Chinese Trans Women in Japan and Their Embodied Search for Gender Identity in the Online–Offline Continuum

Abstract

Abstract This article addresses the intersectionality of digital connectivity, international mobility, gender, and ethnicity among Chinese trans women in Japan. Drawing on interviews with seven interlocutors residing in five prefectures in Japan, it illustrates a rather complex picture regarding how gender identities are interpreted and performed in various ways. Specifically, this article argues that their gender identities reflect their individualistic quests for a sense of wholeness and ontological security when dealing with the tension and fusion between online and offline realities. In this way, their gender identities are spatially realized and ultimately linked with and shaped by the movement of the queer body across different online and offline locations.