The ‘queer generation’:queer community documentary in contemporary China

Hongwei Bao

doi:10.1080/25785273.2019.1662197

Abstract

ABSTRACTIn this article, I chart a brief history of the queer community documentary in the PRC since the 2000s by introducing its historical conditions of emergence and development. In doing so, I highlight the activist dimension of queer filmmaking and its transnational nature. I focus specifically on the aesthetics and politics, together with modes of production and circulation, of these queer community documentaries. I call the group of filmmakers working around the Beijing Queer Film Festival and the China Queer Film Festival Tour the ‘queer generation’. The ‘queer generation’ filmmakers use documentary films as a tool to engage in political and social activism. Their films and activist practices should be put in a transnational context and seen as part of the transnational screen activism and international queer movements. As these filmmakers documented queer community histories, they also ‘queered’ Chinese documentaries and Chinese film industries at large. Their works represent grassroots, community-based and activist-oriented political engagements in contemporary China; these works also point to the political potential of queerness and documentary films in the world today.

Highlights

In the past two decades, there has been a surge of queer-themed documentary films in the People’s Republic of China (PRC)
Not difficult to list some of the characteristics shared among the ‘queer generation’ filmmakers: most of them are LGBTQ, or queer, identified; their films primarily document the life of gender and sexual minorities in China
As I will demonstrate in this article, growing up in a globalising China, the ‘queer generation’ filmmakers’ filmmaking and activist practices are situated in a transnational context, and informed by international discourses about sexual identity and social movements

Summary

Introduction

In the past two decades, there has been a surge of queer-themed documentary films in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Not difficult to list some of the characteristics shared among the ‘queer generation’ filmmakers: most of them are LGBTQ, or queer (ku’er), identified; their films primarily document the life of gender and sexual minorities in China. As I will demonstrate in this article, growing up in a globalising China, the ‘queer generation’ filmmakers’ filmmaking and activist practices are situated in a transnational context, and informed by international discourses about sexual identity and social movements.

Results

Conclusion