Han Mama told her ­daughter Skye, “You are your ­father’s trea­sure; if he finds out, it is as if his trea­sure fell to the ground and shattered.” Autumn, a bisexual ­woman from central Taiwan, explained that she has chosen to protect her ­father’s feelings by not coming out; her reasons for ­doing this include the fact that he loves her and has a ten­ der (溫柔 wenrou) personality. Queer in­for­mants also said that they did not want to disappoint their ­mothers. But they did not connect this directly to their ­mothers’ love, and they ­were more likely to risk disappointing their m ­ others in order to seek support from them. ­People who described their ­mothers as loving and tender usually saw them as having a greater capacity to accept their LGBT ­children. For young ­people in par­tic­u­lar, ­mothers’ love was a reason to come out, while ­fathers’ love was a reason to stay s­ ilent. My findings suggest that even as a discourse of love emerges for both m ­ others and ­fathers, it reinforces the gendered division of emotion work and f­athers as authority figures, by linking maternal love to ­mothers’ sacrifice and care and paternal love to c­ hildren’s deference and re­spect. ­Because queer p­ eople are more likely to rely on their m ­ others for support and ­because ­mothers often know about their sexuality first or second only to

Gender and Power across Generations • 69

siblings, some ­mothers also shoulder the task of educating ­fathers about ­these issues. Huang Mama described numerous instances in which she implored her husband to change his attitude t­ oward their bu fen lesbian d­ aughter. When Huang Baba threatened to cut off their ­daughter’s finances, Huang Mama intervened to make sure this did not occur. Recounting ­these tense occasions, Huang Mama said, “It has always been difficult for me. I have to be the bridge between them.” She built this bridge through years of emotion work, smooth­ ing conflicts between her husband and d­ aughter, talking to Huang Baba about queer issues, exposing him to films and TV shows with LGBT characters, rea­ soning with him (“Can you just cut off your own d­ aughter? Of course not”), and taking care of his emotions in other ways. His gradual opening up is due in a large part to Huang Mama’s patient efforts. ­Mothers in this research faced multiple and often competing pressures. They wanted close relationships with their c­ hildren but w ­ ere keenly aware of their responsibility to guide and prepare the ­children to lead normatively successful lives. They worried about how to achieve this in the realms of sexuality and gen­ der and had no models on which to base their efforts. Queers, for their part, ­were far more likely to discuss sexuality-­related ­matters with their ­mothers than with their ­fathers. Often they asked their ­mothers—or ­were asked by them— to keep their queer identities hidden from their ­fathers and other relatives. ­Mothers also placed pressure on themselves to support their ­children and felt it reflected poorly on them if they could not. Bai Mama confessed that she did not feel the desire to touch or embrace her gay son and concluded this with a personal rebuke, saying, “I know it is disgraceful for me to feel this way [我知道我這樣很糟糕 wo zhidao wo zheyang hen zaogao].” F ­ athers did not make such self-­critical remarks in the parent meetings or during their interviews, no m ­ atter how sad or angry they felt. It was m ­ others who did the more reflexive work, contemplating, from e­ very a­ ngle, their role in all that had happened.

Child Outcomes and Maternal Selves The notion of “parent causality,” described by Ellen Lee as “the idea that ­there is a direct and inexorable relation between ‘parenting’ and ‘outcomes’ mea­sured by how successful in vari­ous ways a child might be,” has gathered steam in the twenty-­first c­ entury and infuses global and transnational parenting discourses.23 Among the ­mothers in my sample, a sense of accountability for child outcomes ran very deep, beginning from the moment of conception and encompassing the ­whole of their c­ hildren’s lives. Many wondered if they had somehow influ­ enced the child’s sexuality or gender in utero. For example, Tan Mama recalled that during her pregnancy with her very masculine T d­ aughter, her m ­ other told her that she needed to have a second boy. “Maybe I wished she was a boy,” Tan Mama said. In fact, Tan Mama did not know for sure that she had wished for

70  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

this; the mere possibility of wishing was enough to raise questions: Had she influenced the child’s gender in some way? Was her ­daughter born with the qualities of the son her ­mother (might have) hoped for? Such questions are consistent with a prevalent belief that the ecol­ogy of the ­mothers’ womb directly affects the child’s characteristics and the closely related practice of taijiao (胎教“prenatal education”) in which ­mothers begin to care­ fully cultivate their ­children during pregnancy.24 As a component of traditional Chinese medicine, prenatal education practices ­were believed to influence fetal health, the ease of ­labor, and the gender of the child, with proper taijiao pro­ ducing sons and improper taijiao resulting in d­ aughters. More recently, taijiao practices have focused on improving the child’s intellect and disposition. Thus, con­temporary forms of cultivation may begin well before the child’s birth, and the possibility of ­mothers influencing a child’s sexual orientation or gender expression fits within this logic. Other ­mothers worried that they had contributed to their sons’ gayness by encouraging feminine be­hav­iors in early childhood. (No ­mothers had encour­ aged masculine be­hav­iors in their d­ aughters. When masculinity did emerge in girls, it was identified and problematized much earlier, compared to femininity in sons, among the ­mothers in my sample.) Liang Mama wondered if she had raised her son to be too well mannered; her husband, she noted, is not such a polite and careful person. Did her son’s manners make him more inclined to be gay? When Tong Mama’s son was very small, she dressed him up in pink clothes, and a co-­worker who had studied counseling told her that such actions might incline her son t­oward homo­sexuality. Now that her son r­eally is gay, Tong Mama worries that the co-­worker was right. During our interview, she asked me many times ­whether I thought a ­mother could influence her child’s sexuality. I stressed that I did not, but I failed to adequately comfort Tong Mama, who cried quietly throughout the interview and left still believing that she is some­ how at fault. Liang Mama and Tan Mama do not feel so sad about having a gay son and T ­daughter, respectively. Liang Mama volunteers her time to counsel and encourage other parents of LGBT c­ hildren. Tan Mama and her husband fully embrace their d­ aughter and are among the most supportive parents in my research. Yet t­hese three m ­ others share a nagging feeling that they may have caused their child to be more masculine (in Tan Mama’s case) or feminine (in Tong Mama’s and Liang Mama’s cases) and attracted to the same sex. ­Fathers also cared a ­great deal about where their kids ended up in life. But they ­were less likely to blame themselves for unexpected outcomes. When I asked Wu Baba and Mama, parents of a gay son, how parents like themselves are viewed by the general public, Wu Baba jumped in right away: WU BABA  ​My answer to this question is very ­simple: I ­don’t know! [Laughs]

I’ve never heard anything about this.

Gender and Power across Generations • 71 WU MAMA  ​Well, for example, I’ve heard some ­people say the ­mother is to blame

for not bringing her child up correctly [媽媽沒有把小孩教好 mama meiyou ba xiaohai jiao hao]. WU BABA  ​(incredulously) What? ­People say that? How strange! WU MAMA  ​So I think parents themselves also need support to face this kind of pressure [父母也需要支持來面對這種壓力 fumu ye xuyao zhichi lai mian dui zhe zhong yalì]. WU BABA  ​I d ­ idn’t know ­there was such a pressure.

Wu Baba, like other ­fathers I interviewed, was highly knowledgeable about public opinion and Taiwanese society writ large. In fact, I often had to steer ­fathers away from ­these abstract topics to elicit descriptions of their own f­ amily lives. Yet when it came to this topic, even the most thoughtful ­fathers ­were sur­ prised and puzzled to hear that m ­ others are u­ nder a disproportionate amount of pressure related to childrearing. Through the Wus’ conversation, a clear gender difference emerges on two dimensions: ­mothers’ greater accountability for bringing up their c­ hildren as “correctly” gendered and heterosexual mem­ bers of the society, and, subsequently, ­mothers’ greater attention to wider public opinion on this issue. This sense of personal and social accountability for their c­ hildren was a pri­ mary f­ actor motivating ­mothers to seek information from spiritual advisors, psychiatrists, NGOs, self-­help books, and other resources marketed to parents. Both m ­ others and ­fathers procured information with a goal of changing their child (often the first goal) and/or understanding the child (often a l­ater goal, once ave­nues of change ­were exhausted). But m ­ others had an additional goal of understanding themselves and re-­examining their role in the child’s life. They reflected on their past and pres­ent circumstances, the aspects of their biog­ raphies that they wished to see replicated for their ­children, and ­those they ­were willing to give up or wanted to change. Often this prompted m ­ others to think and talk about gender in more structural ways, evaluating it not as a personal characteristic but as a component of a larger kinship system that organizes the l­ abor and bodies of ­women.

“Why on earth should a w ­ oman go through such hardship?”: ­Mothers Talk about Marriage The first (and by no means the last) time I heard a ­mother critique the insti­ tution of marriage, I was sharing cake with Ye Mama and her ­daughter ­DuoDuo in their home in a small town in northern Taiwan. DuoDuo, a po in her early forties, had just finished telling her m ­ other about the phenome­ non of lesbians getting married to gay men (as Betty and Henry did, described in chapter 3). Ye Mama was dismayed and urged her ­daughter not to do this. DuoDuo assured her that she had no such plans and conceded that the

72  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

arrangement is unfair to the ­woman. At this point, Ye Mama weighed in at length: Y E MAMA  ​Yeah, I am someone’s wife, too, so I know, in a ­family, the son’s wife

has the lowest status. Like some of your ­father’s ­sisters are younger than me, but they would complain to their ­mother about me, and my mother-­in-­law would believe them and treat me badly. So, living together with them was very tough for me. By the time I had my second child, my sisters-­in-­law had ­children, too. I had to take care of five ­children all by myself. When I washed the floor, I was not allowed to use a mop ­because my mother-­in-­law ­didn’t like that. I had to be on my knees wiping the floor with a rag in my hands. I had to get up at five e­ very morning to make boxed lunches while I cooked breakfast. It was the most miserable period of my life. When I finished making breakfast, I had to feed all five ­children. By the time I could sit down to eat, t­ here was nothing left on the ­table. So, I would mix what­ever was left in the dishes in a bowl of rice. I ­really felt like a dog would have better food than me. That’s why I was very skinny then, less than fifty kilograms (about 110 pounds). Why on earth should a ­woman go through such hardship? DUODUO  ​Yeah, but a lot of times, they [­people in lesbian-­gay marriages] reach an agreement ­because ­those gay men need to carry on the ­family line [傳宗 接代­chuan zong jie dai]. Y E MAMA  ​Then it’s their business; they should not bring a lesbian into this as a sacrifice [幹嘛找女同志來犧牲 ganma zhao nv tongzhi lai xisheng]! DUODUO  ​They think if they pay the lesbian, then it’s a mutual agreement. I pay you to help me, like that. Y E MAMA  ​This help is a lifetime of suffering [這個幫忙是一輩子的痛苦 zhege bangmang shi yi beizide tongku]. If the man refused to divorce, the money would run out eventually! The w ­ oman’s ­whole life would be ruined. No, it’s not good.

In this conversation, Ye Mama marshaled evidence from her own experience as a wife and ­mother to dissuade her ­daughter from marriage to a (gay) man. In her estimation, and in Henry and Betty’s example, men’s pressure to carry on the f­ amily line becomes w ­ omen’s work, or what Ye Mama called “a lifetime of suffering.” Ye Mama was one of several ­mothers who made peace with her ­daughters’ sexuality (she had one T, one po [DuoDuo], and one unmarried straight ­daughter) by recalling her own unhappy nuptial life and concluding that ­women are not necessarily better off with a heterosexual marriage and ­family. As I was writing up my analy­sis of ­these data, a story from Taiwan’s popu­ lar Apple Daily newspaper popped up in my Facebook newsfeed, where it

Gender and Power across Generations • 73

immediately caught my eye. The story, titled “So what if my d­ aughter ­doesn’t have a heterosexual ­family [女兒無法異性成家 那又怎樣 nv’er wufa yixing chengjia na you zenyang]?” was submitted to the newspaper anonymously by the ­mother of a po lesbian. This m ­ other devoted a large part of the story to her experiential knowledge of w ­ omen’s suffering and sacrifices within heterosex­ ual marriage: My m ­ other gave her w ­ hole life to her f­ amily, and I followed her in this path. I began working at age 16. I shouldered the economic burden of the ­family, and I married the man that my f­ amily recommended . . . ​A ll of my income before mar­ riage was given to my ­family of origin, and ­a fter marriage all of my income was given to my marital f­ amily. I never saved anything for myself . . . ​For over 10 years, I have worked 20 hours a day . . . ​I am like my ­mother; I d­ on’t have a sense of self [都沒有自我 dou meiyou ziwo] . . . ​As a w ­ oman, I saw my m ­ other and myself, and I know the days that we spent with men ­were not ­really happy . . . ​Maybe [my ­daughter] cannot form a ­family with someone of a dif­f er­ent sex. But so what? Did my m ­ other and I achieve a happy and stable life? We have not been happy our ­whole lives [我跟我媽一輩子都不快樂 wo gen wo ma yibeizi dou bu kuaile] . . . ​ If my ­daughter wants to form a ­family with another ­woman, I have no reason to oppose it based on sex.25

Like the author of this article, ­mothers in my research did not see heterosexual marriage as necessarily bringing happiness to their d­ aughters. Some pointed to their own strug­g les with husbands and in-­laws as a reason to support their ­daughters’ same-­sex ­unions. Having queer ­daughters thus provided ­mothers with an opportunity to reflect critically on marriage as an institution, identi­ fying its disadvantages for heterosexual w ­ omen as well as lesbians.

Reflexivity among M ­ others of Gay Sons Reading the Apple Daily article, my mind returned to Bai Mama, whose pain­ ful feelings I wrote about in the beginning of this chapter. Like the article’s anonymous author, Bai Mama connected her own suffering and loneliness within marriage to her child’s sexuality. But as the ­mother of a gay son, Bai Mama asked a dif­f er­ent question—­not “So what?” but “How can this be?” She experienced her son’s refusal to marry as a dislocation of her life as well as his. Given the gender asymmetry within marriage, it is not surprising that some ­mothers of gay sons encouraged them to marry lesbian wives, while m ­ others of lesbians w ­ ere much less likely to support this and some, like Ye Mama, emphatically opposed it. Other ­mothers of gay sons used self-­reflection to achieve a more peaceful state of mind and to move away from a singular focus on marriage. As Liang Mama shared, “I just think that if I’m always suffering from all ­these thoughts,

74  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

then I ­won’t be happy [為了這些事情悶悶不樂，那我也不會快樂weile zhexie shiqing menmenbule, na wo ye bu hui kuaile]. I should open my heart [to my gay son] so that I ­will be happier.” At first, Liang Mama felt sad that her son would not have a traditional marriage and ­family. But ­later she felt that not get­ ting married is also OK. Finding happiness with the right person is more impor­tant than marriage itself. In this way, Liang Mama was able to disentan­ gle a “happy” life from traditional or expected ways of being and to apply this new way of thinking to both herself and her son. In Yijun, the T ­mother introduced in chapter 2, I witnessed another exam­ ple of self-­reflection as a result of parenting a gay son. Yijun had lived in an unhappy heterosexual marriage for many years. But upon learning that her son Tommy is gay, Yijun began to think more boldly about what she wanted for him and, by extension, for herself. Armed with determination to protect him from the f­ amily abuse she had endured, Yijun stopped g­ oing home for Chinese New Year. (­Unless a person has a very busy job or lives abroad, getting out of ­going home for Chinese New Year is a major feat; Yijun is one of the only p­ eople I knew who pulled it off year a­ fter year.) During the Chinese New Year holi­ day that I spent with this ­family, Yijun drove me past the home where her rela­ tives had gathered. She and Tommy ducked down in the car, laughing, so as not to be seen. We then drove to a karaoke bar, where the two of them spent the next several hours singing blissfully. They preferred the cozy karaoke box to the invasive questions and criticisms of the extended ­family gathered just a few miles away. Having Tommy strengthened Yijun in her resolve to break with tradition and leave a f­ amily that had been unkind to her for many years. It was not primarily her T identity but rather her role as the m ­ other of a gay son that opened this door in her life. Having a gender-­or sexually nonconforming child can be a transforma­ tive experience, one that sharpens social critique, invites self-­reflection, and, ­ others for some, leads to a greater sense of personal freedom. This is true for m and ­fathers alike. But in a f­ amily context that continues to allocate a dispro­ portionate share of childcare and childrearing tasks to w ­ omen and to tie ­women’s social value to their reproductive ­labor and child outcomes, it is most often ­mothers who make the link between their personal experiences and strug­g les and the sexual and gender norms that their ­children have called into question.

Compressed Modernity and Grandparenting As Yijun’s story reminds us, bonds between parents and their c­ hildren are influ­ enced by the presence of other ­family members, and vice versa—­parents are compelled or make choices to, for example, limit ­others’ involvement, defer to

Gender and Power across Generations • 75

elder ­family members, or rely on them for care. A study conducted in northern Taiwan in 2000 found that one-­half of adolescents surveyed had been raised in a co-­resident living arrangement with a grandparent.26 For single-­parent fami­ lies, ­these arrangements vary by gender—62 ­percent of single ­fathers co-­reside with their parents, and 10.5 ­percent of single ­mothers co-­reside with their parents-­in-­law. Only 4.2 ­percent of single parents of any gender co-­reside with a grandparent from the m ­ other’s side.27 The gendered dimension of t­hese arrangements remains largely invisible in media coverage and publications on this topic. That is, widely reported “grandparent care” is usually g­ rand­mother care, an extension of w ­ omen’s reproductive ­labor into mid-­and ­later life. My in­for­mant Deer is among ­those raised by a paternal grand­mother. Deer describes herself as “neither man nor ­woman” (不男不女 bu nan bu nv), having a male sex assignment and feminine gender pre­sen­ta­tion. She recalled having a close relationship with her ­mother as a child but transitioned in fifth grade to living full-­time with her paternal relatives. Her parents had divorced, and her ­father lived with his girlfriend; he provided financially but did not co-­reside with Deer. Deer connected this transition to the housing insecurity and frequent mov­ ing more broadly characteristic of single-­mother-­headed families (see, for instance, Yijun’s story in chapter 3). “At that time, we w ­ ere moving a lot,” she said. “I realized how tough it is for a single mom to raise a child in Taiwan. I realized that having me was keeping her from getting [re]married. She needed to get her own ­house and her own f­ amily. She ­couldn’t be moving around all the time.” I asked Deer ­whether she felt anxious about ­going to live with her ­father, whom she d­ idn’t r­ eally know. She said that she w ­ asn’t anxious b­ ecause she knew that her grand­mother, hereafter Ama (阿媽, Taiwanese Hokkien for “grandma”), loved her and would take care of her. Even as a fifth grader, Deer recognized the cards stacked against her m ­ other and resolved to help in the only ­ other to remarry and become part of another way she knew—by freeing her m ­family. Ama’s love helped Deer to make this difficult choice with confidence. From that point forward, Ama supervised all aspects of Deer’s development, including the heightening attention to her gender and body. This became more of an issue during her male puberty. Deer’s voice did not drop, like the voices of other boys—to this day, her voice is very light and sweet—­and her feminin­ ity only became more noticeable as she matured. Ama worried that being “sissy” (娘娘腔 niang niang qiang) would cause Deer to get bullied at school. She called frequent ­family meetings to discuss this and other issues pertaining to Deer’s upbringing. As Deer described, “My grandma d­ idn’t r­ eally have the resources to seek help from outside, so e­ very time we had a prob­lem, she would call a ­family meeting. She would go to my f­ ather’s relatives, her c­ hildren, and ask for their opinions. They told me not to talk back to my grandma. Mind my

76  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

grandma. And be more like a boy. Mostly they gave pretty mild suggestions.” Like other grandparent caregivers, Ama did not attend a support group, purchase a book, or search the Internet to learn about her transgender grand­ child; instead, she went to the f­ amily for advice and support. Deer felt that her grand­mother would not be able to grasp such concepts as bisexuality, pansexuality, or gender fluidity. “So,” she said, “I just challenge her with very basic t­ hings, such as, ‘Men can be beautiful’—­things like that.” On other occasions, Deer has addressed Ama’s concerns more directly: “At first I thought her rejection [of how I dress] was ­because she ­didn’t like my choice of style or color. ­Later I realized she’s worried that if I go to school in Taipei, ­because Taipei is more dangerous than other places, I may become a target of vio­lence. So ­after I realized that, I told her not to worry ­because t­ here are so many ­people in Taipei that are even more strange than me!” In college, Deer had long hair and wore loose, flowing clothes. She left the ­house very early each morning to catch the train to Taipei. One day, a neigh­ bor asked her grand­mother, “Who is that ­woman leaving your ­house so early in the morning?” “That’s my grand­son,” Ama replied cheerfully. She and Deer laughed together heartily when Ama shared this story ­later that night. Grandparents are often perceived as lacking the ability to grasp nontradi­ tional genders or diverse forms of sexual expression. Yet in the end, Ama is com­ paratively laid-­back about gender fluidity, even poking fun at the neighbor’s confusion. Perhaps she is more adaptable than young ­people give her credit for or more confident b­ ecause of the reputation she has achieved with age. Or per­ haps it is precisely b­ ecause Deer does not require her grand­mother to under­ stand in a par­tic­u­lar way, using specific terms, that other modes of understanding become pos­si­ble. Grandparents tend to rely on dif­fer­ent sources of knowledge and cultural resources than do parents of LGBT c­ hildren. They are less likely to reach out to queer organ­izations or to access websites, books, and other materials pertain­ ing to lesbian, gay, and transgender issues. At the same time, grand­mothers are raising or helping to raise many of the queer and trans young ­people growing up in Taiwan ­today. As a result, young ­people and grandparents alike must find ways to make themselves understood outside of popu­lar LGBT discourses. For Deer, this included noting that men can be beautiful and that Taipei is full of many strange ­people, assuring her grand­mother that she is safe, and finding mutual enjoyment in the paradox of being a grand­son who is also a w ­ oman. The relationship between Deer and Ama (as relayed by Deer) struck me as particularly warm and affectionate. I found evidence of this warmth in many grandparent-­grandchild relationships. This quality helped some queers to stay close to their grandparents even as their life paths diverged from ­family expec­ tations. In other situations, as I describe next, warmth and affection for elders

Gender and Power across Generations • 77

helped families to discipline and shame queer subjects when they ventured out of bounds.

Remaking Filiality Writing about heterosexual grandparents and GLBQ grandchildren in the United States, Kristen Scherrer connects grandchildren’s decisions about dis­ closure to more general beliefs about older adults. She notes that ­because older adults are often perceived as physically and emotionally fragile, some p­ eople express an impulse to protect them from unsettling or uncomfortable news.28 While general beliefs about older adults vary, the view of grandparents as more fragile and vulnerable is prevalent in Taiwan as well.29 A majority of my in­for­mants felt that their grandparents lacked the intellectual and/or emo­ tional ability to comprehend LGBT issues. Some, like Deer, experimented with alternative modes of communication about ­these topics. ­Others kept mum altogether. ­Mothers and ­fathers of LGBT ­children voiced similar views about their parents and in-­laws. This view of older adults helped parents to legitimate the containment of information about queer sexuality within a smaller ­family circle. That is, parents ­were able to mitigate some of their own risks by insisting that elder f­amily members are not equipped to deal with queer or trans issues and by strongly associating grandparents with filial values and moral conduct.30 Many queer in­for­mants encountered filiality as a disci­ plinary mechanism within their families, and grandparents played an impor­ tant role in this discourse. Often it was not grandparents themselves but the symbol of grandparenthood that parents and other relatives invoked to disci­ pline or shame queer p­ eople and try to alter their be­hav­iors. A memorable example of this occurred one day as I was hanging around Hotline. A good friend and gay activist, Kuan, returned from the funeral of his paternal grand­mother, who had raised him from childhood. This was among his closest and most trea­sured f­ amily relationships. For all the years I have known him, up to the pres­ent, Kuan’s social-­media profile picture has been a photo of himself and his grand­mother. ­A fter moving to Taipei, he took the train to his hometown to visit her ­every weekend and did this ­until ­ ese faithful visits w ­ ere not just obligatory; Kuan the day of her death. Th enjoyed and looked forward to them and missed his grand­mother terribly when she was gone. At her funeral, an elder f­ amily member declared that Kuan is unfilial b­ ecause he failed to marry before his grand­mother died. As a result, at the same moment that my friend grieved the loss of a parent figure, he also had to absorb the pub­ lic accusation that he had not honored her appropriately, that he had let her down in the deepest of ways. Upon hearing Kuan’s story that day at Hotline, a lesbian friend quickly crossed the room, wrapped him in her arms, and exclaimed, “You are the most filial [你是最孝順的 ni shi zui xiaoshun de]!” She

78  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

held him tightly as they both fought tears. Her embrace and the hush in the room conveyed something beyond sympathy. This was an experience that too many ­people shared in common. The moments in which ­family members chose to leverage filiality w ­ ere often moments of grief and loss, and the genu­ ine love between grandparents and grandchildren made ­these blows land all the more heavi­ly on p­ eople’s hearts. Perceptions and meanings of filial responsibility are changing rapidly.31 Like posterity and other f­ amily discourses analyzed in previous chapters, filiality is not a static and universal concept; it is constructed interactively with the tools available in a given place and time. New circumstances, such as the increasing number of transnational families, as well as new ideas about mutual re­spect, love, and affection, have seeped into conceptualizations of filial be­hav­ior.32 Many of the queers I interviewed found themselves pitched into the midst of ­these negotiations around filiality and other f­ amily values. Rather than discard­ ing ­these values, p­ eople reworked them as components of queer ethics. By referring to Kuan as “the most filial,” our lesbian friend is contributing to a larger discourse that redefines filiality and connects it to new forms of devo­ tion and care. She rejects a narrow view of filial virtue tied to heterosexual mar­ riage and reproduction, instead recognizing all of the ways in which Kuan has respected, honored, and cared for his grand­mother as evidence that he is a devoted and filial grand­son. Grandparents embody, in their person, the intergenerational and ancestral ties that the patrilineal system strives to preserve. They may exert their author­ ity in the ­family to reproduce norms, extract ­labor, and ensure that their ­children and grandchildren adhere to conventional roles. Other ­family mem­ bers may use filial be­hav­ior ­toward grandparents as a justification for their own objections and prejudices, as Kuan’s relative did in the story above. At the same time, it is not the case that elders are, as some imagine, always and automati­ cally the least progressive members of their families. Just as social change is never linear, so f­ amily change does not follow a s­ imple chronological line from closed-­to open-­minded, and members of the grandparent generation can, at times, be allies to their grandchildren in ­family conflicts about sexuality and gender. ­These cross-­generational relationships provide an opportunity to re-­ examine and rework filiality and other core values in ways that more accu­ rately reflect con­temporary f­ amily life.

Cross-­Generational Jet Lag In an era of compressed modernity, cross-­generational relationships are often characterized by a kind of jet lag—­what Christopher Lee calls “jetlag [as] a per­ spective, not simply a condition . . . ​the ever-­transitory, in-­between world which we regularly inhabit.”33 Past, pres­ent, and f­ uture intermingle within the folds of ­these relationships. A new discourse of parental love, modern and

Gender and Power across Generations • 79

gender-­neutral, gets mapped onto the unyielding division of h ­ ouse­hold l­abor and becomes another dimension of ­women’s work. Filial obligations coexist with the rising numbers of daughters-­in-­law who work outside the home and mothers-­in-­law who look a­ fter the c­ hildren. Grandparent-­grandchild relation­ ships take on an emotional complexity as young p­ eople figure out what it means to be filial ­toward elders in their twenty-­first-­century families. In this “in-­ between world,” Bai Mama feels betrayed by her son’s break from tradition and, si­mul­ta­neously, ashamed of her unwillingness to hug him. Perhaps even in her grief, she is watering the seeds of a new vision for his f­ uture and her own. Among the families in this study, ­mothers spent more time with their ­children on average and felt responsible for the outcomes of their lives. P ­ eople generally saw m ­ others as playing a supportive role in their families, and m ­ others strug­gled with ways to balance this support and sacrifice with effective chil­ drearing. For many ­mothers, the journey to understanding a gay or transgen­ der child was, si­mul­ta­neously, a journey to understanding the conditions and inequities of their own lives. Some used this opportunity to develop a broader critique of heterosexual marriage and the f­ amily as an institution. F ­ athers also cared deeply about their ­children and worried about their ­futures. However, their journeys did not involve the same level of introspection; nor did they second-­g uess their own actions and choices to the same degree. Grandparent-­g randchild relationships encapsulate many dimensions of ­family change ­under compressed modernity. Grandparents are both transmit­ ters of ­family values and emblematic of t­ hose values, as p­ eople proj­ect their own ideas and fears onto grandparents—­for instance, worrying that grandparents are too fragile to h ­ andle queer issues or pressuring a young gay man to be filial to his grandparents by getting heterosexually married. ­These projections do not necessarily reflect the views of grandparents themselves. Although they may not use the same terminology or seek support in the same places, grandparents have lived a long time and absorbed many changes; their flexibility may surprise us yet. Some of the parents I write about in this chapter, including Bai Mama, Han Mama, and Tong Mama, are dismayed or even brokenhearted about having a gay or lesbian child. Elsewhere in the book, we meet ­fathers who express simi­ lar feelings (see, for example, Shu Baba in chapter 6). I have included and pri­ oritized them b­ ecause such parents are not often a part of academic work on LGBT families of origin. ­These studies tend to attract a narrower sample of parents who are left of center in their social values and affirming of their LGBT ­children. Supportive parents are more likely to find out about research on this topic, to feel comfortable sharing this part of their lives, and to trust that an ­ ill represent them accurately. Thus, it is especially impor­tant to interviewer w do the work necessary to build trust with parents who are not supportive or still struggling with t­ hese issues and to bring their voices into our work.

80  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

­Others, like the Tans, the Wus, Ye Mama, and Ama, are, to varying degrees, supportive and pragmatic about the differences their c­ hildren and grand­ children embody and the kinds of obstacles they are likely to encounter. By including ­these contrasting voices, I hope to disabuse readers of the notion that Taiwanese families are uniformly “more” or “less” open-­minded about queer issues compared to families elsewhere, a question I am often asked when I tell ­people about my research. ­Simple cultural comparisons obscure the extent to which gender, class, education, and other aspects of p­ eople’s lives shape their ­family relationships and dynamics around sexuality. As I conclude this chapter about cross-­generational ties, t­ here is a ­simple pic­ ture that comes to my mind. The picture is not of my in­for­mants or of anyone I know. It is a young man and elder ­woman who are strangers to me, who crossed my path only briefly in a busy metro station near my home in Taipei. The man was very tall, thin, and elegant, moving through the crowd with a swish of his hips and a streak of purple in his hair. The ­woman was very small, about half his size, wrinkled and stooped a ­little, her hand tightly gripping his forearm. I read them as a grand­mother and grand­son, although I have no way of know­ ing the relationship between them. They looked as if each had stepped out of a dif­f er­ent moment in time. And yet they proceeded, he with a swish and she with a shuffle, gentle and familiar in their togetherness, embodying, for an instant, the generation gap that many ­people are trying to cross and the sweetness of making it to the other side.

5

Strategic Normativity Sex, Politics, and Parents Gatherings for parents of LGBT c­ hildren overlapped spatially with other kinds of queer activism. This resulted in parents coming in and out of spaces that queers had claimed as their own and decorated in a joyful and flamboyant style. On the entry­way ­table of such a space, one might find, for example, a postcard advertising a transmasculine clothing line, a print by the gay artist Tai Wang, popu­lar for his depictions of bears and their admirers,1 an announcement about an upcoming march for mi­grant workers’ rights, and a graphically illustrated safe-­sex booklet. Parents paused to peruse ­these materials, gradually forming an impression of the subcultural spaces their child might inhabit. For signifi­ cant numbers of parents, ­these gatherings comprised their first exposure to (known) queer ­people other than their own son or ­daughter. On a certain after­noon the meeting swelled to its usual size—­about a dozen ­mothers (­fathers ­were rare), three volunteers, the host, and me. We gathered in a back room furnished with a semicircle of brightly colored stools facing a TV hooked up to a laptop. Th ­ ere ­were several photo­graphs on the walls of the room, mostly of seminude men, and a poster advertising Gin Gin’s bookstore. Gin Gin’s is the first queer bookstore in the Chinese-­speaking world, a hotspot for queer gatherings, and the target of a censorship campaign discussed l­ ater in this chapter. The poster portrayed a young man wearing a neatly pressed white shirt, glasses, and a messenger bag, absorbed in a magazine while surrounded by groups of naked men in vari­ous erotic poses, meant to embody the magazine

81

82  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

content. This impressed me right away ­because I thought U.S. parents would have trou­ble with the sexual expressiveness of the image. I certainly could not imagine my own parents feeling at ease in a room with such a poster on the wall. A gay volunteer opened the meeting with a Power­Point pre­sen­ta­tion about Buddhism and homo­sexuality. He concluded the pre­sen­ta­tion with a photo­ graph of a Buddhist lesbian wedding, celebrated in the press as the first in Taiwan. W ­ hether Buddhist ceremonies for same-­sex ­couples had happened more quietly before, this was the first to draw such national and international pub­ licity. The scene was familiar to me ­because the images had been widely circu­ lated, at one point taking over my social media, and also ­because I had attended this wedding with some friends the previous August. The photo­graph showed the two brides in flowing white gowns and veils, smiling ­gently ­toward one another beneath an elevated statue of the Buddha surrounded by incense, fruit, and flowers. The Buddhist master who officiated the ceremony faced the c­ ouple, a smaller figure but drawing the eye with her deep orange and red robes. This photo­graph remained on the TV screen as we transitioned to the Q & A portion of the pre­sen­ta­tion. None of the parents asked any questions about Buddhism or religion. This was not especially surprising as Buddhism and Taoism, the major religions of Taiwan, are largely s­ ilent on the topic of homo­ sexuality.2 The parents focused instead on the issues that w ­ ere on their minds, such as w ­ hether it is pos­si­ble for lesbian and gay ­people to have stable lives and relationships, a topic of interest at nearly ­every parent meeting that I attended. Am ­ other seated near me, whom I ­later interviewed, said suddenly, “What is that poster on the wall? Is this the kind of t­ hing gay men like to do?” (She was pointing to the ad for Gin Gin’s bookstore.) “Not all gay men, but some gay men like to do this,” a volunteer replied. The ­mother pressed on: “If not all gay men like to do this, then why do you have a poster encouraging them to do it?” ­ other continued to criticize the poster, For the next several minutes, the m while the volunteers did a delicate dance of trying to ease her mind without abandoning their sex-­positive ethic. Fi­nally one of the volunteers said light­ heartedly, “Mama, ­don’t focus on this poster—­look over ­here, at this photo,” as he redirected her attention to the photo­graph of the Buddhist lesbian wed­ ding. This was a small act of redirection, but not an insignificant one. It is through small, everyday actions like this one that we decide which aspects of queer experience are presentable to families of origin and which should be shielded from the f­ amily gaze. Such moments occurred often in my fieldwork. Queers and their siblings redirected their parents and quelled parental anx­i­eties through depictions of normatively successful lesbian, gay, and transgender life. In this example, the success story is a stable relationship anchored in normative femininity and a

Strategic Normativity • 83

reputable religious institution, juxtaposed against the specter of noncommit­ tal, multi-­partner sex. Just as often, the success story is one of educational attainment and c­ areer stability. For many parents, t­ hese ­things are deeply interrelated. Being a successful person means achieving a stable ­career and a stable relationship, both of a certain caliber. Parents focused on ­these areas in their frequently asked questions: Do lesbians and gays form lasting and stable relationships? Are they discriminated against by their employers? How do they support themselves when they are old? The concerns they raised are specific to ­children who are gender and sexually nonconforming at the same time that they are firmly embedded in a broader set of parenting expectations and goals. In response, p­ eople pointed to lesbians and gays who are famous, wealthy, and influential and to their own upwardly mobile lesbian and gay friends and co-­workers, to promote ac­cep­tance of homo­sexuality. As the elder ­sister of a po lesbian explained, “I have a friend whom my ­mother knows and trusts, and she is also a lesbian. This ­woman is very responsible, very capable of managing her life. So I point this out to my ­mother and try to show her that lesbians can have a good life. B ­ ecause my m ­ other has a very traditional mind-­set, I thought this kind of successful example might be convincing to her.” ­People had access to fewer examples of transgender lives but deployed t­ hose they did know of with similar aims. Celebrities and other public figures, as well as trusted friends and acquaintances, ­were extended, like the photo­g raph, as representatives of the best-­case scenario: stability, social integration, success. This chapter delves into moments of “strategic normativity” as heterosexual parents and siblings, queer adult c­ hildren, and activists work cooperatively to mesh queer politics and movement goals with parents’ aspirations for their ­children’s lives and f­ utures. Reproduction of the heterosexual f­ amily is entwined with notions of social stability and upward mobility, with “making it” in life. How, then, do queers assure their parents that they ­will make it? And what kind of social and po­liti­cal price tag is attached to this assurance? Prominent queer scholars have been highly critical of the normalizing cur­ rents and “gentrifying tendency” of the con­temporary tongzhi movement.3 ­These scholars emphasize ways that a middle-­class politics of respectability fur­ ther disempowers queers, sex workers, and other subjects that threaten the liberal demo­cratic state and the new moral-­sexual order. As Petrus Liu argues, “the liberal strategy of incorporating the ‘normal homosexuals’ further polar­ izes the cultural terrain, making Taiwan’s society more hostile t­ owards t­ hose who fall outside the norm than before.”4 Similar concerns animate critiques of queer liberalism in the United States and other locations.5 Many of the queer activists I met w ­ ere familiar with t­ hese concerns and shared them to a large extent. At the same time, they ­were looking for ways to reconcile their politics with the needs and desires of the parents who showed up in increasing numbers, often seeking assurance that a “normal” life was indeed pos­si­ble for their child.

84  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

­Here the lit­er­a­ture pres­ents us with somewhat of an impasse between queer critiques of hetero-­and homo-­normativity, on the one hand, and scholarship on queer families of origin, on the other. In the former analy­sis, kinship and ­family function primarily as normative systems of social organ­ization that engender re­sis­tance and strug­gle. In the latter, kinship and f­ amily represent sites of belong­ ing and desire that remain very close to the hearts of ­those struggling. The entrance of parents into Taiwan’s queer movement opens a conversation between ­these streams of thought. It is this conversation that the chapter seeks to enter.

Heterosexuality and Social Mobility Parents in my research understood heterosexuality as an economic institution, as well as a social one. The recent recession had caused many to feel anxious about their c­ hildren’s f­ utures, and middle-­class parents recognized that their c­ hildren ­were unlikely to achieve the levels of social mobility they had experienced.6 As a result, they actively looked for ways to prepare their ­children to be all the more competitive and credentialed. Parents saw partnership choices as key to mobility and assessed their ­children’s romantic partners on such ­factors as ­family back­ ground, education, and c­areer prospects. Heterosexuality figured centrally in their visions for their c­ hildren’s advancement in life, not as a stand-­alone aspira­ tion but as part of the larger package of social and cultural capital accumulation. The elder ­sister of a bisexual man recalled her f­ather making this link between heterosexual marriage and social mobility: “My dad asked ­whether my ­brother’s failure to find a girlfriend is due to the fact that he d­ oesn’t have money, that our ­ e’ll say ­things like, ‘Oh, if we had money, if we ­family ­doesn’t have money. And h won the lottery, then he’d be able to start a ­family.’ ” This ­father is not alone in his concerns. “Educational assortative mating”—­the tendency of ­women to marry more highly educated men—­persists in con­temporary Taiwan, inclining parents to worry about education and income in relation to their sons’ marriageability.7 ­ ere picky about their d­ aughters’ boy­ On the other side of this coin, parents w friends and prospective husbands. Lin Mama, the m ­ other of two straight ­daughters and one gay son, worried constantly about her eldest ­daughter’s mar­ riage to a man from an impoverished ­family. In fact, she devoted as much energy to this topic as to her son’s gay sexuality during the days I spent in her home. She was pleased that her son’s boyfriend had a stable job at a reputable mobile phone com­pany. This was more than she could say for her ­daughter’s husband. Lin Mama perceived a hard path ahead for this ­family; already, her ­daughter had grown exhausted from long hours of work and financial strain. Reflecting on this, Lin Mama said, “We put in so much effort and energy to educate them, to ensure that they ­will have a good life and that the next generation ­will have a better life. Upward mobility, not downward mobility [向上的，不是向下的 xiang shang de, bu shi xiang xia de]!”

Strategic Normativity • 85

Class differences between same-­sex partners also mattered, with some parents (like Lin Mama) accommodating ­these ­unions b­ ecause of the financial stability, education level, or other perceived credentials of the partner and some parents flatly opposing ­unions on this basis. In one of the first stories shared with me in the field, a ­mother pressured her son, a doctor, to break up with his boyfriend, a teacher, ­because the doctor’s salary was five times higher. (By the time this story was relayed to me, the ­couple had separated.) Another ­mother confided that she is bitterly disappointed in her son’s cohabiting relationship with an unemployed man with a disability. In the parent meetings, she focused on the latter qualities as much as on the gender of her son’s partner, and other parents responded sym­ pathetically; in separate conversations, several told me that this ­mother’s situa­ tion is particularly difficult. F ­ amily responses to queer coupling reflect more than parents’ attitudes t­oward homo­sexuality. They are also barometers of the class ideals and prejudices baked into parenting practices and goals. In a recent interview study, JhuCin Jhang found “being normal” to be the most salient theme in Taiwanese parents’ expectations for their lesbian, gay, and bisexual ­children. Indicators of being normal, for parents of the queers in her study, included “to be married, have a stable job, have ­children, buy a ­house, grow old, and die peacefully.”8 In this vision, employment and wealth in the form of home owner­ship are intertwined with normative f­ amily ideals that serve as life’s benchmarks. Parents desire happiness for their ­children but define this happiness according to their own heteronormative scripts.9 Heather Love has focused her analy­sis of “compulsory happiness” on U.S. culture; nevertheless, her observations bear some relevance h ­ ere: “­Because homo­sexuality is traditionally so closely associated with disappointment and depression, being happy signifies participation in the coming era of gay possibil­ ity. In this brave new world, one can be gay without necessarily being tragic; however, one may only belong by erasing all traces of the grief that, by definition, must remain sealed off in the past of homosexual abjection. Given this climate ­ hether gays and lesbians still of emotional conformism, it makes sense to ask w have the right to be unhappy.”10 For some of the parents I interviewed, including the ­mother I introduce next, the answer to this question is a firm and pragmatic no. (We might ask, further, w ­ hether it is reasonable to expect parents to tolerate unhappiness in their ­children, and if not, what do we do with the unhappiness and grief that remain a part of queer and transgender experience?)

“To change something, you need power”: Success as a Condition for Visibility Sun Mama, the affluent m ­ other of a gay son and only child, articulated what I have called “strategic normativity” at length and with acuity. She pointed to the gay celebrity Cai Kanyong11 as a role model for gay men. Cai Kanyong

86  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

prepared well, she noted; he came out only a­ fter acquiring fame and status to protect himself adequately. Our conversation proceeded with Sun Mama refer­ ring to gay men in general and also, at my prodding, to her son’s par­tic­u­lar situation. (This portion of the interview was largely in En­g lish. Sun Mama oscillated between En­g lish and Chinese, often using both languages in a single sentence; this too communicated her education and class.) SUN MAMA  ​Some ­people ­haven’t prepared anything, and they just come out. It’s

like lifting a rock only to drop it on your own foot. First, make sure you have a good job and can support yourself completely. Have a certain social status. If ­you’re only thinking of yourself, just do your job, keep quiet, and live well. But if ­you’re ambitious and want to help ­others who are weaker than yourself, you need power. Then you can do something to help them. If you have no power and just speak loudly, no one ­will listen to you. AM Y  ​It sounds like your son has some power now, ­because he has a good education and a good job. [Sun Mama’s gay son graduated from a presti­ gious university, studied abroad for his MBA, and works for a multina­ tional corporation in Taipei.] SUN MAMA  ​Yes. AM Y  ​Do you feel that he’s prepared to come out? SUN MAMA  ​I think he is not qualified now. He needs more reputation, higher status. For instance, I saw in the newspaper yesterday that Belgium’s new prime minister is gay . . . ​If a lot of power­f ul men are gay, then the society ­will change. You see, this is very impor­tant. To change something, you need power.

Parents in this research widely endorsed the status-­based pathway to lesbian and gay social integration that Sun Mama describes. In this view, class distinc­ tions empower lesbian and gay elites to carry the “weaker” or less successful members of their group. Th ­ ose less successful members should avoid drawing attention to themselves—as Sun Mama put it, “do your job, keep quiet, and live well.” Thus even for t­ hese less “ambitious” queers, achieving respectability, particularly at work, is integral to the prescription for a good life put forth by this ­mother and many other parents whom I interviewed. Who stands to benefit from ­these normalizing strategies? In the example above, Sun Mama advocates for a strategic accumulation of power, status, and influence to bring about real change for the w ­ hole community. Yet empirical evidence does not support this kind of trickle-­down approach to social jus­ tice.12 Empowering elites does not ultimately benefit the less advantaged or “weaker” members of the group. Instead, such incrementalism usually rein­ forces stratification within the movement.13 Sun Mama’s proposal primarily benefits wealthy gay men and reflects her standpoint as a successful and

Strategic Normativity • 87

financially in­de­pen­dent businesswoman with a college degree and similar expectations of her child. She is one of the few ­mothers in this study who graduated from college. Do less educated and less wealthy parents hold the same expectations for their gay ­children? What about impoverished or working-­class parents who are just trying to stay afloat eco­nom­ically? Do they ­really expect their ­children to become celebrities and prime ministers before coming out as gay? An emphasis on normative success emerged among parents regardless of class.14 But their criteria for educational and status attainment ­were rela­ tive. That is, parents judged their ­children against an immediate circle of friends, neighbors, and kin. All parents emphasized educational attainment as a vehicle to a better life and as an inculcation against discrimination. But some middle-­and upper-­class parents, like Sun Mama, felt that education was not enough. They believed their ­children needed to excel in more ways to offset the penalties they would incur if they ­were openly lesbian or gay. Yiping Shih analyzes childrearing as a field in which Taiwanese parents strug­gle to distinguish their c­ hildren and establish symbolic class bound­aries. Upper-­class parents accomplish this through a combination of educational achievement, talent development, and internationalization. Middle-­class par­ ents focus on educational achievement and talent development, while impov­ erished and working-­class parents focus on educational achievement only.15 ­These class-­specific socialization pro­cesses served as tool kits for achieving the specific kinds of strategic normativity that my parent interviewees espoused. Sun Mama’s reference to a celebrity is another strategy that came up fairly often. Most parents believed that lesbian and gay celebrities and public figures could sway ­people to view homo­sexuality more favorably. They saw t­hese figures as antidotes to sensationalized stories about gay male hypersexuality, lesbian murder-­suicides, and deeply possessive, even violent, relationships between ­women propagated by local media. For instance, in March 2012, reporters broke a story about a T who killed her ex-­girlfriend’s new (cisgender) boyfriend and found a so-­called expert to go on rec­ord saying that T’s are jealous of men and deeply possessive of their ­women; thus, men who date former pos should be careful. Joint suicides of ­women lovers (or presumed lovers) and accounts of ­ ere widely circulated lesbian, gay, and transgender suicide in protest or despair w among the parents I interviewed. In this climate, activists ­labor to relieve par­ ents of a sense that queers are inherently unstable and in constant danger from STIs, jealous ex-­partners, or profound depression. Cai Kanyong and the prime minister of Belgium—or more day-­to-­day examples, like the slideshows of ­wholesome, smiling same-­sex c­ ouples that Guo Mama often shared with other parents—­are part of a counter-­discourse rooted in a new homo-­normative imaginary, which parents use to resist the denigration of queers in the media and public discourse.

88  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

“What is unseemly about the bookstore?”: Success as a Counter-­Discourse Readers ­will recall that a ­mother in my study objected to the advertisement for Gin Gin’s bookstore ­because it depicted gay men in erotic poses. The original owner of the bookstore, J. J. Lai, is no stranger to such objections.16 His store became a pivotal site for contestations over sexual rights in Taiwan at the turn of the twenty-­first c­ entury. In 2003, customs authorities and local police seized and confiscated hundreds of legally imported, sealed gay magazines en route to the bookstore from Hong Kong. A group of parents, teachers, ­lawyers, and activists then sued J. J. Lai for violating Article 235 of Taiwan’s Criminal Code, Dissemination of Obscenity. The court found him guilty and sentenced him to ­either spend fifty days in jail or pay a fine of NT$45,000 (US$1,500). Through­ out the trial, J. J. remained squarely in the public eye. He coordinated with local queer activists and scholars to hold press conferences and demonstrations, drawing attention to the persecution he experienced throughout the judicial pro­cess. Several academic articles and a documentary film discuss the po­liti­cal and cultural implications of the trial.17 ­Here, I want to focus more narrowly on the figure of J. J.’s m ­ other. To justify increased state surveillance and regulation, anti-­sex activists often invoke the symbol of a concerned parent protecting a real or ­imagined child. This kind of rhe­toric draws the ­actual parents of queer ­children into the crosshairs of a larger cultural strug­gle, charged with “protect­ ing” their c­ hildren by refusing their existence. Many of t­ hose opposing J. J. Lai asserted parenthood as the grounds for their activism and the basis of their moral superiority. Meanwhile J. J. Lai’s own ­mother, who had loaned him the money to open Gin Gin’s bookstore, supported him resolutely from the begin­ ning. Recounting this in an interview with me, J. J. shared, The most touching t­ hing of all is that, when I had just opened the bookstore, I was frequently in the news, and my mom’s friends, neighbors, and relatives all saw it. One day, when my mom was picking up my elder b­ rother’s kid from preschool, the teacher said, “Lai Mama, how is it that your son opened such an unseemly bookstore in Taipei?” My mom replied, “What is unseemly about the bookstore? In this bad economy, my son had the ability and the determination to open a store and make it successful. See if you can do that.” She spoke very sternly to that teacher. ­Later when she told me about this, I felt surprised that in protecting her son, she was able to become so power­f ul.

Lai Mama pointed to her son’s successful business in a bad economy as a way of countering the censure of an “unseemly” queer enterprise that she herself had subsidized. (J. J. joked that his m ­ other was the real laoban, or “boss,” of the

Strategic Normativity • 89

bookstore.) Her action is rooted in values of education, determination, perse­ verance, and achievement that are ranked as impor­tant by Taiwanese parents.18 In exchanges like this one, normative success stories give parents a platform from which to challenge cultural biases. J. J. Lai saw his ­mother come to power through this action, standing up to the im­mense social pressure levied against her son on this and many other occasions. A small body of work examines normativity as a component of queer re­sis­ tance. For example, Dana Rosenfeld writes about heteronormativity and homo-­ normativity as practical and moral resources for lesbian and gay elders in the United States.19 Carla Pfeffer analyzes how U.S. trans men and their partners engage in normative social practices in ways that both reproduce and resist nor­ mative social structures.20 Writing about gay elders in Hong Kong, Travis Kong conceptualizes hetero-­and homo-­normativities, including the ­family home, as sites of discipline and surveillance but also of re­sis­tance and subver­ sion.21 ­These studies do not romanticize normativity or ignore its role in con­ straining queer identities and movements. Rather, they share an understanding of power and re­sis­tance, normativity and subversion, as dialectical forces. Some­ times it is not against but through normativity that queer and trans existence becomes legible.

“Let Mom and Dad know ­you’re the OK kind of gay”: Success as a Front-­Stage Per­for­mance In addition to her work with parents, Guo Mama, the founder of Loving Parents of LGBT Taiwan, met often with queer young ­people to discuss their ­family issues. She focused unswervingly on love and communication (the same themes she raised in her Pride speech, described in chapter 2) and on her conviction that most parents are, in time, capable of accepting a lesbian or gay child. (Nearly every­one believed that their parents would be the excep­ tion.) In one such talk delivered to a queer club on a college campus, Guo Mama urged, “Let Mom and Dad know y­ ou’re the OK kind of gay [讓爸爸 媽媽知道你是一個很 OK 的同志 rang baba mama zhidao ni shi yige hen OK de tongzhi].” ­A fter making this statement, Guo Mama focused on dispel­ ling myths that parents are likely to hold about gay promiscuity, HIV/AIDS, and other “not OK” gay qualities. “It is impor­tant to emphasize to your parents that you have a happy, stable life,” she advised the young queers in the room. Guo Mama is arguably among the strongest proponents of strategic norma­ tivity in Taiwan’s con­temporary tongzhi movement. This part of her philoso­ phy is one reason why an amicable split occurred between her organ­ization and the f­ amily branch of the Hotline Association. Other activists worry about cen­ sorship of their personal stories, while Guo Mama urges a more uniform

90  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

message and image management as part of building a professional LGBT organ­ization. But a­ fter this lecture, as she and I rode the bus together from Chungli to Taipei, I asked Guo Mama, “What about ­people who are HIV positive? Or sex­ ually active with more than one person?” She replied, “Parents can also learn to accept HIV . . . ​They can learn to accept promiscuity. The key is to begin communicating with your parents earlier in life.” For Guo Mama, strategic normativity is not the destination but the vehi­ cle. She believes it is better to open parents’ minds gradually. A ­ fter all, she pointed out, it took most queer ­people a long time to cultivate the perspectives they now hold. Guo Mama herself does not believe that the package she offers parents is the only correct way to conduct a lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgen­ der life. Put another way, letting Mom and Dad know y­ ou’re the “OK kind of gay” does not mean that you have to be the OK kind of gay or remain locked in the homo-­normative imaginary that serves as a gateway to ac­cep­tance for many parents. Models of fluid, context-­specific strategies of re­sis­tance are common in ­family studies. For instance, in their research on Taiwanese and Taiwanese American mother-­and daughter-­in-­law relationships, Kristy Shih and Karen Pyke found that daughters-­in-­law used covert re­sis­tance to maintain a greater balance of ­family power.22 They feigned compliance with their mothers-­in-­law, vocalizing agreement and appearing to defer to their opinions, but then carried out their lives as they wished when their mothers-­in-­law w ­ ere not around. Shih and Pyke conclude, “­These findings suggest scholars should not assume Asian cultural ideals dictate a­ ctual ­family practices or that ritualistic displays of deference indicate powerlessness.”23 For Taiwanese queers, examples of nor­ mative success are often a kind of feigned compliance, a display of deference to their parents’ wishes, which do not dictate their a­ ctual life and work situations, po­liti­cal commitments, or sexual be­hav­iors. Shih and Pyke draw on Erving Goffman’s dramaturgical meta­phor to ana­ lyze w ­ omen’s front-­stage deference and backstage re­sis­tance to the authority and involvement of mothers-­in-­law in their daily lives.24 For the majority of queers and siblings in this research, strategic normativity was similarly situational, a “front-­stage” per­for­mance. This was true for a small number of parents as well. Guo Mama was intentional in her decision to put certain characteristics on the front stage for parents who are newer to the community. Strategic normativity is structured by and dependent on hierarchies of class and status. Success stories shore up the legitimacy of the normative systems and power relations that they invoke. They also provide glimmers of empowerment for individual actors, who do not necessarily buy into ­these larger systems even as they reproduce them narratively. Th ­ ese sorts of complex choices are pres­ent in queer movements around the world. Th ­ ere are many examples of queer p­ eople

Strategic Normativity • 91

violating their own po­liti­cal commitments to protect themselves and their loved ones and to secure a place in the f­ amily and society.25 ­These choices are partic­ ularly salient as a greater degree of social integration brings the politics of respectability within families into more direct contact with queer movement strategies and goals.

“­Don’t you think your parents have also seen pornography?”: Front-­and Backstage Collisions As heterosexual parents venture into queer spaces, they are increasingly likely to interact with queer sexual politics and repre­sen­ta­tions. Taiwanese queer activists have new choices to make about how to ­handle ­these front-­and back­ stage collisions as the movement gains visibility and thus draws larger numbers of heterosexuals into its ranks. Welcoming parents warmly and without reser­ vation, as most organizers have done, also means that the compartmentaliza­ tion of queer politics and f­ amily life is harder to achieve. At the same time, it is impor­tant not to construct a false dichotomy between radical imagination as the exclusive purview of queers and normative aspira­ tions as the exclusive purview of parents. A ­ fter all, some queers genuinely long for the same normative lifestyles that many parents endorse. And parents may not be as innocent or closed-­minded as their own c­ hildren presume them to be. Guo Mama often became affectionately fed up with queer young p­ eople who insisted that their parents could not possibly accept or comprehend sex-­related topics. On one such occasion, she declared good-­naturedly, “Well! D ­ on’t you think your parents have also seen pornography? Th ­ ese are not t­ hings they dis­ cuss with you, but they are more complex than you give them credit for.” Indeed, as much as parents expressed shock and discomfort, they also engaged in strikingly candid discussions about sex. At the very same meeting where a m ­ other objected to the poster, another parent shared that her son is a “zero” (bottom/receptive sexual partner) and said that she would like to be able to discuss this with him in a knowledgeable and helpful way. Other parents expressed surprise that her son spoke so freely with her about sex, but their sur­ prise was tinged with admiration, not judgment. In another meeting, a ­father asked a series of increasingly detailed questions about how men derive plea­sure from anal penetration. The volunteers answered his questions thoroughly and also provided information about how to cleanse the anus prior to penetration (at one point insinuating that perhaps the ­father wanted this information for his own exploration, since straight men can also enjoy receiving anal penetra­ tion from their ­women partners). As the only foreigner pres­ent, I also seemed to be the only person surprised by the explicit nature of this conversation. When I remarked on it l­ ater, a volunteer shrugged and said, “Well, of course we need to educate the parents. They want this information.”

92  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

­These instances are impor­tant ­because they reveal the places where norma­ tivity is more and less malleable for parents and families. Ultimately, it was not sex itself but other dimensions within the pa­norama of respectability politics to which parents clung most determinedly. In contexts where the objection to homo­sexuality is rooted in religion, it is necessary to make a moral case for homo­sexuality with many parents—to address their concerns that homo­ sexuality is sinful and against divine w ­ ill. (And t­ hese are the contexts that have received the most attention in research on LGBT family-­of-­origin rela­ tionships.) In Taiwan, organizers had to make a more pragmatic and also a more class-­based case for homo­sexuality with many parents—­that is, address their concerns that homo­sexuality ­will compromise a person’s ability to be success­ ful in life. Strategic normativity served many purposes for my in­for­mants. Some used it to reassure their parents and to c­ ounter the discourses of queer tragedy and loss that circulate in the media. Parents themselves used strategic normativity as a platform from which to speak boldly on behalf of their LGBT ­children. ­Others promoted normative success, the accumulation of status and power, as an inculcation against discrimination and a condition for being out. As their vision for their c­ hildren’s ­f utures—­and by extension, for their own futures—­ registered the shock of queer sexuality and/or heterosexual marriage re­sis­ tance, parents reached for other familiar modes of stability. Perceptions of the ethic of this strategy varied among queers, and I saw glim­ mers of this diversity within my own research team. ­A fter my interview with Sun Mama, I made a comment to my research assistant about how this m ­ other expects ­people to “earn the right to be gay.” (This was not an analy­sis so much as my gut reaction to the interview.) My RA, a young T, disagreed. She appre­ ciated Sun Mama’s frank advice and thought this ­mother had reasonable ideas about how to navigate society as a queer person. As a result of our varying points of reference, she and I experienced and pro­cessed this interview very differently. In general, academics and queer activists with whom I spoke viewed strate­ gic normativity more unfavorably compared to gender and sexually noncon­ forming p­ eople (and f­ amily members) who did not participate in the sex rights movement and who lived, worked, and socialized in primarily heterosexual circles. To some extent, this difference goes without saying; activism is, ­after all, aimed at changing social systems and norms. Perhaps less explicit and worth noting are its implications for how we analyze normativity and re­sis­tance as ­these manifest empirically. Critiques of normativity are levied from par­tic­u­lar and often more privileged locations. Thus, even as t­ hese critiques strive to expose and dismantle class biases, they run the risk of creating a new bias—­positioning more critical (or, in the popu­lar En­glish vernacular, woke) queer subjects as the representatives of queer identity and culture. It is impor­tant that we engage

Strategic Normativity • 93

critiques of normativity without stratifying queers by the extent to which our desires exceed the bounds of existing social structures. This ­will involve some­ times unsettling but surely very fruitful conversations about the diverse ways that normativity functions in p­ eople’s f­ amily relationships and lives.

“Are you happy?”: Lessons from My Own Slippage into Strategic Normativity I write this chapter with a host of resources at my disposal, including queer the­ ory and research that show the limits of normativity quite plainly. But even knowing its limits, I, too, fall back on this strategy somewhat accidentally from time to time. One instance that stands out in my mind occurred during the Q & A portion of a lecture I gave at a university in eastern Taiwan. I had man­ aged to come out at some point during the lecture, and the students ­were as interested in this as in anything ­else I had to say. Amid the many queries about my background, my ­family, and how I came out and came to Taiwan, a con­ ventionally pretty young w ­ oman wearing a soft, off-­the-­shoulder sweater roused herself from leaning on her elbows to stand up and ask me a single question. “Are you happy?” she said. I had expected personal inquiries, but this one was so ­simple, so direct. I said yes. And then, ­because I felt like she was waiting for more, I said, “I enjoy my job as a sociologist and a teacher. I love my partner and f­ amily. I am very happy.” The ­woman sat down, the Q & A continued, and I became another example of “strategic normativity” in my research. Why did I say that? I knew what she was asking—­can a queer person be happy? Of course we can. We can also be unhappy. This does not compromise the worth or validity of our queerness. Th ­ ere are many ways to unpack the ques­ ­ oman, in essence, that I was tion asked of me. Put on the spot, I told this w Guo Mama’s “OK kind of gay.” I let her know that I have the normative indi­ cators of a happy life ­because I sensed that this was what she needed to hear. It’s true, I rationalized ­later—my lover, f­ amily, and job bring me real joy. What does this answer achieve, and what does it not achieve? It pushes back on the myth that queer p­ eople are inherently unstable, lonely, isolated, suffering, sad—­that marginalization is the defining characteristic of our lives. But it can also make heterosexual ac­cep­tance contingent on a certain per­for­mance of “happiness.” When our lives are unstable and our relationships messy, when we lose a job or a love, when we are tired, when our hearts break, do we have to bury ­these parts of being ­human in order to prove that we are still “OK”? ­There are, to be sure, ­great emotional costs to the politics of respectabil­ ity. ­There are also social costs, as we fracture our community along the line of precarity. For t­ hose among us who are most oppressed, who have ­little or no access to power, for whom the fight is most urgent, are made invisible by a discourse that showcases our successes.

94  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

I do not know what I would say if I could go back to that moment in the lecture hall. What answer is the most honest? What answer is the most care­ ful? And is it better to be honest, careful, or strategic? I’m still not sure. I am grateful for this experience—­one that lingers in my mind as I code, analyze, and write about strategic normativity in my research. It is impor­tant for t­ hose of us who do critical queer studies to recognize that we, too, are enmeshed in the normative discourses and systems that we study. We strug­gle against and with them just like our in­for­mants do. And their choices, like ours, are adap­ tive, not frozen in time but constantly ­shaped and reshaped by the worlds we inhabit.

6

Siblings and ­Family Work Sibling narratives appear throughout this book, intersecting with the narratives of queer and trans in­for­mants and heterosexual parents. Yet the book would not be complete without a more focused analy­sis of sibling relationships. S­ isters and ­brothers play meaningful roles in many of our lives, often outlasting other social bonds and providing a connective glue within larger kinship structures.1 As ­children, siblings socialize, look a­ fter, and pick on one another in ways that are rarely reproduced in other relationships.2 When pitched into conflicts or witnessing harassment by a third party, siblings tend to stick up for each other, even if they disagree strongly or mete out the same harassment at home.3 ­People whose siblings are queer or trans may experience t­ hese common qualities of sib­ linghood in distinctive or heightened ways. For example, Rosalind Edwards and colleagues identify protectiveness and guarding against bullies as a type of sibling care4—­one that is surely relevant to ­those with gender-­and sexually non­ conforming siblings, who are disproportionately likely to encounter such bully­ ing in school and elsewhere. Given the significance of ­these relationships, it is surprising that we so rarely include siblings in our efforts to learn about and support LGBT families of origin.5 This topic is one that lies close to my heart. I began my ­career as a sociolo­ gist with a study of heterosexual ­women and men in the midwestern United States who grew up with a lesbian, gay, or bisexual sibling.6 This small proj­ect opened my eyes to the gaps in our knowledge of mixed orientation sibling rela­ tionships. In one of the few studies on this topic, and the first to adopt a mul­ ticultural framework, Jill Huang interviewed first-­generation Taiwanese and

95

96  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

Chinese Americans with lesbian and gay siblings.7 A majority of Huang’s inter­ viewees had thought about ways to protect their siblings from discrimination and harm, and this was true of my interviewees as well. As Huang’s in­for­mant May described, “I remember talking to my m ­ iddle b­ rother and both of us thought, well what if our parents disown my gay b­ rother? And both of us w ­ ere willing to financially support him if that was necessary.”8 ­These young adults acted as bridges or buffers between their siblings and other f­ amily members. They extended many kinds of emotional and material support, such as educating parents and grandparents about sexuality and organ­izing alternative holi­ day gatherings that siblings could attend openly with their partners. They wrestled with anger ­toward unsupportive f­ amily members and left intolerant religious communities. Having a queer sibling became a part of their identities, one they carried with them into other social settings and relationships.9 With few exceptions, the lit­er­a­ture on LGBT families of origin emphasizes dyadic relationships between parents and c­ hildren or, in rarer instances, between an LGBT person and a sibling or another member of the f­ amily. Th ­ ese studies deepen our understanding of how sexuality and gender shape a par­tic­u­ lar node on the ­family tree. But in our daily lives, ­family relationships rarely occur in isolated twosomes. Intra-­and intergenerational ties are deeply entangled. ­Family hierarchies, alliances, conflicts, and bonds draw multiple ­people into relationship with one another, and a rupture in one relationship reverberates through the o­ thers. This chapter treats s­ isters and b­ rothers as an integral part of a larger f­amily network, as issues of f­amily work and resource distribution raised throughout the book are re-­examined through the lens of sibling ties. I have or­ga­nized the chapter around the theme of f­ amily work, including emotion work, care for siblings’ physical well-­being, and reproductive l­ abor. This theme arose from interviews and fieldwork with siblings themselves, as well as from heterosexual parents and queer in­for­mants talking about sibling relationships. In the latter part of the chapter, I explore sibling relationships in the parent generation. I find that heterosexual parents care a ­great deal about what their siblings think but do not count on sibling loyalty and support in the same manner that many queer p­ eople do, revealing variation in the timing and types of support that siblings are asked to provide.

Interviewing Siblings Together and Apart My interviews with Logan, a T in her early thirties, and her ­sister Sandy, a straight w ­ oman in her late twenties, began with a boisterous conversation in a Taichung café. Over waffles that the café had managed to elevate to an elabo­ rate art, decorated lavishly with fruits and creams, the siblings compared memories and traded affectionate barbs in a gradually unfolding story about

Siblings and F­ amily Work • 97

their lives together and the open secret of Logan’s sexuality. Logan had never declared herself to be a lesbian or a T, but Sandy “slowly came to know it.” Their bedrooms shared a wall, and beginning in m ­ iddle school, she could hear Logan on the phone late at night. (Logan chimed in, pulling an innocent look: “I ­didn’t have phone sex, all right?”) I asked Sandy why this had been a clue; ­after all, c­ ouldn’t it have been a boy on the phone? Sandy waved her hand dismis­ sively. Logan went to an all-­girls high school, so how could she meet a guy? “And besides,” Sandy said, “she’s always been like a boy, ever since she was ­little . . . ​ She hated wearing skirts, and she preferred short hair. And she was always more interested in girls.” “Did you feel that I treated girls especially well?” Logan asked. “No,” said Sandy. Her swift answer and flat tone caused every­one to laugh. Turning to me, she continued, “She was very obvious. Like when she brought her high school girlfriend home, they would sleep together, but if it was just a friend, she would come sleep with me.” Logan interjected again: “I’m a very loyal person, in terms of my relation­ ships. I only sleep with my girlfriend.” I asked Sandy ­whether s­ he’d had a boyfriend in high school. Thus we arrived at a second secret. Sandy affirmed that she did have a boyfriend “for a very, very short time.” Logan gasped dramatically. This was news to her, and she made a big show of her shock and excitement. “This is what happens when you d­ on’t go home,” I chided. (Earlier, Logan confessed that she did not go home as often as she should.) “­You’re a bad ­sister!” my research assistant declared, and Logan echoed with gusto, “Oh, I am a bad s­ ister!” Sandy remained nonchalant as Logan plied her with questions. She had dated the boy for a few months; her classmates knew; she did not tell any f­ amily members ­because ­there was nothing that especially needed telling. This had ­ hether she would like to have another boy­ been her only relationship. I asked w friend in the ­future. “What­ever [無所謂 wusuowei],” Sandy said. “I d­ on’t want to get married.” Pressed by Logan, she supplied her reasons: “Marriage is a lot of trou­ble. It would be troublesome to have to get along with another f­ amily.” Logan noted admiringly that her ­sister has a strong personality and is not some­ body that you can push around. Sandy concurred. “The more they push me [to get married], the more I d­ on’t want to do it.” I had intended to interview Logan and Sandy separately. But I am glad that they thwarted my plans and launched into the interview as a pair (although I ­later followed up with each alone). Through their back-­and-­forth, I learned a ­great deal more than I would have other­wise. For instance, Sandy would likely have presented her high school boyfriend as unremarkable, not mentioning that it had been a secret from her s­ ister and parents. Logan badgered her for details to an extent that I would not have done or known to do in this case. As a result,

98  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

I learned about ways that straight young p­ eople may occasionally hide their inti­ mate and sexual lives from their siblings and parents. A ­ fter all, queers are not the only ones who keep secrets within our families. Subsequent separate interviews brought dif­fer­ent kinds of issues to light. Together, the ­sisters ­were playful; they egged one another on and drew out new information. Apart, they ­were introspective and a bit more vulnerable. For example, Sandy admitted, in private, that she worries about Logan and won­ ders if the ­family’s mistreatment is more burdensome than she lets on; perhaps this is why her ­sister ­doesn’t come home very often? Sandy is one of several straight in­for­mants who felt shy about raising such concerns in the presence of a queer sibling. Another straight ­woman made her T ­sister leave the room “so that I can cry without feeling embarrassed.” This small interaction is also data—an emotional layer of the ­family story and itself a kind of emotion work, managing one’s feelings in front of ­others. Interviewing and observing siblings both together and apart highlighted for me the ­g reat variety of ways that ­people think about, pres­ent, and perform ­family work and the highly interactive nature of f­ amily stories and histories. I managed to do this with about two-­thirds of the siblings I interviewed. ­These interactions and contestations over memory, together with the interviews themselves, inform the analy­sis to follow. Collectively they serve as a reminder that ­family stories, including t­ hose in this and other research, are always liv­ ing and evolving even as we try to capture them in the pages of a book.

Care Work and Emotion Work among Siblings ­ amily work performed by siblings has not received nearly the same level of F attention as work performed by parents and the gendered distribution of ­labor among ­couples.10 Lorena García writes, “Our discussions about who cleans the home and cares for ­family members and the time spent ­doing such work often fail to consider how c­ hildren are incorporated into this central aspect of ­family life.”11 In addition to the care provided by siblings as they are growing up, Shelly Erikson and Naomi Gerstel find that care work among U.S. siblings extends into adulthood.12 Pau-­Ching Lu similarly reports that siblings in Taiwan pro­ vide assistance to one another throughout the life course and especially in early adulthood.13 The lives of my in­for­mants reflect this pattern. Young adults in par­tic­u­lar spoke at length about care they had provided or received from s­ isters and ­brothers. For p­ eople with queer and trans siblings, this care work and emo­ tion work often materialized in the context of ­family negotiations and con­ flicts surrounding gender and intimate relationships. My interview with Rose, a straight w ­ oman in her twenties and the elder ­sister of a gay man, Timothy, illustrates the range of work that many siblings performed. I knew Rose for just one after­noon, but she left a deep impression

Siblings and F­ amily Work • 99

on me, affixed not only in my field notes but also in my emotions and memory. I had finished a guest lecture at a university and was preparing to depart when my host steered me unexpectedly into the faculty lunchroom and introduced me to a young ­woman who wished to add to the research I had lectured about. The program faculty graciously ceded their space, and I interviewed Rose on the spot. She struck me as quiet by nature but not at all shy, composing her nar­ rative with carefulness and detail. Sometimes she would pause, look up and to the side as one does when thinking, and then say, “Oh!” and launch into another part of her story. She shared intimate details candidly but without the extro­ verted and sometimes exhibitionistic personality that often conditions such storytelling. Rose is from a southern ­family; she and her ­brother go to school in neigh­ boring counties. Both travel home to see their parents several times per month. Throughout the interview, Rose stressed that her ­brother truly loves his ­family and is beloved by all. This fact has made his gay identity all the more difficult for the ­family to absorb. Their ­father is the eldest son, and Timothy, the eldest grand­son. Thus the love and affection heaped on him is tinged with the favor­ itism accorded to his sex and birth order. Rose recalled many f­ amily altercations about her b­ rother’s gender. The first occurred when Timothy’s boyfriend visited their home, introduced to the ­family as a friend and classmate. Rose’s grand­father disliked this friend, find­ ing him strange in appearance and manners, and ­because the ­family is very filial, Rose said, every­one went along with him. As they gossiped about the boyfriend, Rose did what she could to allay their concerns. For example, when her ­mother commented disapprovingly, “What sort of boy wears ­house slip­ pers with flowers on them?” Rose said, “Boys with lots of personality do this [很有個性的男生會 hen you gexing de nansheng hui].” A more severe altercation occurred some months ­later, when Timothy dyed his hair blond. On that day, Timothy was late to bai bai (拜拜 offer the ances­ tral prayers), arriving home ­after five ­o’clock ­because the color pro­cessing took the w ­ hole after­noon. Their ­father complained loudly, saying, “It’s almost five and no one has gone to bai bai!” Fi­nally he went to do it by himself. Shortly thereafter, Timothy came in with blond hair. Rose’s ­father flew into a rage. “You look like a homosexual [同性戀 tongxinglian], just like that friend of yours!” he snapped. Only Rose knew that this friend was actually Timothy’s boyfriend, and thus she alone recognized how t­ hese words cut, disparaging Timothy and his boyfriend as “looking like” the gay men that they are. Her ­father contin­ ued in this manner ­until Timothy ran out of the h ­ ouse and dis­appeared. Rose’s parents placed her in charge of locating him. She texted him and dialed his number repeatedly, receiving no answer, as the ­family headed to her paternal grand­mother’s nearby home. ­There, Rose’s ­father continued to harshly and publicly criticize her ­brother. Ordinarily Rose does not talk back or

100  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

intervene in her f­ ather’s discipline. But the event moved her, and she spoke in Timothy’s defense. This gesture of defiance planted a seed in her m ­ other’s mind, and she began from that moment to suspect Rose of “knowing some­ thing” about her ­brother. Eventually the f­ amily sent Rose to the beach to look for Timothy. B ­ ecause their home is near the beach, she explained, the ­family members often go ­there when they want to think; also her ­brother has a habit of exercising ­there in the mornings. Rose felt extremely worried about Timothy ­going to the beach in such a bad emotional state. Reflecting on this, she said, partly to herself, “Well . . . ​but he ­wouldn’t . . . ​I ­don’t think he would . . . ​Anyway I was worried about him.” I took this to mean that Rose worried about but ultimately dismissed the possibility of Timothy harming himself. Rose fi­nally found her b­ rother sitting by the w ­ ater, listening to m ­ usic. She said simply, “I’ve come to take you home.” Timothy resisted, but in her firm and quiet way, Rose prevailed. No further words passed between them as she drove Timothy to their grand­mother’s h ­ ouse. Rose believed her efforts in looking for him communicated her support. As they pulled into the driveway, their ­mother and grand­mother came out to greet them, saying such ­things as, “It’s OK, never mind; the hair looks fine.” But as soon as Timothy entered the ­house, their f­ ather said passionately, “I hate that hair!” Once again, in an unusual display of defiance, Rose told her f­ ather to let her ­brother be. Over time, Rose intervened for Timothy in many more large and small ways. She asked her f­ ather what he would do if his son reached thirty and then forty without marrying and it turned out that his son likes boys. Her f­ ather declared that he would kick his son out of their ­family. It is impossible to know ­whether her ­father would carry out such a drastic action. In any case, the threat made a deep impression on Rose. She tried to expose her parents to more positive per­ spectives, for instance, telling them that nowadays ­there are many gay ­people and this is simply a form of diversity (多樣 duoyang) in society. In response, her ­mother said, “If you know something we d­ on’t know, and you a­ ren’t telling us, you are in the wrong.” Rose’s parents expect her to watch over Timothy and report on his be­hav­ior. As a result, she risks her relationship with her parents in order to protect his privacy. Her relationship with her elder ­sister is also affected. This ­sister thinks Timothy’s sexual orientation is Rose’s fault b­ ecause Rose played with her ­brother too much and made him think that he is a girl. Timothy’s Facebook account indicates that he is in a stable relationship but does not say with whom. Upon seeing this status, Rose’s ­mother phoned her to ask, “Why does your ­brother’s Facebook say that he is in a stable relation­ ship? Does he have a girlfriend? What do you know about this?” Her parents are worried about the type of person he might find, asking, for example, “What if our ­future daughter-­in-­law ­doesn’t want to live with us? What if she ­doesn’t cook or clean?” They are organ­izing t­ hese worries about the ­future around the

Siblings and F­ amily Work • 101

assumption that Timothy ­will have a wife. They discuss ­these ­things when Rose is at home and include her in ­these conversations. As a result, on a regular basis, Rose does the emotional ­labor of trying to educate her parents while also pro­ tecting her ­brother’s secret and deflecting questions about his current and ­future relationships. Burdened by this stressful f­ amily situation, Rose reached out to an elder male cousin for advice. This cousin believes it would be best for Timothy to become a heterosexual. Following her cousin’s suggestion, Rose asked Timothy w ­ hether, in the f­ uture, he might begin to like girls. Timothy said, no, he likes boys only. Rose accepted this and began to look for ways to communicate her w ­ holehearted support, such as asking him questions about his boyfriend, exchanging friendly Facebook messages with the boyfriend, and interviewing Timothy for a class proj­ect about diversity in relationships. She continues to spend a g­ reat deal of time worrying and pondering the best way forward. She thinks it might be better for Timothy to wait u­ ntil a­ fter their parents have gone to live openly as a gay man. But, Rose noted, that is such a long time from now, with many difficulties in between. Rose’s story brings up many dimensions of the sister-­brother relationship. Sex and birth order are particularly impor­tant in shaping her experience and Timothy’s. Timothy’s position as the only son of the eldest son imbues him with a birthright of abundant love and pressure. As his closest ­sister, Rose is expected to assist her parents in socializing and caring for him while also preserving his masculinity (not making him “think that he is a girl”). ­People with queer and trans siblings face hard choices as schisms open up in the f­ amily and as they are pressured to take sides. Encountering an impasse between her parents and ­brother, Rose chose to side with her b­ rother. I found this to be by far the most common choice u­ nder similar circumstances. Among ­those in their thirties and younger, a majority of heterosexual sib­ lings, including t­ hose I interviewed and t­ hose described to me by queer in­for­ mants, had helped in some way to contain the knowledge of queer sexuality within their generation, hiding it from parents, grandparents, aunts, and ­uncles. They served as alibis for siblings who needed to secretly see their partners; fielded questions about dating, marriage, and physical appearance, as Rose did ­ ouse slippers; when she said that boys with “lots of personality” wear flowered h and did what they could to prepare their families for eventual disclosure or dis­ covery. The normative success stories I described in chapter 5 comprised a part of t­ hese efforts. ­ ere exceptions—­young ­people who did not side with their siblings ­There w and who viewed their identities as problematic. Rose’s elder ­sister is such a per­ son. Recall Edward, the gay man in chapter 3 whose ­sister viewed his coming out as a selfish act connected to his male privilege and entitlement as a son. In cases where siblings did not extend support, sex and birth order also mattered.

102  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

S­ isters often felt more acute consequences of having a gay ­brother in families that favored boys. This was true ­whether ­sisters w ­ ere supportive as in Timo­ thy’s case or unsupportive as in Edward’s case. ­Daughters in such families, ­whether straight, lesbian, or bisexual, felt they had to work harder to earn their parents’ ­favor, to “prove” that they could love and care for their parents as well as or better than their b­ rothers. Thus it was particularly crushing when b­ rothers disappointed their parents and yet remained the child on whom the parents pinned their hopes. While the examples above focus on s­ isters and b­ rothers, same-­sex sibling ties are not void of power. Differences of birth order, education, and other forms of capital shape same-­sex sibling dynamics throughout the course of life and determine how care is distributed. For example, elder ­sisters are often enlisted to help both younger ­brothers and younger ­sisters by remitting their income to support siblings’ education.14 Within Confucian ethics, elder ­brothers hold authority over younger b­ rothers, and proper relations involve benevolence of the elder and obedience of the younger ­brother.15 Zhixiong, the transsexual man introduced in chapter 3, renegotiated his sibling relationships through the pro­ cess of gender transition. I presented his transition as one from ­daughter to son; it is, at the same time, a transition from elder s­ ister to elder ­brother of sev­ eral sons, also a shift of significance to each ­brother and to the ­family as a ­whole. ­A fter his ­father died, Zhixiong took on added responsibilities commen­ surate with his role as “the eldest son of the f­ amily” (我們家的長子 ­women jia de chang zi). His ­brothers, busy with their own families, willingly ceded t­ hese responsibilities to him. The analy­sis I provided of transing the patriline holds relevance for both intergenerational and intragenerational kin, as siblings often work cooperatively to provide for their parents and give their ­fathers posterity. In the next part of the chapter, I re-­examine the discourse of carry­ing on the paternal line (傳宗接代 ­chuan zong jie dai), this time from the standpoint of siblings and cousins.

“In the ­future, you could bear a child and give it to him”: Siblings and Cousins D ­ oing Reproductive L­ abor I met Shu Baba on several occasions, and to the end, he remained somewhat of an enigma to me. Sometimes he gregariously cracked jokes and asked very pointed questions, while at other times he appeared baffled by the conver­ sations taking place around him. I read him, alternately, as refreshingly uncon­ ventional in his approach to sex (for instance, not assuming monogamy) and somewhat clueless. (Or he just assumes we are all nonmonogamous ­because queers c­ ouldn’t possibly be other­wise?) In any case, I never did fix Shu Baba in an ideological landscape, and over time I grew to appreciate this unpredictable quality about him.

Siblings and F­ amily Work • 103

I interviewed Shu Baba in his chosen location, a busy cafeteria at a univer­ sity to which he personally had no ties. He wore a nondescript jacket and a base­ ball cap pulled low over his face. Throughout the interview, Shu Baba spoke pointedly and passionately on the topic of patrilineal succession. He dwelt at length on his T ­daughter and his gay nephew (­brother’s son), deeply worried to the point of being preoccupied with their respective childlessness. When I asked Shu Baba for a fond memory of his elder ­daughter, who is straight, he circled back to this topic: “Oh, I should say . . . ​­because I’m very concerned about this nephew. So I spoke to my elder ­daughter about this. I said, in the ­future, you could bear a child and give it to him, to this nephew as an adoptive child . . . ​ She is willing to do it. But it’s not so ­simple. It’s not like you can just have a child if you want one.” (Shu Baba’s elder ­daughter strug­gles with infertility.) ­Later, Shu Baba mentioned soliciting his ­daughter’s help to care for her ­sister as they age: “I often say [to the elder ­daughter], ‘You need to help her. Maybe she ­won’t have ­children in the f­ uture. When she’s old you ­will need to take care of her.’ ” As the ­father of two d­ aughters, Shu Baba is particularly concerned about his ­brother’s son having a child. He worries about his younger d­ aughter’s f­ uture since she is likely to have no c­ hildren, husband, or (by his definition) f­ amily. Rather than hoping his d­ aughter ­will find a stable partner—­based, in part, on his ­daughter’s track rec­ord of dating straight ­women who eventually break up with her—­Shu Baba has allocated the responsibility for her care to her ­sister. This heterosexual ­daughter serves a pivotal role in the relationship between her ­father and her T s­ ister, as well as between her f­ ather and her gay cousin. Of the three young ­people, Shu Baba perceives his heterosexual ­daughter as the most likely to conceive in spite of her fertility issues. He holds out a dwindling hope for his T d­ aughter but no hope for his gay nephew. As he put it to me, “For lesbians, ­there is still the possibility of giving birth to a child. But how can a gay man produce descendants? It’s easier for lesbians. Gay men are ­really pitiable.” A narrow focus on parent-­child or father-­son relations fails to capture the whole-­family experience of patrilineal succession. In this case, an u­ ncle is very involved in trying to secure his ­father’s posterity through his gay nephew, using the womb of his ­daughter. Shu Baba’s proposal is embedded in the specific con­ text of Taiwanese kinship and adoption practices while also resonating with queer pathways to parenthood in other parts of the world. In one of the first books about gay fatherhood in the United States, Gerald Mallon identified kin care—­including parenting a niece or nephew—as an impor­tant route to parenthood, and subsequent work found this to be true in other queer com­ munities as well.16 At pres­ent, we do not know how many queer and trans ­people in Taiwan are involved in informal kin care and parenting arrange­ ments. We do know that the courts have chosen to discriminate against queer

104  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

and gender-­nonconforming prospective parents in ­family adoption cases. For example, in 2007, the Taiwan Taoyuan District Court ruled that a lesbian could not adopt her niece ­because her sexual orientation and masculine gen­ der pre­sen­ta­tion might create social pressure for the child.17 Ironically, in its ruling, the court produced the very discrimination it claimed to sympatheti­ cally seek to avoid. Although families may support such adoptions (in the Taoyuan case, the ­whole ­family agreed that the lesbian d­ aughter and her part­ ner should parent the child) or actively promote them as in Shu Baba’s case, queer adoptive parents remain vulnerable legally and socially. Intra-­family adoption and care arrangements highlight the significance of lateral ties for reproduction of the patrilineal ­family. In LGBT families of ori­ gin, heterosexual, cisgender siblings may assume patrilineally proscribed duties if a queer or trans child is unable or unwilling to do so. Shu Baba’s story invites us to examine the imperative to continue the paternal line from this intragen­ erational perspective. As I argued in chapter 3, it is impor­tant to consider not only the ideological but also the embodied and material dimensions of patri­ lineal kinship. If we take the traditional view of posterity as a men’s issue, Shu Baba’s gay nephew is the subject of this ­family pressure. If we look instead at the reproductive l­abor required to achieve posterity, other subjects emerge— in this case, Shu Baba’s d­ aughter, the nephew’s female cousin. ­These currents of ­family support and care flow in multiple directions. As much as straight siblings provide emotional, reproductive, and other l­abor, queer and trans siblings also step in to do needed care work. In Mallon’s research, gay men parented nieces and nephews ­because personal hardships made it impossible for their siblings to do so.18 A similar situation motivated the Taoyuan adoption case discussed above.19 Th ­ ere is some evidence that U.S. queers do more elder­ care compared to their heterosexual siblings, as families perceive them to be unattached and thus more available to help.20 W ­ hether and to what extent this is true in Taiwan is an area to be explored empirically. While my research cannot answer this question, the data I have gathered clearly show that queer and trans ­people are invested in their families and assist with eldercare, childrearing, and other ­family work. In the next part of the chapter, I shift from a focus on queer sexuality and gender and straight sibling support to a focus on how straight siblings fashion sexual and gender identities and how queer p­ eople provide support and care, including support for siblings’ intimate relationships.

The Other Side of the Coin: Straight Sexuality, Cisgender Identity, and Queer Support Of course, queer and trans ­people are not alone in having a sexuality and a gen­ der. Straight, cisgender siblings also navigate f­amily pressures and norms related to t­ hese aspects of their lives. Adele, a straight w ­ oman with two T s­ isters,

Siblings and F­ amily Work • 105

attributed the restrictions imposed by her parents to her normative feminin­ ity. Her s­ isters ­were allowed to come and go as they pleased and to socialize freely with their friends, while Adele did not enjoy this liberty. “Maybe b­ ecause I’m the most girly ­daughter in my f­ amily,” she said. “Maybe they think that if a girl is very pretty, she ­will get taken advantage of by guys.” Adele’s ­sisters tease her about her girly style and groan if she tries to stop in the makeup aisle at a store. I asked Adele w ­ hether she had ever tried to emulate them. When she was younger, she said, “I tried to wear their clothes ­because I just ­didn’t have many clothes of my own, so I had to wear them. One time I cut my hair very short ­because I had just broken up with one of my boyfriends. And all of my classmates said, ‘Wow, you look so handsome [帥 shuai], like your ­sister!’ ” Adele laughed as she recalled this. She did not mind being associ­ ated with her s­ ister in this manner. Nor did she mind being perceived as her ­sister’s po girlfriend when the two of them ­were together in public. It mattered ­little to Adele w ­ hether p­ eople assumed she was straight, lesbian, or bisexual. Like Sandy (Logan’s ­sister, introduced earlier in this chapter), Adele kept her boyfriend a secret from her parents. Living at home presented serious obsta­ cles as her relationship with him matured. Eventually Adele moved into an apartment with one of her T s­ isters and the s­ ister’s partner. This arrangement made it pos­si­ble for Adele to see her boyfriend and even spend the night with him. Her ­sister helped to cover her tracks, hiding evidence of the boyfriend’s presence and telling their parents that Adele was busy with work. As Adele’s experience illustrates, queer siblings can be allies to straight ­women who strug­ gle to claim personal autonomy ­under vigilant parenting and the constraints of normative femininity. Heterosexual sibling experiences differ from t­ hose of LGBT young p­ eople in numerous ways. Straight ­women may feel scrutinized, but they do not endure the relentless interventions and marginalization that T’s and other gender non­ conforming p­ eople experience at home, in public, and in the workplace. While their parents may try to control their coming and ­going, their friends and dating relationships, many ultimately leave their parents’ home through marriage to the man of their choice. Their early relationships may be a source of worry, but in the end, most have relationships that are legally protected and socially supported (with exceptions). In other ways, straight and queer ­daughters share certain f­ amily pressures in common. Straight d­ aughters also experience surveillance and censure of their sexuality and need alibis to pro­ tect their secrets. They often strug­gle with pressure to conform to a very nar­ row standard of feminine beauty, which secures their physical capital while devaluing other aspects of their person. Issues of bodily autonomy and integ­ rity, including decisions about how one looks and when, where, and with whom to have sex, are an area where straight and queer s­ isters (and b­ rothers) can extend mutual support.

106  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

Families vary in the types of care that they require, and I witnessed some queer ­people d­ oing extraordinary amounts of caregiving as needs arose. For example, a transmasculine in­for­mant, Charlie, gave up the chance to study abroad ­because his ­father abused his ­mother verbally and physically. “I have to be h ­ ere to protect my ­mother,” he explained, upon making this decision. “My ­ ill do it?” A lesbian ­sisters are married with families of their own; who e­ lse w in­for­mant, Niki, helped her ­mother to care for a ­little ­sister with an intellec­ tual disability and life-­threatening medical condition. She nursed her s­ ister a­ fter numerous surgeries, helped to quiet her emotions in periods of confusion and distress, and did all she could to brighten her ­sister’s daily life. Charlie and Nicki inhabited ­these caregiving roles in ways that ­were directly connected to their respective trans and lesbian identities, providing a level of care that is (as Char­ lie noted) still unrealistic for many heterosexually married ­women. This was true even while both ­were in long-­term, marriage-­like relationships, as they did not have competing commitments to in-­laws. Niki’s dual roles as a lesbian and as the sibling of a person with a disability intersected in her po­liti­cal activities and ethics as well. Recently Niki ran for public office and addressed both queer and disability rights issues in her platform. Charlie and Niki presented their choices as wholly their own and described this ­family work as something they valued and wanted to do. Queer l­ abor can also be extracted in more exploitative ways, particularly when queer partner­ ships are not recognized. The Taiwan Tongzhi Hotline Association created a short film, 喘息 (chuanxi, En­g lish title “I need a break”), about a lesbian exhausted by such demands, treated as a “single” ­woman with time to spare in the eyes of her f­ amily and employer, while struggling to provide adequate care for her hospitalized partner. In a moving scene, the ­woman breaks down cry­ ing ­after her m ­ other scolds her harshly for being a selfish and negligent d­ aughter, even as she has spent all day ­running from one obligation to the next.21 ­These kinds of sacrifices and strug­gles are often invisible as queer ­couples are forced to hide their relationships or pres­ent them as “friendships” without the levels of commitment and re­spect granted to a marital bond. Books about LGBT family-­of-­origin relationships (­whether academic or self-­ help style) tend to frame LGBT ­people as recipients of ac­cep­tance and support or as lacking t­ hese t­ hings in their ­family relationships. LGBT p­ eople also pro­ vide care and support to their siblings and other f­ amily members. For t­ hose who are not heterosexually married, ­family claims on their time, energy, and income may be premised on a false sense of the queer person as single, available, and still a contributing member of the f­ amily of origin, rather than an in­de­pen­dent adult with their own f­ amily to care for. In the next part of the chapter, I con­ tinue to focus on straight ­family members as care recipients, this time looking at the care and support (or lack thereof) that heterosexual parents receive from their own siblings.

Siblings and F­ amily Work • 107

Parents and Their Siblings S­ ister and b­ rother relationships mattered in the parent generation as well. As parents responded and ascribed meaning to their ­children’s nonnormative sexualities and genders, their own siblings added pressure, offered advice, extended support, and, at times, made secrecy more necessary and more com­ plicated. Shu Baba, whom we met earlier in this chapter, had much to share about his extended ­family and his ­sisters in par­tic­u­lar. In an especially poignant part of the interview, Shu Baba burst out, “They accuse us, saying [raising his voice], ‘Why ­can’t you control your ­daughter? Why ­can’t you control your ­daughter [你怎麼不管她，你怎麼不管她 ni zenme bu guan ta, ni zenme bu guan ta]?’ But what can I do? How should I control this child?” “Who says such t­ hings to you?” I asked. “My relatives, my siblings,” he said. “My older and younger ­sisters. They ask, ‘Why ­can’t you control your d­ aughter? Why do you permit her to dress like a boy?’ I feel terribly sad. I have no way to change my d­ aughter. I ­can’t tell any­ one about t­ hese issues; I have to suppress every­thing.” Shu Baba believed that if his ­sisters knew the truth, they would oppose it strongly, all the more strongly ­because they are Christians. He asked a string of questions directed partially to me, partially to himself, and perhaps largely to the s­ ilent universe or Chris­ tian god that he also worships: “How can I talk to them? What should I do? What if they find out? ­Will I have to face this for the rest of my life?” As a result of this stress, Shu Baba no longer enjoys f­ amily gatherings and avoids them whenever he can. His ­sisters’ criticisms have compromised their bond to such an extent that Shu Baba has, in his words, “no idea how to relate to them.” I wondered briefly if Shu Baba might find support and camaraderie with his ­brother, the ­father of his gay nephew. However, the issue has never come up between them. The nephew has not come out to his ­father, only to Shu Baba (his ­uncle). Further, it was his ­daughter’s gender, not her sexual orientation, that drew the bulk of the negative attention, and Shu Baba’s nephew has a normatively masculine gender pre­sen­ta­tion. The nephew’s mar­ riage pressure is likely to increase in the f­ uture, but for now, it is Shu Baba’s T ­daughter who is in the ­family spotlight. (This of course is as experienced by Shu Baba—­family members vary in how they perceive pressure in relation to ­others and to themselves.) Shu Baba is not alone in t­ hese feelings. Many parents strug­gle in deciding ­whether and how to acknowledge a child’s queer sexuality within the extended ­family. In a climate where ­family consultations are common (recall Ama’s “­family meetings” about Deer in chapter 4), parents described ­these strug­gles as urgent and per­sis­tent. The assumption of sibling loyalty held by many queers was not mirrored among heterosexual parents. That is, parents did not assume that sibling loyalty would guide their ­sisters and ­brothers to support them and

108  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

stand by them a­ fter learning that they are the parent of a queer or transgender child. Th ­ ere are many pos­si­ble reasons why sibling loyalty may shift through the life course or in dif­fer­ent ­family scenarios (e.g., siblings supporting one another as ­children versus siblings supporting one another as parents). All of the parents I interviewed ­were in their fifties or older, as ­were their siblings. Thus, generational changes in expectations and types of sibling support may be one ­factor among o­ thers. Life stages are also critical for siblings. Sibling sup­ port is often strongest in early adulthood and then tapers off to some degree as siblings acquire other ­family commitments.22 A small number of parents did receive queer-­affirming counsel from their siblings. Skye Han’s ­father is one such person. Both Skye (the young T we met in chapters 2 and 4) and Han Baba in­de­pen­dently reached out to Han Baba’s elder ­sister Ako for advice. Ako encouraged her ­brother to make peace with his ­daughter’s sexual orientation and informed him that in some places lesbi­ ans do get married and have families. “So,” she concluded, “­don’t assume she ­will remain unmarried and work for you forever.” (With this comment, Ako addressed the ste­reo­type, mentioned above, of queers as permanently single and available to their families of origin.) Skye was understandably ner­vous to find out that a conversation about her sexuality had tran­spired between her f­ ather and aunt. But she was also grateful to her aunt for clearing up some of her ­father’s misconceptions and nudging him ­toward a more tolerant mind-­set. To Skye’s knowledge, this s­ ister is the only person to whom her ­father has disclosed, in or out of the ­family. ­Sisters may also become involved in parenting a niece or nephew. Deer (the transfeminine person introduced in chapter 4) confided a ­g reat deal in her ­father’s younger ­sister and sought her advice about gender-­confirmation sur­ gery. This aunt is a source of support for Deer and also, in a roundabout way, for Deer’s f­ ather, providing forms of care and advice that he is not equipped to offer. In a similar manner, Shu Baba is a supportive ­brother, albeit invisible to the recipient of this support, as he is the only adult of their generation who knows that his ­brother’s son is gay and has taken it upon himself to find a way for this son to have a child. In sum, my research confirms that sibling relationships are influential for parents as well but without the taken-­for-­g ranted quality of sibling support among young ­people. Research shows that in adulthood, siblings provide more help in the form of social companionship and emotional support than in instru­ mental support.23 Consistent with this trend, siblings of parents in my study offered counsel and active listening as their most common forms of support. The anxiety parents feel about disclosure to their siblings reveals the enduring importance of t­ hese relationships. Fear of sibling rejection and reproach is a highly motivating emotion even for mature adults who are financially in­de­pen­ dent and have grown c­ hildren. As p­ eople drift apart, busy with their separate

Siblings and F­ amily Work • 109

lives, their siblings’ actions and opinions retain a special significance. Multiple generations of siblings—­including siblings of LGBT p­ eople and siblings of par­ ents with LGBT c­ hildren—­have a meaningful part to play in queer f­amily dynamics.

Sibling Identity and Relationality In the introductory chapter, readers met Coral Lu as she picked me up from a rural Pingtung train station. On that day, Coral donned a “masculine appear­ ance” (男性的樣子 nanxing de yangzi) corresponding with her assigned sex but exuded femininity in her body language, manners, and interactions with vari­ ous p­ eople throughout day, including numerous f­ amily members. On our way to dinner, her ­sister Fanyu regaled us with a story about a close ­family friend who saw Coral “dressed” and mistook her for Fanyu. The siblings found this hilarious but agreed that they do indeed look alike. They have a similar style ­because, Fanyu explained, “I give her clothes to wear.” “Do you wear the same size?” I asked. “No, I’m fatter!” Fanyu declared, laughing. “When she buys something cute, it ­doesn’t fit me. What a pity.” I asked about shoe size. (As a femme with my own penchant for shoes, this conversation was of g­ reat interest to me also—at this point all three of us w ­ ere holding our feet up to admire one another’s shoes.) Coral is a size and a half bigger, so if Fanyu buys shoes that ­aren’t too tight, Coral can usually fit them. “Oh, and the underclothes,” Fanyu said, looking at Coral, laughing. “Yes, the underclothes,” said Coral. Fanyu continued, “I give her my old underclothes. ­She’ll see me getting rid of a bra and say, ‘Do you want this anymore?’ And if I say no, ­she’ll take it.” Coral made a self-­deprecating joke about the hand-­me-­down bras and then steered the conversation to a dif­fer­ent clothing-­related issue that she wanted to address. Coral likes dressing up and posing for photos and wishes Fanyu would pose with her. The siblings disagreed on why Fanyu prefers to be the photo­ grapher rather than a subject of t­hese photos. Fanyu said it is ­because she (Fanyu) is too chubby; Coral said it is b­ ecause Fanyu is not comfortable appear­ ing publicly with a transfeminine person. This was a real impasse but one they broached frankly and, from my outsider’s view, with mutual re­spect. During this conversation, Lu Mama sat in the passenger seat of the van driven by her eldest son, Coral’s ­brother, and the two of them carried on their own intermittent conversation. I sat in the m ­ iddle with Coral, and Fanyu sat in the back with her ­daughter and son, who chimed in frequently about entirely random topics in the charming manner of young c­ hildren. Each person in the van approached Coral’s gender in ways that reflected their own social location—­ sex, birth order, ­family role. Just as significantly, each person had adjusted in

110  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

their relationship to the ­others. Fanyu and her ­brother interacted differently with their ­mother as a result of having a transgender sibling. In a ­later conver­ sation, Fanyu’s b­ rother acknowledged that he would be the only son to ­father ­children. He accepted this as an additional ­family responsibility. Fanyu recog­ nized that she would need to provide emotional support to her ­mother and edu­ cate her about gender issues. Both siblings said that having Coral in their ­family had caused them to think carefully about how to parent their own ­children, particularly in terms of nurturing the ­children’s in­de­pen­dence. Having a transgender sibling produced intergenerational effects, shaping the ­family and home in which the l­ ittle ones would grow up. Siblings in this research talked at length about the t­hings they shared: shared homes, rooms, and thin walls between their rooms, through which they overheard late-­night phone chats with secret loves; shared computers, with revealing browser histories; shared schools and social circles, where rumors quickly spread; shared bathrooms and mirrors, where they traded tips on how to dress and style their hair and observed their siblings’ use of gen­ dered cosmetic products; and shared possessions, like the underclothes Fanyu gave to Coral. Even siblings who ­were not emotionally close described an inti­ macy created by the imbrication of their everyday lives. (As a meaningful exception, ­those siblings who differed vastly in age did not experience this kind of intimacy.) As Rosalind Edwards and colleagues write, “At the heart of relationships between siblings—­whatever their quality—­lie issues of identity and relationality . . . ​Siblings form an impor­tant part of who [many ­children] are, their relationship to other p­ eople, and their sense of their place in the social world.”24 This connectivity manifests for queer families of origin in the care work and emotion work that siblings do, in their roles as allies and alibis, in the repro­ ductive l­ abor that they are called on to provide, and in the emotional costs of sibling rejection. S­ isters and b­ rothers in this study vary by gender, age, class, region, and, frankly (like any sibling pair), by how much they like each other. Across ­these differences, p­ eople identified their siblings as influential figures in their lives. Queers and their parents had to make decisions about ­whether and how to address issues of sexuality and gender with their siblings, and sib­ lings, for their part, had to make decisions about how to respond, particularly when they ­were asked to take sides in a f­ amily conflict. Overwhelmingly, it seemed that sibling loyalty won out for younger generations and for queers, while middle-­aged, heterosexual parents had mixed expectations ranging from reliance on siblings for advice to ambivalence and apprehension about how siblings might behave. In a beautiful piece on brother-­sister relationships in Lebanon, Suad Joseph argues that sibling bonds cannot be reduced to the romanticized dimension of love or the structural dimension of power; rather, it is the interlinking of love

Siblings and F­ amily Work • 111

and power that merges siblings’ sense of self.25 Although Joseph is writing about a very dif­f er­ent context, her framework resonates with what I observed among siblings in Taiwan. Sibling relationships involve, in varying degrees, love, nur­ turance, intimacy, inequity, conflict, and power. S­ isters love the b­ rothers they are called on to look ­after, even as they are clear-­eyed about the privileges ­these ­brothers receive. ­Brothers step in to take additional responsibility for their par­ ents (like Coral’s ­brother) or to cede that responsibility (like Zhixiong’s ­brothers) as queer and transgender subjectivities complicate ­family caregiving. The entangled sense of self is not just psychodynamic but social—­siblings are sometimes mistaken for each other’s partners (like Adele) or for each other (like Coral and Fanyu) and are implicated in each other’s gender socialization (like Rose). Having a queer or trans sibling may change the way a person parents and reconfigure other relationships and values. Tatjana Thelan and colleagues argue that sibling relations are as impor­tant as parenthood and marriage to the maintenance of families and the making and breaking of kinship ties.26 In this spirit, I hope the lit­er­a­ture on LGBT families of origin becomes ever more inclusive of sibling relationships, with this chapter as one small contri­ bution to that shift.

Conclusion

At the Taipei Pride March in 2011, I was in full research mode. I took nearly one hundred photos and copious field notes; I greeted ­people I knew march­ ing ­under all kinds of banners, accepted e­ very invitation, and made new con­ nections to expand my pool of in­for­mants. At the Taipei Pride March in 2012, I was in a new relationship and attended with my then-­partner’s mom and dad, who had come up from Changhua for the event. In contrast to my parent interviewees, with whom I mostly formed more temporary relationships, ­these parents would remain in my life, even becoming my parents-­in-­law for a period of time. ­A fter the march, the four of us met my partner’s cousin for dinner at a nearby shopping mall. I felt guilty about missing an opportunity for data collection at several concurrent Pride events. In retrospect, my con­ cerns ­were silly—­I “missed” an opportunity to learn about queer family-­of-­ origin relationships by spending time with my T partner’s ­mother, ­father, and cousin. My feelings about ­these two marches reflect the ways that our personal ­family lives are often defined as separate from or even antithetical to queer social and po­liti­cal organ­izing and academic knowledge production. While d­ oing this fieldwork, I observed that the focus and energy that some p­ eople put into think­ ing about and dealing with their families was not usually viewed as po­liti­cal or critically queer by more seasoned activists (with some exceptions).1 Yet fami­ lies of origin remain a crucial site of po­liti­cal work and queer organ­izing and desire in Taiwan. This work is embedded in the dynamic conditions of com­ pressed modernity even as it unfolds in micro-­interactions: a parent opening a child’s diary, a sibling overhearing a flirtatious phone call or an argument that could only occur between lovers, a trans w ­ oman leaving her makeup on the 112

Conclusion • 113

bathroom ­counter. It is in the ebb and flow of ­these shared moments that new f­ amily structures and practices emerge. Much of the book has involved a pro­cess of linking queer kinship, on the one hand, to ­family change in Taiwan, on the other—­the two parts of the book title are in fact two rather separate bodies of lit­er­a­ture, approaching similar issues from dif­fer­ent theoretical corners. Both are concerned with ways that ­people (desire to) have sex, fall in love, form and dissolve attachments, set up their ­house­holds, and manage or fail to manage f­ amily obligations; with the rising number of non-­procreative u­ nions, w ­ hether t­ hese are heterosexual married ­couples (as presumed in lit­er­a­ture on Taiwan’s low birth rate) or alternative sexual partnerships; and with the fluidity and permeability of kinship struc­ tures previously assumed to be static and enduring. However, lit­er­a­ture on ­family change in Taiwan generally takes heterosexuality for granted or engages alternative sexual cultures only briefly and then as an empirical anno­ tation (e.g., lesbian and gay ­people exist), rather than a central analytic frame­ work.2 Meanwhile, ­those of us who work with queer subjects typically end up in deep conversations with other queer scholars, by our own choice or through academic siloing whereby every­thing queer is perceived as being only or primar­ ily about sexuality.3 Intersecting t­ hese two bodies of work yields a more his­ torically situated analy­sis, one that is attuned to the interplay between social systems and interpersonal relationships.

Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan: Mapping Changes and Continuities Compared to earlier cohorts, t­ oday’s queer youth live in smaller families, spend longer periods of time as dependents and thus more time co-­residing with siblings of similar ages, are monitored more closely by their parents, and have a greater expectation that f­ amily relationships ­will involve some degree of emotional expressiveness and self-­disclosure. Modes of presenting and com­ municating about sexuality and gender are responsive to ­these changes. Queer young ­people tend to experience ­family silence around sexuality as rejecting and alienating; in contrast, queer elders describe silence as a form of tolerance if not support. It is not just the practice of silence but the meanings attached to it that have changed as p­ eople engage with new ideas about what a ­family is and should be. Gendered ­family roles are slow to change relative to other aspects of men’s and ­women’s lives, and patrilineal continuity remains a cherished value that organizes relationships in many families. ­Because of this, gay men face particularly strong pressure to marry and produce heirs. But this pressure is also absorbed by w ­ omen, including married and unmarried lesbians and heterosexual ­mothers and s­ isters. Viewing patrilineal kinship as a cultural

114  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

institution or ideology is insufficient; we must also examine it as an embodied form of ­labor. Heterosexually married ­women do this work for their in-­laws, while unmarried and divorced ­women often contribute to their natal families without receiving the instrumental support extended to sons. The per­sis­tence of a male-­centered system of kinship and succession holds numerous implications for queer family-­of-­origin relationships. Gender ineq­ uities shape queer ­women’s culture and experience and are often at the root of their ­family conflicts. Trans ­people are in a challenging and often precarious position as they navigate gendered f­ amily structures and roles. At the same time, roles that are oppressive to some may serve as more subversive tools for ­others. My female-­to-­male in­for­mant Zhixiong took on the ritualistic role of a son at his ­uncle’s funeral, affirming his gender by participating in practices that explic­ itly exclude ­women. As Zhixiong’s experience illustrates, even deeply patriar­ chal and heteronormative constructs may be co-­opted to create spaces for queer and trans self-­expression within families. The same is true of normativity in a larger sense. ­People and especially par­ ents in my research used normativity in strategic ways. Some showcased lesbi­ ans and gays who had achieved normative indicators of success—­a good education, a stable job, wealth, influence—in order to sway public opinion or stand up to personal criticism. I described t­ hese as Erving Goffman’s “front­ stage per­for­mances,” conceptualized as stepping stones to a more inclusive poli­ tics.4 However, normative bargains like t­hese rarely benefit ­those who are most disadvantaged, and parents’ emphasis on stability and success is likely to empower some queers at o­ thers’ expense.5 For heterosexual w ­ omen in the study, interactions with queer siblings and ­children carried notes of the gender in­equality in their own lives. One ­sister, for instance, saw her b­ rother’s gay identity as an expression of his male privi­ lege; another perceived it as a potential collapse of the pedestal he occupied as the f­ amily’s only son and tried to intervene on his behalf to cushion the fall. Several m ­ others pointed to their own suffering within marriage as a reason to reject the heterosexual marriage imperative for their ­children. ­Others grieved that their long suffering and sacrifice had not secured a stable ­future as they ­were promised or felt that it should. Historically, a w ­ oman’s son anchored her standing in the ­family.6 Although ­things have changed, some ­mothers still expe­ rience a very real loss of security when their sons choose not to marry. Gay men recognize this, and some have entered heterosexual marriages for precisely this reason. It is clear from ­these and other examples populating ­these pages that forms of oppression or privilege experienced by one ­family member have a meaningful impact on the ­others. Understanding heterosexual ­family mem­ bers in a deeper way ­will also help us to better understand queer and trans experiences and choices, and vice versa.

Conclusion • 115

­People in this study varied in what they hoped for and expected of their f­ amily relationships. Some desired greater closeness and access to one another’s lives, while o­ thers wished for greater autonomy and privacy. Some desired an emotional connection, while o­ thers prioritized instrumental support. Some longed for a life that is “as normal as pos­si­ble” (to borrow language from Yau Ching’s 2010 anthology)7 and pursued this by entering a heterosexual marriage or forming a marriage-­like relationship with a same-­sex partner, while ­others wanted to “query the marriage-­family continuum” (to borrow language from Naifei Ding and Jen-­Peng Liu’s 2011 anthology)8 by creating a life outside of ­these hierarchal institutions. Ultimately, the production of knowledge about queer families of origin ­will be richer when we acknowledge the ambivalence that often surrounds ­these relationships and the variation not only in how families look but also in what p­ eople wish they looked like.

What Issues M ­ atter to Queer Families of Origin? This research points to a more expansive vision of queer families of origin and the types of issues that might be addressed ­under this rubric. Beyond the usual suspects—­coming out, carry­ing on the paternal line, being filial to one’s elders—­are a host of other concerns, many with economic and material roots. Lack of access to f­ amily capital and housing insecurity among lesbians is a queer ­family issue. So is the gendered division of care work and emotion work, shap­ ing the ways that parents, c­ hildren, and siblings encounter and navigate sexual differences. Educational and class disparities meaningfully structure queer family-­of-­origin relationships, both as actually experienced and as leveraged to convince parents (and the public) that queers ­will be able to lead normal and successful lives. It is impor­tant to situate families of origin not only culturally but also po­liti­cally, eco­nom­ically, socially, and historically and to analyze heterosexual ­family members with the same critical, intersectional lens that we apply to queer and transgender subjects. Exploring queer ­family issues out­ side the Anglophone West as exemplars of cultural difference is reductive and does a disser­vice to our knowledge about ­these families and the variation among them. Concrete steps to support ­these families ­will be strongest when they, too, are critical, intersectional, responsive to variation in the lives of heterosexuals as well as queers, and grounded in the specific conditions that parents and other ­family members must navigate. Modes of parent outreach that focus dispro­ portionately on morality and religious beliefs about homo­sexuality (as is the case for most outreach programs developed in North Amer­i­ca) are inadequate for parents who have more economic and relational concerns and thus require dif­fer­ent kinds of information and support. Many activists in Taiwan are committed to a critical and class-­conscious framework and to addressing a

116  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

wide variety of parent and ­family needs. The strug­gle, then, is to protect this commitment from the normalizing currents of local and global LGBT move­ ments that try to shoehorn queer politics into narrower proj­ects of marriage and ­family reform.

More Than Marriage: Recent Gains and Activist ­Futures In any context, but especially u­ nder the conditions of compressed modernity that I have highlighted, ethnographic research on queer culture is social his­ tory nearly as soon as the ink dries. As I revised this book manuscript, Taiwan’s highest court, the Judicial Yuan, ruled it unconstitutional to exclude same-­sex ­couples from marriage. The court gave the legislature two years to change the civil code to bring it in line with the constitution (At the time of the court’s decision in 2017, Article 972 of the civil code defined marriage as between a man and a ­woman.) I joined the cele­bration from afar, exchanging joyful text messages with friends in Taiwan, including some who had put tremendous amounts of work into the case. “I am soooo tired but extremely happy,” one friend wrote back. This ruling is significant. But it is not the climax or culmination of strug­ gles for LGBT rights (or LGBT f­ amily rights) in Taiwan. So far, Taiwanese queer activists have managed to resist the supremacy of marriage in order to maintain a more diverse agenda, presenting partnership rights as one part of a much larger fight for gender and sexual self-­determination. But as Western and international media increasingly frame queer strug­gles everywhere through the lens of same-­sex marriage, and as marriage has become a mea­sure (if not the mea­sure) of LGBT pro­gress in global discourse, it becomes ever harder to swim against this tide. In 2013, Taipei Pride or­ga­nized around the theme of sexual refugees (性難民 xing nanmin), broadly defined to include all who are outcast in society on the basis of their sexuality or gender. Yet I noticed some English-­language media covering the event as a “march for same-­sex marriage.”9 Other examples of this marriage-­washing phenomenon occurred in discussions about the theme. In one online forum, a Taiwan resident from New Zealand wrote, “It is my under­ standing that the ‘theme’ for this year’s parade is sexual refugees! This appears to be aimed at: recreational drug users, BDSM prac­ti­tion­ers, sex workers: no way.”10 This person lamented that “the marriage equality message was overshad­ owed by marchers carry­ing signs promoting their own agenda.” He held up New Zealand gay rights activism as a model and argued, “ONLY when all rights are equal can you think about turning it [Pride] into a theme/circus parade.” The author of this post does not allow for the possibility that recreational drug users, BDSM prac­ti­tion­ers, and sex workers are included in a world wherein

Conclusion • 117

“all rights are equal.” For him, “all rights” boils down to the right to marry. This may be a strongly worded view, but it is representative of a larger trend in which rights discourse is co-­opted to exclude a majority of queers and ­others whose sexuality is labeled as deviant. Marriage and ­family equality cannot be achieved for Taiwan’s LGBT pop­ ulation through the lone engine of ­legal same-­sex marriage. Further, I do not believe legalizing same-­sex marriage in Taiwan ­will automatically make it eas­ ier for p­ eople to integrate their queer relationships with their families of origin. (And with this my in­for­mants agreed—­few had broached the possibility of same-­sex marriage with their parents, and ­those who hoped or planned to marry a same-­sex partner anticipated confusion rather than greater legitimacy within their families.) Marriage remains the major instrument of patrilineal reproduction, accomplished through stratification by sex and generation, with elder males occupying positions of authority and privilege in the ­family. Sim­ ply extending the ­legal benefits of marriage to same-­sex ­couples does not address ­these core ­family issues. This was evident in my interviews with gay men who said it would be complicated to have ­children with a male partner ­because, in that case, only one ­father could claim the c­ hildren as his descendants. Another gay interviewee longed to give his parents a daughter-­in-­law; he did not see a male partner or husband as fulfilling this role, since another man would have competing responsibilities to his own parents. A marriage-­equality movement that sidesteps the question of gender (as the heavi­ly exported U.S. marriage-­ equality movement has done) cannot address t­ hese issues satisfactorily. To this end, a hopeful quote came, quite inadvertently, from a group strongly opposing marriage equality, the Alliance of Religious Groups for the Love of Families Taiwan (台灣宗教團體愛護家庭大聯盟 Taiwan Zongjiao Tuanti Aihu Jiating Da Lianmeng). In response to the court’s ruling in May 2017, a spokesperson for this group told Al Jazeera, “The ­whole definition of marriage ­will be changed . . . ​Ancestral lineage and ­family structure ­will all be disrupted.”11 While the alliance intends this as a warning, for o­ thers, such changes are long awaited and sorely needed. To the extent that same-­sex marriage can disrupt existing structures rather than simply inhabit them, it may play a role in creat­ ing more sexual equity and gender possibilities for heterosexuals as well as queers.

Limitations and Places to Go from H ­ ere A book is never perfect, and having arrived at the end, t­ here are some t­ hings I wish I had done better. In par­tic­u­lar, I wish that I had been more intentional in interviewing parents and perhaps grandparents of dif­fer­ent social classes. This is an area I would like to develop in the f­ uture, and I look forward with

118  •  Queer Kinship and F­ amily Change in Taiwan

anticipation to work by ­others in the same vein. My research has just scratched the surface of trans experiences within f­ amily structures that are not repre­ sented by the prevailing Eurocentric models. Popu­lar Western discourses tend to frame transgender experience in an individualistic way, focusing on identity over forms of relationality and connectivity that animate gender in ­family and social contexts. Trans ­people and other gender diverse groups in patrilineal socie­ties have impor­tant contributions to make to our understanding of how ­family roles and rituals enable and foreclose gendered ways of being. All of my interviewees are a part of Taiwan’s Han majority, comprising roughly 95 ­percent of the population. (Within this group, p­ eople varied in their identification as benshengren/native Taiwanese or waishengren/mainlanders who immigrated to Taiwan with the Kuomintang between 1945 and 1949 and their descendants. Several families included both a benshengren and waishengren parent, and interviewees described ­these as interethnic marriages.) Queers who are a part of other racial and ethnic communities, such as Taiwan’s indigenous ­peoples and growing numbers of mi­g rants from Southeast Asia, have family-­of-­origin stories that are not included in this book. Th ­ ese stories are impor­tant to gather as they, too, are a part of queer kinship and ­family change in Taiwan and are likely to differ in significant ways from ­those I have written about. Issues of immigration and transnationalism could certainly be explored in more depth than I have managed to do ­here. For as many questions as I have answered, I hope that I have inspired abun­ dantly more. Queer family-­of-­origin research has the potential to engage numer­ ous fields of study, encompassing but also surpassing its common tropes of coming out and pathways to parental ac­cep­tance. Its promise is greatest when we do not relegate ­these families to niche status and, instead, ask what they can teach us about gender, sexuality, modernity, parenthood, grandparenthood, sib­ ling bonds, and other social and material dimensions of kinship and f­amily relationships.

Parting Words The p­ eople who contributed their stories to this research often shared their hopes for what my proj­ect might accomplish. I want to give my in­for­mants the last word in this book by sharing a small number of their hopes in its final pages. In some cases, my research spoke directly to the concerns they raised. In other cases, I was not able to provide the answers they desired. Thus, ­these requests may also energize ­future research endeavors, by highlighting wells that my work has left untapped. I ­don’t know if my story is valuable to you. Some ­people say I am not moral. When Y. M. asked me ­whether she can introduce me to you, I did not hesitate,

Conclusion • 119

b­ ecause I want to tell my story. I feel more comfortable a­ fter telling it. Last week, I mentioned to my son that I want to write out my story, write it into a book. My son supported me. I ­don’t know where to start, how to start, but I am trying. —­Yijun, a T in her fifties and m ­ other of a gay son Once we answer our relatives’ questions [about our d­ aughter], a war w ­ ill break out within our ­family. I ­don’t know how long I can bear this. Over time, we feel more and more pressure. Coming out and staying in are both unacceptable. I hope your research can tell us how to deal with this prob­lem. —­Shu Baba, ­father of a T d­ aughter I feel happy that I have this child. Other­wise I would never have had the chance to learn about and understand [the gay community]. I hope that my experience can encourage other parents. —­Zhang Baba, ­father of a gay son I think it’s better if my ­brother can wait u­ ntil a­ fter my parents have gone [passed away] to come out. But that is such a long time from now, with many difficulties in between. So I want to know, how do other families ­handle such prob­lems? —­Rose, elder ­sister of a gay ­brother Actually I am not so interested in academic research. I am interested in making a connection, in touching someone with my story. This is why I agreed to par­ ticipate. I hope that my story has touched you in some way. —­Junyu, a bu fen lesbian in her twenties

Together with Yijun, Shu Baba, Zhang Baba, Rose, and Junyu, I hope that research on this topic can encourage members of the community and address the prob­lems that queer p­ eople and families themselves find most urgent; and that even as we build academic theories, we also allow the stories to touch us in a lasting and personal way. Perhaps most of all, I hope that ­those who, like Yijun, desire to speak out about their lives can be heard.

Appendix A Naming and Language I have a friend whose ­mother calls us “the ABCDEFG ­people.” Flummoxed by the endless proliferation of the acronym (LGBTQQIA . . .), she has—­ cleverly, in my opinion—­gone back to the beginning of the alphabet to denote a community characterized as much by its diversity as by its cohesion. Naming sexualities and genders in even one language is difficult. Naming t­ hese across multiple languages poses a still greater challenge. I have made a deliberate choice to vary the terms I use throughout the book. I use “queer,” “LGBT,” “gender and sexually nonconforming,” and related terms more or less interchangeably when describing the ­whole com­ munity. I do not believe that any single term is more representative or f­ ree of the assumptions and baggage that accompany words across borders. Varying terms is one small attempt that I have made to highlight their par­ tiality and fluidity; t­hese are descriptive placeholders, not fixed identity categories. An impor­tant aim of this proj­ect is to expand the English-­language LGBT ­family lit­er­a­ture beyond a primarily white, Western empirical and theoretical foundation. Put another way, by including Taiwanese ­people and families in this lit­er­a­ture, we broaden the base of knowledge about sexualities, genders, and families and the theoretical models and tools that can emerge. I believe using the acronym “LGBT,” with acknowl­edgment of its limits, signals to scholars who work in this area that this research is in conversation with their own. At the same time, the word “queer” connotes my epistemological commitments to denaturalizing gender and sexual categories even as I invoke them provisionally in my work.

121

122  •  Appendix A

Terms Used by My In­for­mants ­ eople in this research used many dif­fer­ent words to describe themselves and P their ­family members, and ­these also appear in the book as I introduce indi­ vidual characters: bu nan bu nv (不男不女 neither man nor ­woman, nonbinary) bu fen (不分 a lesbian who does not differentiate herself as T or po) kua xingbie (跨性別 transgender) lazi (拉子 lesbian) po (婆 “wife,” a female-­assigned person whose gender is consistent with cultural definitions of femininity and who prefers female [usually masculine] partners) shuangxinglian (雙性戀 bisexual) T (derived from “tomboy,” a female-­assigned person whose gender is consistent with cultural definitions of masculinity and who prefers female [usually feminine] partners; sometimes written phonetically as 踢) tongxinglian (同性戀 homosexual) tongzhi / nan tongzhi / nv tongzhi (同志 “comrade,” appropriated as an umbrella term for sexually and gender-­nonconforming p­ eople in Chinese-­speaking socie­ties by the cultural critic Chen Yihua in 1992; 男同志 nan tongzhi and 女同志 nv tongzhi denote gay men and lesbians, respectively) xihuan nansheng (喜歡男生 liking guys) xihuan nvsheng (喜歡女生 liking girls) Some ­people described themselves as having no sexual orientation. For exam­ ple, an interviewee who was in a seven-­year relationship with another ­woman said she had no sexual orientation ­because she had only ever dated one person. ­Others used the descriptor wo de shiqing (我的事情 my ­thing / this t­ hing about me—­e.g., “my friend knows this ­thing about me”), and parents frequently spoke of their ­children’s sexuality in this manner. ­People also described their own and ­others’ heterosexual practices in a vari­ ety of ways, such as meiyou tebie (沒有特別 nothing special) yixing/yixinglian (異性戀 straight, heterosexual) xihuan nansheng (喜歡男生 liking guys) xihuan nvsheng (喜歡女生 liking girls) zhengchang de (正常的 ordinary)

Appendix A • 123

In my interviews and fieldwork, I never introduced a term such as “yixinglian” or “tongzhi” ­unless the person I was speaking to used it first, in self-­reference or in reference to another. If they did not use any term, we found other ways of talking about their own and o­ thers’ genders, sexual practices, and intimate relationships.

Pseudonyms I have changed in­for­mants’ names and certain nonessential details of their stories to protect their privacy. I provide matching surnames for in­for­mants who have ­family members in the study to make it easier for readers to recog­ nize ­family groups. I refer to heterosexual ­mothers as “[surname] Mama” and heterosexual ­fathers as “[surname] Baba”—­for example, Lin Mama (林媽媽) and Lin Baba (林爸爸), where mama and baba mean “mom” and “dad” respectively—in keeping with the ways that parents introduce themselves in LGBT spaces and are referred to by queers of all ages.

Appendix B Interviewees I conducted in-­depth interviews with the eighty ­people in the ­tables below. I have listed members of the same f­ amily ­under a shared surname. All surnames and first names are pseudonyms. The category “Queer ­family member” refers only to ­children and siblings. Many p­ eople had cousins and other relatives whom they knew or suspected ­were queer; ­these relationships do not appear in the ­tables.

Pseudonyms grouped by ­family unit

Age

Region

Sexual self-­identification

Chen Mama Colin Chen

50s 30s

South South

Yixinglian (straight) Yibande (ordinary)

Fang

Garrett Chen Tiencai Fang Yulan Fang

20s 40s 50s

South North North

Nan tongzhi (gay) Gei (gay) Yixinglian (straight)

Gao

Adele Gao

20s

Central

Han

­Bubble Gao Lisa Han

30s 20s

Central South

Skye Han Tim Han

20s 20s

South South

Xihuan nansheng (liking guys) Niang T (soft butch) Xihuan nansheng (liking guys) T (butch) Yixinglian (straight)

Chen

Queer ­family member

Gay son (Garrett) Gay younger ­brother (Garrett) Gay younger ­brother (Tiencai) Two T older ­sisters (inc. B ­ ubble) T younger s­ ister T older ­sister (Skye) T younger ­sister (Skye) (continued)

125

126  •  Appendix B

Pseudonyms grouped by ­family unit

Age

Region

Sexual self-­identification

Huang

Huang Mama

50s

North

Yixinglian (straight)

Astro Huang

30s

North

Yixinglian (straight)

Nicole Huang

20s

North

Pea Hu

20s

Central

Yixuan Hu

20s

Central

Hsu

Logan Hsu Sandy Hsu

30s 20s

Central Central

Li

Candy Li

30s

North

Liang

Bat Li Liang Mama

30s 50s

North Central

Peter Liang

30s

Central

Summer Liang

20s

Central

Lin Baba Lin Mama Danny Lin Dream Lin

50s 50s 20s 20s

South South South South

Fanyu Lu

30s

South

Coral Lu

40s

South

Philip Ma

20s

East

Nv tongzhi, bu fen (lesbian, neither T nor po) Shuangxinglian (bisexual) Shuangxinglian, T (bisexual, butch) T (butch) Xihuan nansheng (liking guys) Xihuan nansheng (liking guys) Nan tongzhi (gay) Zhengchang de (normal) Shuangxinglian (bisexual) Xihuan nansheng (liking guys) Yixing (straight) Nv (female) Gei (gay) Bijiao xihuan nansheng (liking guys a bit more) Yihun (heterosexu­ ally married) Nvxing de Yangzi (having feminine qualities, transfeminine) Yixing (straight)

Tingting Ma

20s

East

Tan Baba

50s

North

Tan Mama Haiyu Tan

50s 30s

North North

Hu

Lin

Lu

Ma

Tan

Shuangxinglian (bisexual) No sexual orientation Nvxing (female) Straight (spoken in En­g lish)

Queer ­family member

Lesbian ­daughter (Nicole) Lesbian younger ­sister (Nicole)

Bi twin ­sister (Yixuan) Bi twin ­sister (Pea) T older ­sister (Logan) Gay older ­brother (Bat) Bi son (Peter)

Bi older b­ rother (Peter) Gay son (Danny) Gay son (Danny) Gay older b­ rother (Danny) Trans older sibling (Coral)

Bi older ­sister (Tingting) T ­daughter T ­daughter T younger ­sister

Appendix B • 127 Pseudonyms grouped by ­family unit

Age

Region

Sexual self-­identification

Tao

Tao Mama

50s

South

Nv (female)

Charlie Tao

20s

South

Tsai

Tsai Baba Wenchen Tsai

60s 30s

East East

Wu

Wu Baba Wu Mama

50s 50s

South South

Yang

Yang Mama Kris Yang

50s 20s

Central Central

Winnie

20s

Central

Ye

Ye Mama

60s

North

Nanxing de ganjue (feeling of a man, transmasculine) Yixinglian (straight) Gay (spoken in En­g lish) No answer Meiyou tebie (nothing special) No answer Xihuan nvsheng (liking girls), FTM (female-­to-­male) Xihuan nansheng (liking guys) Yixinglian (straight)

Zhang

DuoDuo Ye Zhang Baba Zhang Mama

40s 60s 50s

North East East

Po (femme) Nanxing (male) Nvxing (female)

Queer ­family member

Trans child (Charlie)

Gay son Gay son Gay son Trans child (Kris)

Trans partner (Kris) Po ­daughter (DuoDuo), T ­daughter T younger ­sister Gay son Gay son

The following p­ eople participated alone. I did not interview their f­amily members.

Pseudonym

Age

Region

Sexual self-­identification

Autumn

20s

Central

Bebe Bing Blue Peishan Dawn

40s 30s 30s 30s 30s

South North North Central South

Deer Edward

30s 20s

Central South

Androgynous (said this word in En­g lish a­ fter an extended discussion about having both feminine and masculine qualities) Po (femme) Nan tongxinglian (male homosexual) Nan tongzhi (gay) T (butch) Xihuan nansheng (liking guys, currently in a same-­sex relationship) Bu nan bu nv (neither male nor female) Xihuan nansheng (liking guys)

Queer ­family member

(continued)

128  •  Appendix B

Pseudonym

Age

Region

Sexual self-­identification

Hong Huiling

50s 20s

North South

J. J. Lai Jiafan Jinwan Junyu

40s 30s 70s 20s

North North North South

Gei (gay) No sexual identity, currently in a same-­sex relationship Nan tongzhi (gay) Niang T (soft butch) Nan tongzhi (gay) Nan tongzhi (gay)

Kay

50s

South

Leila

20s

Central

Lily

20s

South

LJ Lu Liangwen Peiyuan Pete Rose

50s 40s 20s 40s 70s 20s

North Central North South North South

Shu Baba Shufen

60s 40s

North South

Spring

20s

North

Sun Mama Teddy Tong Mama Trevor

60s 20s 60s 30s

North Central Central Central

Wanda

30s

North

Wang Mama Xiong Yijun Zhixiong

70s

North

No sexual identity, currently in a same-­sex relationship No answer

30s 50s 40s

North South North

Nan tongzhi (gay) T (butch) Nan (male), FTM (female-­to-­male)

Xianzai wo juede wo ai nvsheng (now I love ­women) No sexual identity, currently in a same-­sex relationship No sexual identity, currently in a same-­sex relationship T (butch) T (butch) Lazi, bu fen (lesbian, neither T nor po) T (butch) Gei (Gay) Xihuan nansheng (liking guys) Xihuan nvsheng (liking girls) Nv tongzhi, bu fen (lesbian, neither T nor po) Meiyou guding (not fixed, transfeminine) Jiehun (heterosexually married) Nan tongzhi (gay) No answer Xihuan nvsheng (liking girls)

Queer ­family member

Gay younger ­brother

Gay younger ­brother T ­daughter

Gay son Gay son Gay older ­brother Gay son Gay son

Grad school, 8, 17%

College, 17, 36%

High school, 10, 21%

Some college, 12, 26%

Levels of education among queers

Grad school, 6, 18%

College, 13, 40%

High school, 6, 18%

Some college, 8, 24%

Levels of education among heterosexual f­ amily members

Acknowl­edgments I am grateful to the ­people and families who took part in this study. I owe my deepest thanks to the LGBT Elders Working Group for welcom­ ing me into their lives. Thank you, Lee Mama, for making me feel at home away from home. Thank you, Allie Chiang, for launching this proj­ect with me. You made a lasting mark on this research and on my life. Thank you, Cindy Szu, for all your help along the way. While its flaws are mine alone, ­there are many ­people whose input enriched and improved the book. I am grateful to my editor, Peter Mickulas, for his responsiveness, kindness, and clarity. I thank the Rutgers Families in Focus series editors and an anonymous outside reviewer for their constructive feed­ back. Peggy Nelson devoted hours to talk with me by phone as I incorporated ­these comments. I thank my program director Suzanne Bergeron, my mentor Rashmi Luthra, and my writing group at the University of Michigan–­Dearborn for supporting me as I brought this work to fruition. Students asked thought­ ful questions about this research in class, shared my excitement about the birth of the book, and sent me encouraging messages in the final push to publica­ tion. I feel lucky to have landed at an institution with such an energizing intel­ lectual community among colleagues and students alike. My ­sister Michelle Davis read so many drafts of ­these chapters that she could refer to many of my in­for­mants fondly by name. I thank Howard Chiang, John Cho, Sara Crawley, Elisabeth Engebretsen, Sara Friedman, Seung-­kyung Kim, and Yin Wang for opening doors for me to cultivate and share this work. I especially thank Elisabeth Engebretsen for her detailed comments on the book proposal. I thank Yenning Chao for encour­ aging me as a scholar and as a person. This research became pos­si­ble ­because my dissertation chair, Barbara Ris­ man, believed in me and supported me unconditionally. My committee 131

132  •  Acknowl­edgments

members Mignon Moore, Lorena García, Yenning Chao, and Richard Bar­ rett ­shaped me as a scholar in ways that w ­ ill remain with me for the duration of my ­career. I thank the faculty at the Sex Center at National Central Univer­ sity for taking a disciplinary risk on a f­ amily sociologist and hosting me in the field. The Wenner-­Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research financially supported my fieldwork, as well as a return trip to share my findings in Kaoh­ siung and Taipei. They w ­ ere delightful to work with and, together with Ellen Lewin, helped me to “come out” as a (so­cio­log­i­cally trained) anthropologist at the AAAs in 2012. Thank you, Pallavi Banerjee, Chiwei Cheng, Shuzhen Huang, Ying-­Chao Kao, Jialin Camille Li, Hsinchieh Lu, Jaden Peng, Kristy Shih, Ken Sun, Michael Yarbrough, Shana Ye, and Jingshu Zhu for inspiring conversations that deepened my thinking about the work. Thank you, Dafne KaDai Chan, for creating cover art that so beautifully captures the spirit of queer kinship and ­family change. I am thankful for my kittens, Bettie and Page, the two l­ ittle beings who accompanied me to the end and added occasional flourish to the manuscript by walking on my keyboard. (I appreciated their presence although I had to remove their contributions.) I thank my parents and siblings for being my best friends. I thank Leatrice Gates for being my ­family. The ­people in this paragraph showed me such patience as I wrote the book. Thank you for cheering me on. ­There is one person whose impact on this book cannot be mea­sured. Thank you, Chuchu (True) Tung, for the part of this journey that you shared with me. I love you and wish you e­ very happiness.

Notes Chapter 1 Introduction 1 ­Because pronouns are gender neutral in spoken Mandarin, Fanyu did not actively gender her sibling with this statement. I use “she” for consistency, as Coral prefers the feminine pronoun 她 in written Chinese. 2 For representative works, see Emilie D’Amico and Danielle Julien, “Disclosure of Sexual Orientation and Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Youths’ Adjustment: Associa­ tions with Past and Current Parental Ac­cep­tance and Rejection,” Journal of GLBT ­Family Studies 8, no. 3 (2012): 215–242; Laurie Heatherington and Justin Lavner, “Coming to Terms with Coming Out: Review and Recommendations for Family-­Systems Focused Research,” Journal of ­Family Psy­chol­ogy 22, no. 3 (2008): 329–343; Charlotte Patterson, “­Family Relationships of Lesbians and Gay Men,” Journal of Marriage and F ­ amily 62, no. 4 (2000): 1052–1069 (a review of the ­family of origin lit­er­a­ture appears on pp. 1063–1064); Caitlin Ryan, Stephen Russell, David Huebner, Rafael Diaz, and Jorge Sanchez, “­Family Ac­cep­tance in Adolescence and the Health of LGBT Young Adults,” Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Nursing 23, no. 4 (2010): 205–213. 3 Iris Erh-­Ya Pai, Sexual Identity and Lesbian ­Family Life: Lesbianism, Patriarchalism, and the Asian ­Family in Taiwan (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017); Chiara Bertone and Maria Pallotta-­Chiarolli, eds., Queerying Families of Origin (New York: Routledge, 2015); Yen-­Jui Lin and Cynthia Hudley, “Taiwanese ­Mothers’ Reactions to Learning That Their Child Is Lesbian or Gay: An Explor­ atory Study,” Journal of LGBT Issues in Counseling 3, no. 3–4 (2009): 154–176; Frank Wang, Herng-­Dar Bih, and David Brennan, “Have They R ­ eally Come Out? Gay Men and Their Parents in Taiwan,” Culture, Health and Sexuality 11, no. 3 (2009): 285–296. 4 Albert Hermalin, Paul Liu, and Deborah Freedman, “The Social and Economic Transformation of Taiwan,” in Social Change and the F ­ amily in Taiwan, ed. Arland Thornton and Hui-­Sheng Lin, 49–87 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994). In his seminal work on capitalism and gay identity, John D’Emilio argues that the transition from a h ­ ouse­hold economy to a wage ­labor economy—­a pro­cess that unfolded over two centuries in North Amer­i­ca—­gradually made it 133

134  •  Notes to Pages 4–5

5

6

7 8

9 10

11 12 13

pos­si­ble for ­people to create sustainable lives outside the ­family unit. As its economic and material basis eroded, the U.S. f­ amily acquired new significance as a site of emotional fulfillment and intimacy. Th ­ ese changes fostered lesbian and gay identities and communities at the same time that they enshrined heteronormative ideals used to justify the persecution of lesbian and gay Americans. See John D’Emilio, “Capitalism and Gay Identity,” in Powers of Desire: The Politics of Sexuality, ed. Ann Snitow, Christine Stansell, and Sharon Thompson, 100–113 (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1983). Taiwan and other countries experienc­ ing compressed modernity provide an opportunity to re-­examine the links between capitalism and sexual cultures as the transition occurs in a much shorter period of time. For a detailed chronology of con­temporary Taiwanese feminist and sex rights activism and the complex and at times contentious relationships among t­ hese movements, see Doris Chang, ­Women’s Movements in Twentieth ­Century Taiwan (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2009); Jens Damm, “Same Sex Desire and Society in Taiwan, 1970–1987,” China Quarterly 181 (2005): 67–81; John Nguyet Erni and Anthony Spires, “The Formation of a Queer-­Imagined Community in Post-­Martial Law Taiwan,” in Asian Media Studies: Politics of Subjectivities, ed. John Nguyet Erni and Siew Keng Chua, 225–252 (Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2005); Hans Huang, Queer Politics and Sexual Modernity in Taiwan (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2011); Tze-­Lan Deborah Sang, The Emerging Lesbian: Female Same-­Sex Desire in Modern China (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003), with emphasis on Taiwan on pp. 225–254. Arland Thornton, Jui-­Shan Chang, and Hui-­Sheng Lin, “From Arranged Marriage ­Toward Love Match,” in Social Change and the F ­ amily in Taiwan, ed. Arland Thornton and Hui-­Sheng Lin, 148–177 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994). Te-­Hsiung Sun, “The Impacts of a ­Family Planning Program on Fertility Be­hav­ior in Taiwan,” Journal of Population Studies 23 (2001): 49–92. Meilin Lee and Yu-­Hsuan Lin, “Transition from Anti-­Natalist to Pro-­Natalist Policies in Taiwan,” in Low Fertility, Institutions, and their Policies: Variations Across Industrialized Countries, ed. Ronald Rindfuss and Minja Kim Choe, 259–282 (New York: Springer, 2016). Ching-­Li Yang and Hung-­Jeng Tsai, “Changes in Fertility and Marriage Rates in Taiwan,” in ­Women in Taiwan: Sociocultural Perspectives, ed. Ya-­Chen Chen, 61–81 (Indianapolis: University of Indianapolis Press, 2009). Shu-­Chin Grace Kuo, “The Alternative ­Futures of Marriage: A Sociolegal Analy­sis of F ­ amily Law Reform in Taiwan,” in Wives, Husbands, and Lovers: Marriage and Sexuality in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Urban China, ed. Deborah Davis and Sara Friedman, 219–238 (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2014); Meilin Lee and Te-­Hsiung Sun, “The ­Family and Demography in Con­ temporary Taiwan,” Journal of Comparative F ­ amily Studies 26, no. 1 (1995): 101–115. Wei-­Hsin Yu, Gendered Trajectories: ­Women, Work, and Social Change in Japan and Taiwan (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2009). James Raymo, Hyunjoon Park, Yu Xie, and Wei-­Jun Jean Yeung, “Marriage and ­Family in East Asia: Continuity and Change,” Annual Review of Sociology 41 (2015): 471–492. Susan Greenhalgh, “De-­Orientalizing the Chinese ­Family Firm,” American

Notes to Pages 5–7 • 135

Ethnologist 21, no. 4 (1994): 746–775; Young-­Mi Kim, “Dependence on ­Family Ties and House­hold Division of L ­ abor in K ­ orea, Japan, and Taiwan,” Asian Journal of W ­ omen’s Studies 19, no. 2 (2013): 7–35; Jessie Shu-­Yun Wu, “Continuity and Change: Comparing Work and Care Reconciliations of Two Generations of ­Women in Taiwan,” in Gender and Welfare States in East Asia: Confucianism or Gender Equality? ed. by Sirin Sung and Gillian Pascal, 66–89 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014); Ruoh-­Rong Yu and Yu-­sheng Liu, “Change and Continuity in the Experience of Marriage in Taiwan,” in Wives, Husbands, and Lovers: Marriage and Sexuality in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Urban China, ed. Deborah Davis and Sara Friedman, 239–261 (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2014). ­ others in the KMT Regime of Taiwan, 14 Yi-­Ling Chen, “Housing and Single M 1949–2000,” Geography Research Forum 26 (2006): 93–114; C. Y. Cyrus Chu and Ruoh-­Rong Yu, Understanding Chinese Families: A Comparative Study of Taiwan and Southeast China (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010); Wen-­Yin Chien and Chin-­Chun Yi, “Marital Power Structure in Two Chinese Socie­ties: Mea­sure­ ment and Mechanisms,” Journal of Comparative F ­ amily Studies 45, no. 1 (2014): 93–111. 15 Ju-­Ping Lin and Chin-­Chun Yi, “Filial Norms and Intergenerational Support to Aging Parents in China and Taiwan,” in “Intergenerational F ­ amily Support for Chinese Older Adults,” ed. Iris Chi and Merril Silverstein, special issue, International Journal of Social Welfare 20, no. s1 (2011): S109–­S120. 16 Emiko Ochiai, “Unsustainable Socie­ties: Low Fertility and Familialism in East Asia’s Compressed and Semi-­Compressed Modernities,” in Transformation of the Intimate and the Public in Asian Modernity, ed. Emiko Ochiai and Leo Aoi Hosoya, 63–90 (Boston: Brill, 2013), 74. 17 Anning Hu and Reid Leamaster, “Longitudinal Trends of Religious Groups in Deregulated Taiwan: 1990 to 2009,” So­cio­log­i­cal Quarterly 54, no. 2 (2013): 254–277. 18 Josephine Chuen-­Juei Ho, “Is Global Governance Bad for East Asian Queers?” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 14, no. 4 (2008): 457–479; Ying-­Chao Kao, “See Through the Enchantment of Science: The Truth ­behind the Letter from the President of the American College of Pediatrics (看穿科學迷障：「美國 小兒科學院長信」事件的真相),” Gender Equity Education Quarterly 57 (2012): 69–73. ­ iddle class; 19 Pei-­Chia Lan describes this as a hypermobility of the transnational m Pei-­Chia Lan, Raising Global Families: Parenting, Immigration, and Class in Taiwan and the US (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2018). 20 On the transnational turn within Asian queer studies, see Hugo Córdova Quero, Joseph Goh, and Michael Campos, eds., Queering Migrations t­ owards, from, and beyond Asia (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014); Megan Sinnott, “Borders, Diaspora, and Regional Connections: Trends in Asian ‘Queer’ Studies,” Journal of Asian Studies 69, no. 1 (2010): 17–31. 21 For the influences of the U.S. Christian Right on international politics and rights strug­g les, see Doris Buss, Globalizing F ­ amily Values: The Christian Right in International Politics (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2003). 22 C. Winter Han, Geisha of a Dif­fer­ent Kind: Race and Sexuality in Gaysian Amer­i­ca (New York: New York University Press, 2015), 67, 77. 23 Han, Geisha of a Dif­fer­ent Kind, 68–73.

136  •  Notes to Pages 7–21

24 Accessed August 16, 2018, https://­w ww​.­gaytaipei4u​.­com​/­g uide​/­. 25​ Around 30 ­percent of the queers in my interview sample also reported having known or suspected LGBT kin. 26 Elizabeth Tonkin, Narrating Our Pasts: The Social Construction of Oral History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995). 27 The Nationalist Chinese government promoted Mandarin from the 1940s and stringently enforced its use during the 1970–1986 period. ­A fter 1986, Taiwan took steps ­toward greater multilingualism and multiculturalism. Mandarin remains the national language, but ­there is increasing support for ­mother tongue preservation and education. See John Kwok-­Ping Tse, “Language and a Rising New Identity in Taiwan,” International Journal of the Sociology of Language 143, no. 1 (2000): 151–164; Jennifer Wei, Language Choice and Identity Politics in Taiwan (Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2008). ­ omen’s Lives 28 Sandra Harding, Whose Science? Whose Knowledge? Thinking from W (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1991). 29 For accounts of such views among feminist and lesbian feminist academics in Taiwan, see Antonia Yenning Chao, “Global Meta­phors and Local Strategies in the Construction of Taiwan’s Lesbian Identities,” Culture, Health and Sexuality 2, no. 4 (2000): 384–386. For an example from the United States, see Lillian Faderman, “The Return of Butch and Femme: A Phenomenon in Lesbian Sexuality of the 1980s and 1990s,” Journal of the History of Sexuality 2, no. 4 (1992): 580–582. 30 Shulamit Reinharz, Observing the Observer: Understanding Our Selves in Field Research (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).

Chapter 2  Meanings of Silence and Disclosure 1 For examples of ­these impor­tant critiques, see Margaretta Jolly, “Coming Out of the Coming Out Story: Writing Queer Lives,” Sexualities 4, no. 4 (2001): 474–496; Kate Klein, Alix Holtby, Katie Cook, and Robb Travers, “Complicating the Coming Out Narrative: Becoming Oneself in a Heterosexist and Cissexist World,” Journal of Homo­sexuality 62, no. 3 (2015): 297–326. For nuanced approaches that consider how coming out is hybridized in Taiwan, Japan, and Hong Kong, see JhuCin Jhang, “Scaffolding in F ­ amily Relationships: A Grounded Theory of Coming Out to ­Family,” ­Family Relations, published online ahead of print, doi:10.1111/fare.12302 (2018); Mark McLelland, “Out on the Global Stage: Authenticity, Interpretation and Orientalism in Japa­nese Coming Out Narratives,” Electronic Journal of Con­temporary Japa­nese Studies (2001); Frank ­ eally Come Out? Gay Wang, Herng-­dar Bih, and David Brennan, “Have They R Men and Their Parents in Taiwan,” Culture, Health and Sexuality 11, no. 3 (2009): 285–296; Day Wong, “Rethinking the Coming Home Alternative: Hybridization and Coming Out Politics in Hong Kong’s Anti-­homophobia Parades,” Inter-­Asia Cultural Studies 8, no. 1–2 (2007): 600–616. 2 John Nguyet Erni and Anthony Spires, “The Formation of a Queer-­Imagined Community in Post-­Martial Law Taiwan,” in Asian Media Studies: Politics of Subjectivities, ed. John Nguyet Erni and Siew Keng Chua, 225–252 (Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2001); Fran Martin, Situating Sexualities: Queer Repre­sen­ta­tion in Taiwanese Fiction, Film, and Popu­lar Culture (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2003); Fran Martin, “Surface Tensions: Reading Productions of

Notes to Pages 22–28 • 137

Tongzhi in Con­temporary Taiwan,” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 6, no. 1 (2000): 61–86. 3 For examples of early work drawing on this model, see Connie Chan, “Issues of Identity Development among Asian American Lesbians and Gay Men,” Journal of Counseling and Development 68, no. 1 (1989): 16–20; Eli Coleman, “Developmen­ tal Stages of the Coming Out Pro­cess,” Journal of Homo­sexuality 7, no. 2–3 (1982): 31–43. For a more recent application, see Margaret Rosario, Eric Schrimshaw, and Joyce Hunter, “Ethnic/Racial Differences in the Coming-­Out Pro­cess of Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Youths: A Comparison of Sexual Identity Development over Time,” Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psy­chol­ogy 10, no. 3 (2004): 215–228. 4 Charlotte Faircloth and Marjorie Murray identify increased monitoring and risk consciousness as part of a parenting culture newly observed in many parts of the world. Charlotte Faircloth and Marjorie Murray, “Parenting: Kinship, Expertise, and Anxiety,” Journal of ­Family Issues 36, no. 9 (2015): 1115–1129. 5 Lang-­Wen Wendy Huang, “The Transition Tempo and Life Course Orientation of Young Adults in Taiwan,” ANNALS of the American Acad­emy of Po­liti­cal and Social Science 646, no. 1 (2013): 69–85. 6 Carlos Decena, Tacit Subjects: Belonging and Same-­Sex Desire among Dominican Immigrant Men (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2011); Carlos Decena, “Tacit Subjects,” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 14, no. 2–3 (2008): 339–359. 7 See, for example, works engaging ­these princi­ples in U.S. Latina, Ca­rib­bean, and Singaporean ­family contexts, respectively: Katie Acosta, “The Language of (In) Visibility: Using In-­Between Spaces as a Vehicle for Empowerment in the F ­ amily,” Journal of Homo­sexuality 58, no. 6–7 (2011): 883–900; Keja Valens, Desire between ­Women in Ca­rib­bean Lit­er­a­ture (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013); Chris Tan, “Go Home, Gay Boy! or, Why Do Singaporean Gay Men Prefer to ‘Go Home’ and Not ‘Come Out’ ”? Journal of Homo­sexuality 58, no. 6–7 (2011): 865–882. 8 Gust Yep, Karen Lovaas, and Philip Ho, “Communication in ‘Asian American’ Families with Queer Members: A Relational Dialectics Perspective,” in Queer Families, Queer Politics: Challenging Culture and the State, ed. Mary Bern­stein and Renate Reimann, 152–153 (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001). 9 Yep, Lovaas, and Ho, “Communication,” 162–163. 10 Martin, Situating Sexualities, 195. 11 Gavin Jones, “The ‘Flight from Marriage’ in Southeast and East Asia,” Journal of Comparative ­Family Studies 36, no. 1 (2005): 93–119. ­ ill be flabbergasted to see 12 In writing this, I am well aware that many readers w someone in their early fifties referred to as an older T (or lao T). This was, in fact, quite common in the LGBT activist community, which skewed very young. 13 I asked LJ how she felt about me including this part of her story in the book. ­A fter all, even if I changed her name and place of residence, other tongzhi might be able to identify LJ and her ­mother based on ­these unique characteristics. LJ’s reply—­ “Whatever helps the movement”—is characteristic of her generous spirit and approach to activism. 14 For a discussion of sexual and gender-­based persecution during this period, see Antonia Yenning Chao, “Global Meta­phors and Local Strategies in the Construc­ tion of Taiwan’s Lesbian Identities,” Culture, Health and Sexuality 2, no. 4 (2000):

138  •  Notes to Pages 29–40

15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23

24​ 25

26

27 28 29

377–390. I heard someone ask Jiang Mama directly about this experience on just one occasion. She described being harassed by police for wearing men’s clothing but quickly changed the subject back to mountain climbing, her favorite hobby and conversation topic. Pei-­Chia Lan, “Compressed Modernity and Glocal Entanglement: The Contested Transformation of Parenting Discourses in Postwar Taiwan,” Current Sociology 62, no. 4 (2014): 531–549. Lan, “Compressed Modernity,” 536. Chin-­Chun Yi and Ju-­Ping Lin, “Types of Relations between Adult ­Children and El­derly Parents in Taiwan: Mechanisms Accounting for Vari­ous Relational Types,” Journal of Comparative F ­ amily Studies 40, no. 2 (2009): 305–324. Yi and Lin, “Types of Relations,” 322. Ju-­Ping Lin, Tse-­Fan Chang, and Chiu-­Hua Huang, “Intergenerational Relations and Life Satisfaction among Older ­Women in Taiwan,” International Journal of Social Welfare 20, no. S1 (2011): S47–­S58. Yih-­Lan Liu, “Parent-­Child Interaction and ­Children’s Depression: The Relation­ ships between Parent-­Child Interaction and C ­ hildren’s Depressive Symptoms in Taiwan,” Journal of Adolescence 26, no. 4 (2003): 447–457. I thank Pallavi Banerjee for her insightful comments about the prob­lems of defining emotions and intimacy in a narrow and often Western-­centric way. Huang, “Transition Tempo.” 台灣地區就業人數：民國102年 (Employment in Taiwan, 2013), Directorate General of Bud­get, Accounting and Statistics, Executive Yuan, Republic of China (Taiwan), accessed May 8, 2014, http://­win​.d­ gbas​.­gov​.­t w​/­dgbas04​/b­ c4​/­timeser​ /­comuse​_­b​_­t14​.­asp​?­chk1​=­1&chk2​=­2&chk3​=­3&chk31​=­31&chk32​= ­0&chk33​ =­0&chk34​= ­0&chk35​= ­0&chk36​= ­0&chk4​= ­0&chk41​= ­0&chk42​= ­0&chk5​ =­0&chk6​= ­0&chk7​= ­0&R1​=­1&yearb​=­102&yeare​=­102#. Huang, “Transition Tempo.” For a description of such agencies as brokers of cross-­border marriages, see Melody Chia-­Wen Lu, “Commercially Arranged Marriage Migration: Case Studies of Cross-­Border Marriages in Taiwan,” Indian Journal of Gender Studies 12, no. 2–3 (2005): 275–303. Sara Friedman, “Marital Borders: Gender, Population, and Sovereignty across the Taiwan Strait,” in Wives, Husbands, and Lovers: Marriage and Sexuality in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Urban China, ed. Deborah Davis and Sara Friedman, 285–311 (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2014). With intragenerational kin, such as siblings and cousins, younger queers w ­ ere more likely to be fully out from adolescence. Jhang, “Scaffolding,” 12 (in online/ahead-­of-­print copy). Doris Chang, ­Women’s Movements in Twentieth ­Century Taiwan (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2009), see especially pp. 110–115.

Chapter 3  (Queerly) Carrying on the ­Family 1 Antonia Yenning Chao, “ ‘How Come I C ­ an’t Stand Guarantee for My Own Life?’: Taiwan Citizenship and the Cultural Logic of Queer Identity,” Inter-­Asia Cultural Studies 3, no. 3 (2002): 377. 2 For example, writing about Taiwan: Chao-­Ju Chen, “Mothering ­under the Shadow of Patriarchy: The ­Legal Regulation of Motherhood and Its Discontents

Notes to Pages 40–41 • 139

in Taiwan,” National Taiwan University Law Review 1, no. 1 (2006): 45–96; Yi-­Ling Chen, “Housing and Single M ­ others in the KMT Regime of Taiwan, 1949–2000,” Geography Research Forum 26 (2006): 93–114; Susan Greenhalgh, “De-­Orientalizing the Chinese ­Family Firm,” American Ethnologist 21, no. 4 (1994): 746–775; Chin-­Ju Lin, “ ‘Modern’ Daughters-­in-­Law in Colonial Taiwan­ ese Families,” Journal of ­Family History 30, no. 2 (2005): 191–209; Erh-ya Pai, “Making Lesbian Families in Taiwan” (PhD diss., University of York, 2013); Margery Wolf, ­Women and the ­Family in Rural Taiwan (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1972). Writing about China and other socie­ties: Yip Lo Lucetta Kam, Shanghai Lalas: Female Tongzhi Communities and Politics in Urban China (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2013); Denise Kandiyoti, “Bargaining with Patriarchy,” Gender and Society 2, no. 3 (1988): 274–290; Tze-­Lan Deborah Sang, The Emerging Lesbian: Female Same-­Sex Desire in Modern China (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003); Siumi Maria Tam, Wai Ching Angela Wong, and Danning Wang, Gender and F ­ amily in East Asia (New York: Routledge, 2014). 3 For example, Chao, “Taiwan Citizenship,” 369–381; Pai, Making Lesbian Families; Sang, Emerging Lesbian. 4 For impor­tant work in this underexamined area, see Henry Chiang, Transgender China (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012); Evelyn Blackwood, “Trans Identities and Contingent Masculinities: Being Tombois in Everyday Practice,” Feminist Studies 35, no. 3 (2009): 454–480; Gayatri Reddy, With Re­spect to Sex: Negotiating Hijra Identity in South India (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005). 5 For intersections of gender, ­family, and religion, including ancestor veneration and gendered death practices, see Fang-­Long Shih, “Reading Gender and Religion in East Asia: ­Family Formations and Cultural Transformations,” in Routledge Handbook of Religions in Asia, ed. Bryan Turner and Oscar Salemink, 295–314 (New York: Routledge, 2014); Fang-­Long Shih, “Chinese ‘Bad Death’ Practices in Taiwan: Maidens and Modernity,” Mortality 15, no. 2 (2010): 122–137. For variation in such practices among Taiwan’s indigenous populations and Han ethnic majority, see Melissa Brown, “The Cultural Impact of Gendered Social Roles and Ethnicity: Changing Religious Practices in Taiwan,” Journal of Anthropological Research 59, no. 1 (2003): 47–67. 6 Kathryn Bernhardt, ­Women and Property in China: 960–1949 (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1999). 7 C. Y. Cyrus Chu and Ruoh-­Rong Yu, Understanding Chinese Families: A Comparative Study of Taiwan and Southeast China (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010). ­ omen and Property, inheritance as a “right” is an 8 As Bernhardt points out in W imported concept that does not account for the ritual aspects of patrilineal succession. 9 性別統計分析 (Gender Statistics Analy­sis), ROC Ministry of Finance, 2012, accessed October 27, 2013, www​.­mof​.g­ ov​.­t w​/­public​/­data​/­378113811670​.­pdf. ­ others. 10​ Chen, Housing and Single M 11 Fenggang Yang and Anning Hu, “Mapping Chinese Folk Religion in Mainland China and Taiwan,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 51, no. 3 (2012): 505–521. 12 Shih, “ ‘Bad Death’ Practices.”

140  •  Notes to Pages 41–49

13 Shih, “ ‘Bad Death’ Practices”; Fang-­Long Shih, “Generation of a New Space: A Maiden ­Temple in the Chinese Religious Culture of Taiwan,” Culture and Religion 8, no. 1 (2007): 89–104. 14 Wen-­Yin Chien and Chin-­Chun Yi, “Marital Power Structure in Two Chinese Socie­ties: Mea­sure­ment and Mechanisms,” Journal of Comparative F ­ amily Studies 45, no. 1 (2014): 93–111; C. Y. Cyrus Chu, Yu Xie, and Ruoh-­Rong Yu, “Coresidence with El­derly Parents: A Comparative Study of Southeast China and Taiwan,” Journal of Marriage and F ­ amily 73, no. 1 (2011): 120–135; Chu and Yu, Understanding Chinese Families, see especially chapter 6, “House­work and House­hold Decisions”; Dudley Poston, Wen Shan Yang, and Demetrea Farris, The ­Family and Social Change in Chinese Socie­ties (New York: Springer, 2014). 15 An-­Chi Tung, Chaonan Chen, and Paul Ke-­Chih Liu, “The Emergence of the Neo-­Extended F ­ amily in Con­temporary Taiwan,” Journal of Population Studies 32 (2006): 123–152. 16 Ruoh-­Rong Yu and Yu-­Sheng Liu, “Change and Continuity in the Experience of Marriage in Taiwan,” in Wives, Husbands, and Lovers: Marriage and Sexuality in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Urban China, ed. Deborah Davis and Sara Friedman, 249 (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2014). 17 Vera Raposo and U. Sio Wai, “Surrogacy in Greater China: The ­Legal Framework in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macao, and Mainland China,” Pacific Basin Law Journal 34, no. 2 (2017): 135–149. 18 On why patrilineal ancestor veneration and son preference persist into the twenty-­first ­century: Monica Das Gupta, Zhenghua Jiang, Bohua Li, Zhenming Xie, Woojin Chung, and Hwa-­Ok Bae, “Why Is Son Preference So Per­sis­tent in East and South Asia? A Cross Country Study of China, India, and the Republic of K ­ orea,” Journal of Development Studies 40, no. 2 (2003): 153–187. On ways that men negotiate t­ hese expectations: Bo-­Wei Chen and Mairtin Mac an Ghaill, “Negotiating Family/Filial Responsibilities: Reflexivity, Tradition, and Taiwanese (Younger) Professional Men,” in East Asian Men: Masculinity, Sexuality, and Desire, ed. Xiaodong Lin, Chris Haywood, and Mairtin Mac an Ghaill, 51–67 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017). 19 Greenhalgh, “De-­Orientalizing.” 20 Wei-­Hsin Yu and Kuo-­Hsien Su, “Gender, Sibship Structure, and Educational In­equality in Taiwan: Son Preference Revisited,” Journal of Marriage and F ­ amily 68, no. 4 (2006): 1057–1068. 21 Leta Hong Fincher, Leftover ­Women: The Resurgence of Gender In­equality in China (London: Zed Books, 2014). 22 Fincher, Leftover ­Women, 75–76. ­ others”; Yi-­Ling Chen and Herng-­Dar Bih, “The 23 Chen, “Housing and Single M Pro-­Market Housing System in Taiwan,” in Housing in East Asia, ed. John Doling and Richard Ronald, 205–229 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014). 24 Hung-­En Liu, “­Mother or ­Father: Who Received Custody? The Best Interests of the Child Standard and Judges’ Custody Decisions in Taiwan,” International Journal of Law, Policy and the ­Family 15, no. 2 (2001): 185–225. ­ egal Issues and the Latest 25 Yun-­Hsien Diana Lin, “Lesbian Parenting in Taiwan: L Developments,” Asian-­Pacific Law and Policy Journal 14, no. 2 (2012): 1–27. 26 En-­Ling Pan and Kuei-­Hsiu Lin, “Growing Up in Single-­Parent Families: An Illustration from Taiwanese Families,” in The Psychological Well-­being of East

Notes to Pages 49–58 • 141

Asian Youth, ed. Chin-­Chun Yi, 51–68 (Netherlands, Springer, 2013); Ming-­Yu Lee, “What Is the Impact of a Confucian Welfare Regime upon Lone ­Mothers in Taiwan?” (PhD diss., University of Nottingham, 2001). 27 Chao, “Taiwan Citizenship,” 375. 28 Antonia Yenning Chao, “Global Meta­phors and Local Strategies in the Construction of Taiwan’s Lesbian Identities,” Culture, Health and Sexuality 2, no. 4 (2000): 382. 29 John Cho, “The Wedding Banquet Revisited: ‘Contract Marriages’ between Korean Gays and Lesbians,” Anthropological Quarterly 82, no. 2 (2009): 401–422; Elisabeth Engebretsen, Queer W ­ omen in Urban China: An Ethnography (New York: Routledge, 2013); Shuzhen Huang, “Post-­Oppositional Queer Politics and the Non-­Confrontational Negotiation of Queer Desires in Con­temporary China” (PhD diss., Arizona State University, 2015, see especially chapter 5, “Queering Marriage: The Practice of Xinghun”); Kam, Shanghai LaLas; Min Liu, “Two Gay Men Seeking Two Lesbians: An Analy­sis of Xinghun (Formality Marriage) Ads on China’s Tianya.cn,” Sexuality and Culture 17, no. 3 (2013): 494–511. 30 Emerging evidence suggests that this may be a point of difference between lesbian-­gay marriages in Taiwan and mainland China. For example, in Huang, “Post-­Oppositional Queer Politics,” Chinese lesbians used their marriages to gay men to relieve f­ amily pressure and negotiate for more gender equity in ­these partnerships. Comparative and collaborative work on lesbian-­gay marriages throughout Asia w ­ ill provide us with a better grasp of the regional diversity in ­these ­unions. 31 Cho, “Wedding Banquet Revisited.” Issues of gendered risk and trust are discussed throughout, especially highlighted on pp. 409 and 412–413. 32 Pei-­Chia Lan, Raising Global Families: Parenting, Immigration, and Class in Taiwan and the US (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2018). 33 “Top surgery” to remove his breast tissue and create a more male contoured chest, and “bottom surgery” to remove his female reproductive organs and construct a penis. 34 Susan Stryker, Paisley Currah, and Lisa Jean Moore, “Introduction: Trans-­, Trans, or Transgender?” W ­ omen’s Studies Quarterly 36, no. 3–4 (2008): 11–22. 35 Stryker, Currah, and Moore, “Introduction,” 14. 36 I refer to “conventional” patrilineal succession in terms of the transmission of ge­ne­tic material as a normative ideal rather than a universally lived real­ity. ­There is already considerable (though often overlooked) flexibility through, for example, vari­ous kinds of adoption. Thus the transgender case is not unique but rather illustrative of ways in which the system is already more fluid than dominant frameworks allow. 37 Amy Brainer, “Patrilineal Kinship and Transgender Embodiment in Taiwan,” in Perverse Taiwan, ed. Howard Chiang and Yin Wang, 110–128 (New York: Routledge, 2017), see especially pp. 124–126. ­ amily, 37. 38 Wolf, ­Women and the F 39 For a review of t­ hese and other recent developments in queer kinship studies, see Joanna Mizielinska, Jacqui Gabb, and Agata Stasinska, “Editorial Introduction to Special Issue: Queer Kinship and Relationships,” Sexualities, published online ahead of print, doi:10.1177/1363460717718511 (2017): 1–8, and the collection of articles in this special issue.

142  •  Notes to Pages 60–63

Chapter 4  Gender and Power across Generations 1 Deniz Kandiyoti, “Bargaining with Patriarchy,” Gender and Society 2, no. 3 (1988): 274–290. From p. 282: “While [the breakdown of classic patriarchy] implies that ­women escape the control of mothers-­in-­law and head their own ­house­holds at a much younger age, it also means that they themselves can no longer look forward to a ­f uture surrounded by subservient daughters-­in-­law. For the generation of ­women caught in between, this transformation may represent genuine personal tragedy, since they have paid the heavy price of an earlier patriarchal bargain, but are not able to cash in on its promised benefits.” 2 Pei-­Chia Lan, “Compressed Modernity and Glocal Entanglement: The Contested Transformation of Parenting Discourses in Postwar Taiwan,” Current Sociology 62, no. 4 (2014): 531–549. 3 Yiping Shih, “Raising an International Child: Parenting, Class and Social Bound­aries in Taiwan” (PhD diss., University at Buffalo, State University of New York, 2010). 4 Kyung-­Sup Chang, “The Second Modern Condition? Compressed Modernity as Internalized Reflexive Cosmopolitanism,” British Journal of Sociology 61, no. 3 (2010): 446. 5 James Raymo, Hyunjoon Park, Yu Xie, and Wei-­Jun Jean Yeung, “Marriage and ­Family in East Asia: Continuity and Change,” Annual Review of Sociology 41 (2015): 471–492. 6 Cherng-­Tay Hsueh, “Diversity among Families in Con­temporary Taiwan: Old Trunks or New Twigs?” in The ­Family and Social Change in Chinese Socie­ties, ed. Dudley Poston, Wen Shan Yang, and Demetrea Farris, 195–211 (New York: Springer, 2014); Ling Xu and Iris Chi, “Ageing and Grandparenting in Asia,” in Routledge Handbook of Families in Asia, ed. Stella Quah, 246–258 (New York: Routledge, 2015); Chin-­Chun Yi, En-­Ling Pan, Ying-­Hwa Chang, and Chao-­Wen Chan, “Grandparents, Adolescents, and Parents: Intergenerational Relations of Taiwanese Youth,” Journal of F ­ amily Issues 27, no. 8 (2006): 1042–1067. 7 For example, Chin-­Chun Yi, ed., The Psychological Wellbeing of Asian Youth (New York: Springer, 2012). 8 Esther Goh, “Grandparents as Childcare Providers: An In-­Depth Analy­sis of the Case of Xiamen, China,” Journal of Aging Studies 23, no. 1 (2009): 60–68; Albert Hermalin, Carol Roan, and Aurora Perez, “The Emerging Role of Grandparents in Asia,” Comparative Study of the El­derly in Asia Research Report No. 98–52 (Ann Arbor: Population Studies Center, University of Michigan, 1998); Feng-­Jen Tsai, Sandrine Motamed, Nadia Elia, and André Rougemont, “Evolution in Intergenerational Exchanges between El­derly ­People and Their Grandchildren in Taiwan: Data from Multiple Round Cross-­Sectional Study from 1993 to 2007,” BMC Public Health 11 (2011): 639–646; Mei-­Chen Lin and Jake Harwood, “Accommodation Predictors of Grandparent-­Grandchild Relational Solidarity in Taiwan,” Journal of Social and Personal Relationships 20, no. 4 (2003): 537–563; Kalyani Mehta and Leng Leng Thang, eds., Experiencing Grandparenthood: An Asian Perspective (New York: Springer, 2012). 9 Charlotte Faircloth and Marjorie Murray, “Parenting: Kinship, Expertise, and Anxiety,” Journal of F ­ amily Issues 36, no. 9 (2015): 1121. 10 Pei-­Chia Lan, Raising Global Families: Parenting, Immigration, and Class in Taiwan and the US (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2018), 62; Xuan

Notes to Pages 63–77 • 143

Li and Michael Lamb, “­Fathers in Chinese Culture: From Stern Disciplinarians to Involved Parents,” in ­Fathers in Cultural Context, ed. David Shwalb, Barbara Shwalb, and Michael Lamb, 15–40 (New York: Routledge, 2013). 11 Yu-­Han Jao and Jui-­Chung Li, “Trends in the Employment of Married ­Mothers of Preschool Aged ­Children in Taiwan,” Chinese So­cio­log­i­cal Review 44, no. 4 (2012): 5–26. 12 On the issue of ­women’s rising employment vis-­à-­vis men’s lower involvement in caregiving and emotional support, see Wei-­Jun Jean Yeung, “Asian Fatherhood,” Journal of ­Family Issues 34, no. 2 (2013): 155. 13 Yeung, “Asian Fatherhood,” see especially p. 156; Lan, Raising Global Families, see especially pp. 45–108. ­ others.” 14 Jao and Li, “Trends in the Employment of Married M 15 Lan, “Compressed Modernity and Glocal Entanglement.” 16 Lan, Raising Global Families. 17 K. L. Broad, Helena Alden, Dana Berkowitz, and Maura Ryan, “Activist Parent­ ing and GLBTQ Families,” Journal of GLBT ­Family Studies 4, no. 4 (2008): 499–520. 18 Lan, “Compressed Modernity and Glocal Entanglement.” 19 Lan, “Compressed Modernity and Glocal Entanglement.” 20 Chin-­Chun Yi and Ju-­Ping Lin, “Types of Relations between Adult ­Children and El­derly Parents in Taiwan: Mechanisms Accounting for Vari­ous Relational Types,” Journal of Comparative F ­ amily Studies 40, no. 2 (2009): 305–324; I discuss this work in a more extended way in chapter 2. 21 Evelyn Nakano Glenn, “Social Constructions of Mothering,” in Mothering: Ideology, Experience, and Agency, ed. Evelyn Nakano Glenn, Grace Chang, and Linda Forcey, 16–17 (New York: Routledge, 1994). ­ other as gay 22 Liang Mama’s son, Peter, identifies as bisexual but came out to his m ­because he felt this would be easier for her to accept. 23 Ellen Lee, afterward in Parenting in Global Perspective: Negotiating Ideologies of Kinship, Self, and Politics, ed. Charlotte Faircloth and Diane Hoffman, 245 (New York: Routledge, 2003). 24 Shih, “Raising an International Child,” 130. For a discussion of how taijiao practices intersect with modernizing discourses, see Tina Johnson, Childbirth in Republican China: Delivering Modernity (New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2011). 25 Accessed January 7, 2014, at http://­w ww​.­appledaily​.­com​.­t w​/­appledaily​/­article​ /­headline​/2­ 0140107​/­35560493​/­. 26​ Yi et al., “Grandparents, Adolescents, and Parents.” 27 Chin-­Chun Yi and En-­Ling Pan, “Intergenerational Relations in Taiwan: A Preliminary Analy­sis on the Lineage Differential,” in Fertility Be­hav­ior and Intergenerational Relations, ed. Anja Steinbach, 233–257 (Wiesbaden, Germany: Springer, 2005). 28 Kristin Scherrer, “Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Queer Grandchildren’s Disclosure Pro­cess with Grandparents,” Journal of F ­ amily Issues 37, no. 6 (2016): 739–764. 29 Chin-­Hui Chen, “Older Adults as Discursively Constructed in Taiwanese Newspapers: A Critical Discourse Analy­sis,” International Journal of Society, Culture, and Language 3, no. 2 (2015): 72–84; Michael North and Susan Fiske, “Modern Attitudes ­toward Older Adults in the Aging World: A Cross-­Cultural Meta-­Analysis,” Psychological Bulletin 141, no. 5 (2015): 993–1021.

144  •  Notes to Pages 77–83

30 For the association of grandparents with the transmission of moral virtue, see Xu and Chi, “Ageing and Grandparenting”; Leng Leng Thang, “Meanings of Being a Grandparent,” in Experiencing Grandparenthood: An Asian Perspective, ed. Kalyani Mehta and Leng Leng Thang, 61–76 (New York: Springer, 2012). 31 Kalyani Mehta and Helen Ko, “Filial Piety Revisited in the Context of Modern­ izing Asian Socie­ties,” Geriatrics and Gerontology International 4, no. S1 (2004): S77–­S78; Hsiu-­Hsin Tsai, Mei-­Hui Chen, and Yun-­Fang Tsai, “Perceptions of Filial Piety among Taiwanese University Students,” Journal of Advanced Nursing 63, no. 3 (2008): 284–290. 32 Sung-­Jae Choi, “Development of a New Concept of Filial Piety in Modern Korean Society,” Geriatrics and Gerontology International Invited Symposia 4 (2004): S72–­S73; Pei-­Chia Lan, “Subcontracting Filial Piety: Elder Care in Ethnic Chinese Immigrant Families in California,” Journal of ­Family Issues 23, no. 7 (2002): 812–835; Mehta and Ko, “Filial Piety Revisited”; Ken Sun, “Fashion­ ing the Reciprocal Norms of Elder Care: A Case of Immigrants in the United States and Their Parents in Taiwan,” Journal of ­Family Issues 33, no. 9 (2012): 1240–1271. 33 Christopher Lee, Jet Lag (New York: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2017), 6.

Chapter 5  Strategic Normativity 1 In gay male culture, a bear is a heavier and sometimes hairier man who proj­ects a more rugged or beefy masculinity. For ways this subculture has evolved in the Taiwan context, see Chris K. K. Tan, “Gaydar: Using Skilled Vision to Spot Gay ‘Bears’ in Taipei,” Anthropological Quarterly 89, no. 3 (2016): 841–864. To visit Tai Wang’s online shop, SexyB, go to http://­w ww​.­sexyb​.­idv​.­t w​/­. 2​ Sebastian Jäckle and Georg Wenzelburger, “Religion, Religiosity, and the Attitudes ­toward Homo­sexuality—­a Multilevel Analy­sis of 79 Countries,” Journal of Homo­sexuality 62, no. 2 (2015): 207–241. See t­ ables on pp. 213 and 227. 3 The language of gentrifying tendency appears in Hans Huang, Queer Politics and Sexual Modernity in Taiwan (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2011), 203; see also Stewart Chang, “Gay Liberation in the Illiberal State,” Washington International Law Journal 24, no. 1 (2015): 1–46; Travis Kong, “A Fading Tongzhi Heterotopia: Hong Kong Older Gay Men’s Use of Spaces,” Sexualities 15, no. 8 (2012): 896–916; and Petrus Liu, “Queer Marxism in Taiwan,” Inter-­Asia Cultural Studies 8, no. 4 (2007): 517–539. 4 Liu, “Queer Marxism in Taiwan,” 520. 5 ­There is a ­great volume of work on this topic. For classic and representative examples, see Lisa Duggan, “The New Homonormativity: The Sexual Politics of Neoliberalism,” in Materializing Democracy: T ­ oward a Revitalized Cultural Politics, ed. Russ Castronovo and Dana Nelson, 175–194 (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2002); David Eng, The Feeling of Kinship: Queer Liberalism and the Racialization of Intimacy (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2010), see pp. 26–47 on the shift from radical critiques of marriage and ­family to demands for inclusion in the heteronormative nuclear f­ amily ­under late capitalism, as Eng writes on p. 30, “­family is not just whom you choose but on whom you choose to spend your money”; Yasmin Nair, “What’s Left of Queer? Immigration, Sexuality, and Affect in a Neoliberal World,” US Marxist-­Humanists June 6, 2010, 1–11, see pp. 5–6 on ways that “in the United States, ‘Gay’ has become a separate class

Notes to Pages 84–90 • 145

6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17

18​

19 20 21 22

identity”; Michael Warner, The Trou­ble with Normal: Sex, Politics, and the Ethics of Queer Life (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1999). Chin-­Fen Chang, “Economic In­equality and Determinants of Earnings in Taiwan in the 2008 Recession,” Development and Society 46, no. 1 (2017): 55–82. Meng-­Jie Lin, “­Women’s Aspirations for Gradu­ate Education in Taiwan,” International Journal of Educational Development 31, no. 5 (2011): 515–523. JhuCin Zhang, “Scaffolding in F ­ amily Relationships: A Grounded Theory of Coming Out to ­Family,” ­Family Relations (2018), published online ahead of print, doi:10.1111/fare.12302, pp. 6–7. Zhang, “Scaffolding,” 7. Heather Love, “Compulsory Happiness and Queer Existence,” New Formations, no. 63 (2007): 52–64, especially p. 54. Cai Kanyong (蔡康永) is a Taiwanese writer and tele­vi­sion host. He disclosed his gay sexuality on tele­vi­sion in 2002. Joseph DeFillippis, “What about the Rest of Us? An Overview of LGBT Poverty Issues and a Call to Action,” Journal of Progressive ­Human Ser­vices 27, no. 3 (2016): 143–174. See also the critiques of gay liberalism in notes 3 and 5 of this chapter. On the harm incurred by the myth of gay affluence, see DeFillippis, “What about the Rest of Us?,” 147–148. As described in chapter 4, I primarily interviewed middle-­class parents. My access to working-­class parents is more partial and derived from fieldwork and interviews with working-­class queers. Yiping Shih, “Raising an International Child: Parenting, Class, and Social Bound­aries in Taiwan” (PhD diss., University at Buffalo, State University of New York, 2010). Given his one-­of-­a-­kind position in the community, I have, with permission, used the same nickname as other English-­language publications and news stories. Yu-­Rong Chen and Ping Wang, “Obstacles to LGBT H ­ uman Rights Develop­ ment in Taiwan,” positions 18 (2010): 399–407; Josephine Chuen-­Juei Ho, “Is Global Governance Bad for East Asian Queers?” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 14, no. 4 (2008): 457–479; Larry Tung, Welcome to My Queer Bookstore (欢迎来到我的同志书店), documentary short (Taipei, Taiwan: Larry Tung, 2009), http://­w ww​.­larrytung​.c­ om​/­welcome​-­to​-­my​-­queer​-­bookstore​.­html. For example, Heejung Park, Jordan Coello, and Anna Lau, “Child Socialization Goals in East Asian versus Western Nations from 1989 to 2010: Evidence for Social Change in Parenting,” Parenting 14, no. 2 (2014): 69–91; Marie-­A nne Suizzo and Chi-­Chia Cheng, “Taiwanese and American ­Mothers’ Goals and Values for Their C ­ hildren’s ­Futures,” International Journal of Psy­chol­ogy 42, no. 5 (2007): 307–316. Dana Rosenfeld, “Heteronormativity and Homonormativity as Practical and Moral Resources: The Case of Lesbian and Gay Elders,” Gender and Society 23, no. 5 (2009): 617–638. Carla Pfeffer, “Normative Re­sis­tance and Inventive Pragmatism: Negotiating Structure and Agency in Transgender Families,” Gender and Society 26, no. 4 (2012): 574–602. Kong, “Fading Tongzhi Heterotopia.” Kristy Shih and Karen Pyke, “Power, Re­sis­tance, and Emotional Economies in ­Women’s Relationships with Mothers-­in-­Law in Chinese Immigrant Families,” Journal of ­Family Issues 31, no. 3 (2010): 333–357.

146  •  Notes to Pages 90–98

23 Shih and Pyke, “Power, Re­sis­tance, and Emotional Economies,” 333. 24 Shih and Pyke, “Power, Re­sis­tance, and Emotional Economies.” For Goffman’s theory of front-­and backstage per­for­mances, see Erving Goffman, The Pre­sen­ta­ tion of Everyday Life (New York: Anchor, 1959). 25 For example, Mary Bern­stein, “Cele­bration and Suppression: The Strategic Uses of Identity by the Lesbian and Gay Movement,” American Journal of Sociology 103 (1997): 531–565; Jaye Cee Whitehead, The Nuptial Deal: Same-­Sex Marriage and Neoliberal Governance (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2012).

Chapter 6  Siblings and ­Family Work 1 Erdmute Alber, Cati Coe, and Tatjana Thelen, eds., The Anthropology of Sibling Relations: Shared Parentage, Experience, and Exchange (New York: Springer, 2013). 2 Alber, Coe, and Thelen, Anthropology of Sibling Relations; Rosalind Edwards, Lucy Hadfield, Helen Lucey, and Melanie Mauthner, Sibling Identity and Relationships: S­ isters and ­Brothers (New York: Routledge, 2006); Suad Joseph, “Brother/Sister Relationships: Connectivity, Love, and Power in the Reproduc­ tion of Patriarchy in Lebanon,” in Intimate Selving in Arab Families: Gender, Self, and Identity, ed. Suad Joseph, 113–140 (Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1999). 3 Edwards et al., Sibling Identity and Relationships, 111. I found this to be true in my own data as well. 4 Edwards et al., Sibling Identity and Relationships, 111–116. 5 For impor­tant exceptions, as well as critiques of this omission, see Angela Hilton and Dawn Szymanski, “­Family Dynamics and Changes in Sibling of Origin Relationship a­ fter Lesbian and Gay Sexual Orientation Disclosure,” Con­temporary ­Family Therapy 33, no. 3 (2011): 291–309; Angela Hilton and Dawn Szymanski, “Predictors of Heterosexual Siblings’ Ac­cep­tance of Their Lesbian ­ rother,” Journal of LGBT Issues in Counseling 8, no. 2 (2014): ­Sister or Gay B 164–188; Jill Huang, Eric Chen, and Joseph Ponterotto, “Heterosexual Chinese Americans’ Experiences of their Lesbian and Gay Sibling’s Coming Out,” Asian American Journal of Psy­chol­ogy 7, no. 3 (2016): 147–158. 6 Amy Brainer, “Growing Up with a Lesbian, Gay, or Bisexual Sibling,” in Families as They ­Really Are, ed. Barbara Risman and V ­ irginia Rutter, 164–181 (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 2015). 7 Jill Huang, “Heterosexual Chinese Americans’ Experiences of their Lesbian and Gay Sibling’s Coming Out” (PhD diss., Fordham University, 2016). 8 Huang, “Heterosexual Chinese Americans’ Experiences,” 42. 9 Brainer, “Growing Up,” 170–171, 176–179; Huang, “Heterosexual Chinese Americans’ Experiences,” 71–73. 10 Shelley Erikson and Naomi Gerstel, “A ­Labor of Love or ­Labor Itself: Care Work among Adult ­Brothers and S­ isters,” Journal of ­Family Issues 23, no. 7 (2002): 836–856. 11 Lorena García, “ ‘This Is Your Job Now’: Latina ­Mothers and ­Daughters and ­Family Work,” in Families as They ­Really Are, ed. Barbara Risman and V ­ irginia Rutter, 411–425 (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 2015). 12 Eriksen and Gerstel, “­Labor of Love.” 13 Pau-­Ching Lu, “Sibling Relationships in Adulthood and Old Age: A Case Study of Taiwan,” Current Sociology 55, no. 4 (2007): 621–637.

Notes to Pages 102–113 • 147

14 C. Y. Cyrus Chu, Yu Xie, and Ruoh-­rong Yu, “Effects of Sibship Structure Revisited: Evidence from Intrafamily Resource Transfer in Taiwan,” Sociology of Education 80, no. 2 (2007): 91–113. 15 Kwang-­Kuo Hwang, “Filial Piety and Loyalty: Two Types of Social Identification in Confucianism,” Asian Journal of Social Psy­chol­ogy 2, no. 1 (1999): 163–183. ­ attle, and Doug Meyer, “Partnering, Parenting, and Policy: 16 Sean Cahill, Juan B ­Family Issues Affecting Black Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) P ­ eople,” Race and Society 6, no. 2 (2003): 85–98; Gerald Mallon, Gay Men Choosing Parenthood (New York: Columbia University Press, 2012); Mignon Moore and Amy Brainer, “Race and Ethnicity in the Lives of Sexual Minority Parents and Their C ­ hildren,” in LGBT-­Parent Families: Innovations in Research and Implications for Practice, ed. Abbie Goldberg and Katherine Allen, 133–148 (New York: Springer, 2013). ­ egal Issues and the Latest 17 Yun-­Hsien Diana Lin, “Lesbian Parenting in Taiwan: L Developments,” Asian-­Pacific Law and Policy Journal 14, no. 2 (2013): 1–27. 18 Mallon, Gay Men Choosing Parenthood, 33–36. 19 Lin, “Lesbian Parenting in Taiwan,” 8–9. 20 Harriet Cohen and Yvette Murray, “Older Lesbian and Gay Caregivers,” Journal of H ­ uman Be­hav­ior in the Social Environment 14, no. 1–2 (2007): 275–298. 21 In Chinese with En­g lish subtitles, accessed May 9, 2015, https://­youtu​.­be​ /­SvFCWAJzNE4. 22​ Lu, “Sibling Relationships in Adulthood.” 23 Lu, “Sibling Relationships in Adulthood.” 24 Edwards et al., Sibling Identity and Relationships, 2. 25 Joseph, “Brother-­Sister Relationships,” 120. 26 Tatjana Thelen, Cati Coe, and Erdmute Alber, introduction to The Anthropology of Sibling Relations: Explorations in Shared Parentage, Experience, and Exchange, ed. Erdmute Alber, Cati Coe, and Tatjana Thelen, 1–26 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013).

Conclusion 1 As Evren Savci argues, contestations over what is “po­liti­cal” or “apo­liti­cal” may also serve as mechanisms of exclusion in queer spaces. Evren Savci, “Who Speaks the Language of Queer Politics? Western Knowledge, Politco-­Cultural Capital and Belonging among Urban Queers in Turkey,” Sexualities 19, no. 3 (2016): 369–387. 2 Impor­tant exceptions have emerged particularly in the area of critical l­ egal studies; see, for example, Grace Shu-­Chin Kuo, “The Alternative ­Futures of Marriage: A Sociolegal Analy­sis of F ­ amily Law Reform in Taiwan,” in Wives, Husbands, and Lovers: Marriage and Sexuality in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Urban China, ed. Deborah Davis and Sara Friedman, 219–238 (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2014); Sara Friedman, “Stranger Anxiety: Failed ­Legal Equivalences and the Challenges of Intimate Recognition in Taiwan,” Public Culture 29, no. 3 (2017): 433–455. 3 On the reduction of lesbians and gay men to sexual identity, see Kath Weston, Families We Choose: Lesbians, Gays, Kinship (New York: Columbia University Press, 1991), 22. While t­ hings have improved considerably in the nearly thirty years between the publication of this book and my own, this part of Weston’s critique still rings true.

148  •  Notes to Pages 114–117

4 Erving Goffman, The Pre­sen­ta­tion of Self in Everyday Life (New York: Doubleday, 1959). 5 See, for example, Petrus Liu, Queer Marxism in Two Chinas (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2015), 162–164, on ways that “social re­spect and normalcy have become the preconditions for queer subjects who seek the status of the ­human and its associated l­ egal protection or social benefits.” 6 Ping-­Chen Hsiung, “Sons and ­Mothers: Demographic Realities and the Chinese Culture of Hsiao,” in ­Women in the New Taiwan: Gender Roles and Gender Consciousness in a Changing Society, ed. Catherine Farris, Anru Lee, and Murray Rubinstein, 14–40 (New York: East Gate, 2004); Margery Wolf, W ­ omen and the ­Family in Rural Taiwan (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1972). 7 Yau Ching, ed., As Normal as Pos­si­ble: Negotiating Sexuality and Gender in Mainland China and Hong Kong (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2010). 8 Jen-­Peng Liu and Naifei Ding, eds., 置疑婚姻家庭連續體 Querying the Marriage-­Family Continuum (Taipei: Shenlou, 2011). 9 See, for instance, the headline and coverage by ­Reuters, “Tens of Thousands March for Same-­Sex Marriage in Taiwan,” accessed October 30, 2013, https://­uk​ .­reuters​.c­ om​/­article​/­uk​-­taiwan​-­gay​-­march​/­tens​-­of​-­thousands​-­march​-­for​-­same​-­sex​ -­marriage​-­in​-­taiwan​-­idUKBRE99P05420131026. 10​ Post dated October 2013, accessed August 30, 2017, http://­t w​.f­ orumosa​.­com​/­t​/­gay​ -­pride​-­parade​-­taiwan​-­2013​/­80250. 11​ Accessed May 24, 2017, http://­w ww​.­a ljazeera​.c­ om​/­news​/­2017​/­05​/­taiwan​-­top​ -­court​-­rules​-­favour​-­gay​-­marriage​-­170524063603646​.­html.

Index adoption, 103–104, 141n36 Ako, 34, 108 Al Jazeera, 117 Alliance of Religious Groups for the Love of Families Taiwan (台灣宗教團體愛 護家庭大聯盟, also known as the ­Family Guardian Co­a li­tion), 117 Amei, 56–57, 58 ancestor veneration, 13, 30, 41, 44, 99. See also filial responsibility; religion antigay groups, 7–8 Apple Daily (蘋果日報), 72–73 Autumn, 68 Bai Mama, 59–61, 69, 73, 79 bears, 81, 144n1 Bernhardt, Kathryn, 139n8 Betty, 50–53, 71, 72 Bing, 31–32, 36–37, 52 birth order, 25, 55, 99, 101–102, 109. See also patrilineal kinship bisexual (shuangxinglian 雙性戀), term for, 122 Broad, K. L., 64 Buddhism, 6, 82 bu fen (不分), 14, 122 bu nan bu nv (不男不女), 75, 122 butch identity. See T (踢) Cai Kanyong, 85–86, 87 care work, 98–102, 106

Chang, Kyung-­Sup, 62 Chao, Yenning, 40, 49 childbirth, rights in, 47 ­children: adoption and kin care of, 103–104, 141n36; of gay men, 31–32, 103, 117; parental surveillance of, 65–66, 89, 105; paternal custody of, 49; sexuality of, term for, 122; ­women’s decisions about, 47–49. See also filial responsibility; parent-­child relationships China, control of Taiwan by, 4, 136n27 Chinese (language). See language Chinese New Year, 13, 50, 52, 74 Cho, John, 52 Chris­tian­ity, 6, 107 chugui (出櫃). See coming out (chugui 出櫃) class barriers and differences, 63–66, 85–91 closeted vs. masking, 23–24, 29. See also coming out (chugui 出櫃) clothing, 2, 65–66, 70, 105, 109 coming out (chugui 出櫃): of Bing, 31–32, 36–37; f­ amily relationships and, 32–35; to ­fathers vs. ­mothers, 67–69; generational differences in, 19–21, 37–38, 138n27; of Leila, 31, 35–36, 37; masking vs. closeted, 23–24, 29; power and, 86; queer visibility and, 21–23; sibling relationships and, 32–33, 35, 138n27; of Skye, 31, 33–34. See also silence, interpretations of

149

150  • Index

compressed modernity, 62–63, 74–79, 116 conservative narrative, 6, 7, 8 cousin relationships, 101, 102–104, 125

queer theory on, 17; of sons, 52. See also ancestor veneration Fincher, Leta Hong, 46

Dear Mom and Dad, I’m Gay (book), 34–35 Decena, Carlos, 23, 24, 29 Deer, 75–76, 77, 107, 108 D’Emilio, John, 133n4 disclosure. See coming out (chugui 出櫃) divorce, 4–5, 40, 46–47, 48. See also marriage

Gao, Adele, 104–105, 111 Gao, B ­ ubble, 67 García, Lorena, 98 Gay Guide to Taipei (2018), 7 gay men: ­children of, 31–32, 103, 117; contract marriage with lesbians, 50–53, 71–72, 141n30; ­family pressure of, 40, 44, 104, 114; terms for, 121–123. See also queer community and kinship; transgender ­people gender-­confirmation surgery, 6, 54, 108, 141n33 gender in­equality: in ­family pressure, 39–40, 52; in f­ amily responsibilities, 25–26, 42, 43, 72–73, 114, 142n1; in home and work environments, 4–5, 63; in inheritance practices, 41–42, 45; in parenting, 63; in sibling relationships, 101–102; son preference, 42–45; in transgender ­people’s ­family roles, 55–57. See also patrilineal kinship generational differences: of coming out, 19–20, 37–38, 138n27; on silence of ­family, 3, 16, 21–22, 29, 32, 37, 113. See also grandparent-­grandchild relationships; parent-­child relationships Gerstel, Naomi, 98 Gin Gin’s bookstore, 81, 88 Glenn, Evelyn Nakano, 67 Goffman, Erving, 90, 114 grandparent-­grandchild relationships: compressed modernity and, 74–77; filiality and, 77–80, 99, 115; parenting style in, 62–63; research on, 61 Guo Mama: on coming out, 19, 22, 34; on parental awareness, 91; on strategic normativity, 87, 89–90

economic considerations: in f­ amily relationships, 30–31; in heterosexuality, 84; ­house­hold vs. wage l­ abor, 4–5, 133n4; of potential spouses, 84–85 education, 129; of c­ hildren, 30; for parents of queer ­children, 5–6, 11, 29, 60, 81–82, 91, 115; of potential spouses, 84–85; in ­ omen, 61, strategic normativity, 114; of w 87. See also support groups Edward, 33, 42–45 Edwards, Rosalind, 95, 110 Erikson, Shelly, 98 Eurocentricity: in describing emotions, 30, 138n21; in LGBT community repre­sen­ta­ tion, 7–8, 16; in social-­science theory and research, 13–14 Exodus International, 15 Faircloth, Charlotte, 137n4 ­family interviews, 2, 10–11 ­family pressure (yali 壓力), 17, 40, 49. See also patrilineal kinship ­family relationships. See cousin relationships; grandparent-­g randchild relationships; parent-­child relationships; sibling relationships ­family work, 98–102, 106 ­fathers and fatherhood: on affecting a child’s sexuality, 70–71, 79; changes in ­family and work life, 4–5, 63; coming out to, 67–69; queer child surveillance by, 65–66. See also parent-­child relationships Fei, 43, 45 femme identity. See po (婆) fertility, 4, 25, 103 filial responsibility: of ­daughters, 36, 50, 51, 53; of grandchildren, 77–80, 99, 115;

Han Baba, 108 Han, Chong-­suk, 7 Han, Mama, 64–66 Han, Skye, 31, 33–34, 64–66, 68, 108 Han, Tim, 33–34, 35, 65 happiness, 93–94 Harding, Sandra, 13

Index • 151

Henry, 50–53, 71, 72 heteronormativity, 88–89 heterosexuality as institution, 84 HIV/AIDS, 89, 90 homonormativity, 85–89 homosexual, term for, 99, 122 Hong, 24–26 Hong Kong, 88, 89 Hotline. See Taiwan Tongzhi Hotline Association Hsu, Logan, 96–98 Hsu, Sandy, 96–98 Huang Baba, 69 Huang, Jill, 95–96 Huang, Lang-­Wen, 31 Huang Mama, 69 inheritance, 41–42, 45–46, 139n8 interview methods, 2, 10–12, 13. See also research methods Italy, 8 Jao, Yu-­Han, 63 Japan, 4, 8 Jhang, JhuCin, 37, 85 jia (家), 49 Jiang Mama, 24, 26–29, 138n14 Joseph, Suad, 110–111 judicial persecution, 88 Junyu, 119 Kandiyoti, Deniz, 60, 142n1 kin care, 103–104 Kong, Travis, 89 Kuan, 77–78 Kuomintang (KMT), 4, 136n27 Lai, J. J., 88, 89 Lai Mama, 88–89 language, 10, 13, 136n27. See also terminology Lan, Pei-­Chia, 29, 52, 63 lazi (拉子), 122 Lee, Christopher, 78 Lee, Ellen, 69 Leila, 31, 35–36, 37 lesbians: contract marriage with gay men, 50–53, 71–72, 141n30; ­family pressure of, ­ atter to, 115; terms 46, 50; issues that m for, 14, 121–123. See also ­women

LGBT community. See queer community and kinship LGBT Elders Working Group (老年同志 小組), 11, 27, 39 Liang Baba, 68 Liang Mama, 68, 73–74 Liang, Peter, 68 Li, Jui-­Chang Allen, 63 Lin, Ju-­Ping, 30 Lin Mama, 84 Liu, Petrus, 83 Liu, Yih-­Lan, 30 LJ, 24, 26–29, 32 Love, Heather, 85 Loving Parents of LGBT Taiwan (organ­i­ zation), 5. See also Guo Mama Lu, 50–53 Lu, Coral, 1–3, 109–110, 133n1 Lu, Fanyu, 2, 109–110, 133n1 Lu Mama, 109 Lu, Pau-­Ching, 98 Mallon, Gerald, 103 Mandarin Chinese. See language marriage, 4–5, 23; of Bing, 31–32; of Buddhist c­ ouple, 82; gay-­lesbian arrangements for, 7, 50–53, 71–72, 141n30; gender in­equality in, 71–73; of Hong, 24–26; inheritance and, 41–42; LJ’s experience with, 28–29; rights of same-­sex, 116–117; of Yijun, 47–49. See also divorce marriage-­equality movement, 116–117 Martin, Fran, 23–24 masculine appearance and be­hav­iors, 1, 70, 109 masking vs. closeted, 23–24, 29. See also coming out (chugui 出櫃) men. See ­fathers and fatherhood; gay men; gender in­equality; patrilineal kinship; transgender ­people ­middle class families. See class barriers and differences ­mothers and motherhood: on affecting a child’s sexuality, 69–71, 79; changes in ­family and work life, 4–5, 63; coming out to, 67–69; LGBT child surveillance by, 64–66; loss and, 59–61. See also parent-­child relationships; ­women Murray, Marjorie, 137n4

152  • Index

naming. See terminology nan tongzhi (男同志), 122 nanxing de yangzi (男性的樣子), 1 New Zealand, 116 Niki, 106 normativity. See strategic normativity nv tongzhi (女同志), 122 Ochiai, Emiko, 5 ordinary, as term, 122 parent causality, 69–70 parent-­child relationships: coming out and, 22–23, 36, 67–69; concept and practice of love in, 66–67, 79; emotional reciprocity in, 29–30, 73–74; financial support and, 31; Guo Mama on, 19, 22; of Lu ­family, 1–3, 109–110; new parenting culture and trends, 63, 66, 137n4; queer education for parents, 5–6, 11, 29, 60, 81–82, 91, 115; surveillance in, 64–66, 89, 105. See also f­ athers and fatherhood; filial responsibility; ­mothers and motherhood participants, research, 61–62, 125–128 patrilineal kinship: as embodied ­labor, 113–114; gay marriage and, 50–53; inheritance and, 41–42, 45, 139n8; parental pressure in, 40, 49, 113; sibling relationships and, 102–104; son preference in, 42–45; transgender ­people and, 40–41, 53–57, 58, 141n36 Peishan, 45–47, 53, 58 persecution, sexual and gender-­based, 88, 138n14 Pfeffer, Carla, 89 po (婆), 14, 122. See also T (踢) power: coming out and, 86; front-­stage per­for­mance and, 89–91; and love in the ­family unit, 67 pregnancy, taijiao during, 69–70 promiscuity, sexual, 81, 89–90 psychiatric evaluations, 64–65 Pyke, Karen, 90 queer community and kinship, 6–7, 112–119. See also gay men; lesbians; transgender p­ eople

reflexivity, 15–16 Reinharz, Shulamit, 16 religion, 6, 8, 64, 82–83, 107 remembering as act, 28 reproductive ­labor, 102–104 research methods, 2, 8–12, 13. See also interview methods research participants, 61–62, 125–128 Rose, 98–101, 111, 119 Rosenfeld, Dana, 89 Savci, Evren, 147n1 Scherrer, Kristen, 77 sex rights movement, 4, 5, 8, 92, 116 Shih, Kristy, 90 Shih, Yiping, 62, 87 shuangxinglian (雙性戀), 122 Shu Baba, 79, 102–103, 104, 107, 108, 119 sibling relationships: coming out and, 32–33, 35, 138n27; of Edward and Fei, 43–44; heterosexuality and, 104–105; identity and relationality in, 109–111; inheritance and, 45–46; of Logan and Sandy, 96–98; of parents, 107–109; reproductive ­labor in, 102–104; of Rose and Timothy, 98–102 silence, interpretations of, 3, 16, 21–22, 29, 32, 37, 113. See also coming out (chugui 出櫃) son preference, 42–45. See also patrilineal kinship standpoint, 12–16 straight, as term, 122, 123 strategic normativity, 85–93, 114 suicides, 87 Sun Mama, 85–86, 87 support groups, 5, 60, 63–64. See also LGBT Elders Working Group; Taiwan Tongzhi Hotline Association surrogacy, 43 T (踢), 14, 122. See also po (婆) tacit negotiations, 23–29 tacit subjects, 23, 29 tactical masking, 23–24, 29 taijiao (胎教), 70 Taipei: global reputation of, 7–8; Pride March in, 19, 112, 116

Index • 153

Taiwan: compressed modernity in, 62–63, 74–79, 116; economic transition of, 4, 133n4; historical overview of, 4–5; language of, 10, 13, 136n27; religion of, 6, 8, 64, 82–83, 107 Taiwan Social Change Survey, 30 Taiwan Tongzhi Hotline Association (台 灣同志諮詢熱線協會), 11, 39, 106 Tan Mama, 69–70 Tao, Charlie, 106 Taoism, 6, 64 terminology, 14, 76, 121–123. See also language Thelan, Tatjana, 111 Timothy, 98–101 tomboy. See T (踢) Tong Mama, 70, 79 tongxinglian (同性戀), 24, 122 tongzhi (同志), as term, 122 Tongzhi Fumu Aixin Xiehui (同志父母愛 心協會), 5 tongzhi movement, 83–84. See also Taiwan Tongzhi Hotline Association Tonkin, Elizabeth, 10 transgender ­people: family caregiving and, 55–56, 106; grandparent relationships and, 76; kua xingbie (跨性別) as term for, 122; patrilineal kinship and, 40–41, 53–57, 58, 114, 141n36; research on, 118; sibling relationships and, 2–3, 109–110; strategic normativity of, 89; terms for, 122. See also queer community and kinship transnationality of queer community, 6–7, 118 Tsai Baba, 67

unemployment, 31 unhappiness, 85, 93 United States: economic transition of, 133n4; ­family care work in, 98; queer community in, 7, 83, 89, 103 visibility, 21–23, 85–87. See also coming out (chugui 出櫃) Wang, Tai, 81 Weston, Kath, 147n3 Wolf, Margery, 57 ­women: fertility of, 4, 25, 103; ­house­hold vs. wage ­labor, 4–5, 133n4; in­equality in f­ amily units, 25–26, 39–40, 42, 43, 52, 72–73, 114, 142n1; inheritance and, 41, 45; rights in childbirth of, 47; taijiao during pregnancy, 69–70. See also gender in­equality; lesbians; ­mothers and motherhood; transgender ­people Wu Baba, 70–71 Wu Mama, 70–71 yali (壓力), 17, 40, 49 Ye, DuoDuo, 71–72 Ye Mama, 71–72 Yep, Gust, 23 Yi, Chin-­Chun, 30 Yijun, 47–49, 74, 118–119 yixing/yixinglian (異性戀), 122 Zhang Baba, 119 zhengchang de (正常的), 122 Zhixiong, 53–57, 58, 102, 114

About the Author AMY BRAINER is an assistant professor of ­women’s and gender studies and sociology and coordinator of the LGBTQ studies certificate program at the University of Michigan-­Dearborn.