Precarious Memory and Sexual Politics in Early Postwar Taiwan and South Korea

Abstract

Focusing on the main figures of 이묵 and T Mama in recent queer documentaries: "The Troublers(불온한 당신)"(2015) and "Small Talk"(2016) produced by South Korean and Taiwanese independent directors, this talk speaks to recent work in queer theory and historiography on the potential for "queer modes of life" (Halberstam, 2005). I argue the "precarious memory" is a useful analytical framework for examining the dominant mode of history writing. To facilitate this argument, I will trace the shifting paradigms of sexual norms from the legacy of colonialism, the cold war ideology of gender and sexual normalization, to the precarious moment when this knowledge production of sexuality is passed on to subsequent generations. To be more specific, I will discuss the issues of gender norms through the reading of the Mr. Pants (바지씨 and 穿褲仔 in Korean and Chinese), the precarious lives of these non-normative subjects under cold war system, and how the directors (as subsequent generations of 이묵 and T Mama) integrate this socio-history into the present and future.