Encountering sexual aliens: state sovereignty and the heteronormative mechanism at work on the margins of Taiwan
| Dates: | 22 April 2013 |
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| Times: | 16:00 - 18:00 |
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| What is it: | Lecture |
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| Organiser: | School of Arts, Languages and Cultures |
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| How much: | free |
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| Who is it for: | Adults, Alumni, Current University students, University staff |
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| Speaker: | Professor Antonia Chao |
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As many scholars of migration studies have shown in their work, the increasingly complicated patterns of border-crossing activities in the contemporary age of globalization have posed a grave challenge to the feasibility of the nation-state model conventionally held by both the sending and receiving countries. Some have also highlighted the fact that gender politics plays a significant, while often hidden, role in shaping the phenomenon that is recognized generally as “the feminization of globalization”. Based on ethnographic research conducted on Taiwan's three crucial sites of national borders, this talk mines the intersections between border control, state sovereignty, national belonging and “perverted sexualities”.
The focus is on three forms of subjects, perceived as “sexual aliens”, whose trans-migratory acts violate the principle of biological and heterosexual reproduction that upholds the meanings, practices and institutions of border control. The normalizing regulations imposed upon these subjects, be they “lived” or “imaginary”, highlight three corresponding sites of bio-political governance at once outside of, within, and right along the borders of Taiwan’s geographical territories. While all are in keeping with the agenda of heteronormativity, these sites are situated in a distinct circuit of transnational traffic of sexualities and thus require different modes of governance. Intentionally or coincidentally, these modes of governance coordinate with each other in helping construct a nation whose sovereignty has been in perpetual crisis within the international political community.
Speaker
Professor Antonia Chao
Organisation: Tunghai University, Taiwan
Travel and Contact Information
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2nd Floor Boardroom
Arthur Lewis Building
Manchester
