Yaoi Research Articles

Reclaiming and remediating space: The dynamics of queer presence in audio drama platform

The censorship of Boys’ Love (BL) content in mainland China is marked by inconsistencies in both its intensity and scope. Amid these shifting regulatory boundaries, this study analyzes the systematic removal and occasional reappearance of visual BL content from the public sphere. We found that as visual channels are most susceptible to suppression, audio – though still monitored – emerges as a crucial medium, leveraging the agentive power of sound and media remediation to sustain fan engagement with BL narratives. Focusing on Miss Evan, a Chinese audio streaming platform, we explore how it navigates state censorship and market marginalization while restoring the BL subculture through innovative design features, sexually appealing voice performances, and provocative sound effects. Additionally, we investigate the agency of Chinese BL fans in reclaiming BL’s presence through polymedia engagement. We argue that the dynamic negotiation between the platform, state censorship, and fandom reveals an ongoing contest between queer marginalization and restoration. While the platform seeks mainstream acceptance by conforming to censorship through the minimization of queer visual representation, the BL fandom employs counterstrategies to sustain the subculture in audio form. This tension highlights the cultural resilience and technological adaptability of queer subcultures as they navigate and resist the censorship imposed by state and societal norms.

Wer Viewership and Queer Imag(in)ing: Thai Soap Opera Shadow of Love and Boys Love Media

Abstract This article brings film/media theory into Southeast Asian research through a revisionist queer approach. It contains two goals: addressing some recent developments about queer imag(in)ing in Thai media whilst reappraising the fundamental question of spectatorship via screen theory. Taking into account the more general issue of media specificity and the particular textual device of identity/gender-switch in several recent Thai television serials, we propose the notion of wer viewership: a mode of viewing practice that features viewer-text interaction through the perceptual-cognitive processes, and is characterised by wer/excessive aesthetics, multiple meanings, and diverse pleasures. Resonant with camp reading, wer viewership underlines how the viewer actively makes sense of the ambiguities about gender, particularly those along the extra-/diegetic interface. We use Thai soap opera Shadow of Love to illuminate the wer/excessive aesthetics rendered through its identity/gender play bordering on the extra-/diegetic divide, and the enhanced pleasures and meanings thus available to its extradiegetic active viewers. We stress, though, the expanded queer imag(in)ing in Shadow is not of total free interpretation, but is animated in relation to both the evolving discourses about gender/sexuality in Thailand, and the popularising homoerotic Boys Love (BL) media across Asia in recent years.

Media Representation of Male Protagonists in Thai Boy Love Commercials: A Visual Discourse Analysis

The media portrayal of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) community may impact public understanding and attitudes towards this community, which has not been extensively studied. This article explores the media representation of gay men in commercials by presenting a visual discourse analysis of three Thai Boy Love commercials. Combining the visual representation framework of social actors and genre and functionality analysis, it examines (a) how the male protagonists are visually represented in relation to the audience from three symbolic dimensions and (b) how the salient patterns of presenting boy love commercials are integrated with the story’s narrative stages and genre functions. The findings suggest that the boys are primarily portrayed positively as inclusive, close, agentive and ordinary social members who feature soft masculinity. Nevertheless, such a generic and idealised representation romanticises gay relationships, diminishes the individuality of gay people and obscures the diversity within the gay community. The portrayal also prioritises the female gaze to cater to the core audience of heterosexual young women consumers. This article provides insights into the reciprocal relationship between public receptivity towards the LGBTQ community and their favourable visual representations in commercials.

Canine courtship: Zoomorphism in Japanese Boys Love Omegaverse manga

In 2010, in the English-language kink fanfiction community of the American television show Supernatural (2005–20), the Omegaverse genre emerged. In this universe, humans have canine-like sexual characteristics and society is structured around a sexual hierarchy stratified by whether one is an alpha, a beta or an omega. In the years since, the genre has spread globally, finding particular popularity in Japanese Boys Love (BL) media. The Omegaverse represents one part of a global boom in zoomorphism, the depiction of humans with animal-like characteristics, for representing and understanding human societal norms. Through a textual and discourse analysis of three Japanese Omegaverse BL manga series and associated reviews from BL fan site Chill Chill, this article discusses the appeal of zoomorphism, its boom in popularity and the reasons for its global spread. Drawing on animal studies, I highlight how the Omegaverse provides a space to critique and explore issues surrounding relationships in the real world, arguing that this suggests that the global appeal of zoomorphism is in how the animal can reflect what it means to be human.

Sissyphilia and Tropicopolitan Sensibilities: Queering the Star in Thai Boys Love Media

This article investigates the queered star image in Thai Boys Love/yaoi (BL)/Y media released after 2020 through the lens of sissyphilia, queer scholarship, and a newly proposed idea—tropicopolitan sensibilities. The study concentrates on PP Krit Amnuaydechkorn’s BL-star persona. PP Krit practices his sissyphilic persona both within and beyond the Thai live-action BL framework, incorporating elements such as costume, makeup, mannerism, coupling culture, and the spectacle of diverse cultures. Arguably, sissyphilia in Thai BL media of the 2020s is no longer a mere withdrawal from gay men’s sissyphobic masculinity. Instead, it should be approached as a testament to another “queer turn” in the Thai mediascape, where an increasing number of celebrities are disrupting and diversifying Thai LGBTQ stereotypes. The BL industry in Thailand employs critical-creative maneuvers to resonate with the socio-political atmosphere of the period and embrace new tropes of transnational queer media.

Chinese Homosexuals in a Utopianised World: Active Involvement, Strategic Interactions, and Contingent Engagement with Practical Life

ABSTRACT Boys’ Love (BL), known as Danmei (耽美) in China, is a popular female-oriented male-male intimacy genre celebrated by today’s Chinese younger generation. From 2000 to 2020, BL fiction rapidly developed, becoming a major expression of male homosexuality and homoeroticism in China. This research detects the dynamics between BL fiction’s utopianized space and gay readers—a community simultaneously being the major subject of BL representation and the minority of BL fans. Conducting semi-structured interviews with three Chinese BL gay readers from high school, college, and workplace, this research delineates a representative picture of Chinese gay readers’ intentions, experiences, and opinions of involving a utopianized BL world. Using Ruth Levitas’ utopian thinking framework, this research investigates how the utopianized representations of idealized homosexual romance, arousing homoerotic behaviors, and the normalized gay everydayness in Chinese BL fiction from 2000 to 2020 can impact gay readers’ engagement with practical lives. The study argues that Chinese BL gay readers’ active involvement and strategic interactions enable them to contingently engage with their lived reality, demonstrating their subjective role as active audiences with agency. This result adds to contemporary BL studies and provides an enriched utopian thinking framework, calling for subsequent minority research to value individuals and individuality.

BL(Boy’s Love) 웹드라마의 시청동기가 시청만족도 및 파생상품 소비의도에 미치는 영향 - 중국 여성 시청자를 대상으로

BL(Boy’s Love) content is gaining popularity worldwide, especially on the web. In particular, the growth of BL web dramas is notable, and the largest viewing group of BL web dramas is Chinese females. This study derived motivation for watching BL web dramas through a survey targeting Chinese women, and empirically analyzed the relationships among viewing motivation, viewing satisfaction, and consumption intention of BL web drama derivative products. Results identified the motivations for watching BL web dramas as; ‘preference for BL culture’, ‘sexual interest’, ‘empathetic choice’, ‘escapism’, ‘pursuit of beautiful love’, ‘awareness of gender equality’, ‘topic’, ‘performer preference’ and ‘BL CP preference’. Among these, ‘'escapism’, ‘pursuit of beautiful love’, ‘preference for performers’, and ‘preference for BL CP’ were found to significantly influence viewing satisfaction, while ‘sexual interest’, ‘pursuit of beautiful love’, and ‘preference for BL CP’ were shown to impact the intention to purchase spin-off products. In addition, viewing satisfaction was found to mediate viewing motivation and derivative product consumption intention. The results of this study are expected to increase understanding of women's motivations for watching BL web dramas and contribute to establishing production strategies and improving profits for future BL web dramas.

Jeremy Bentham on adult-child sex and infanticide

ABSTRACT Jeremy Bentham is becoming increasingly well-known for his defence of consensual male same-sex relationships on the grounds of an ‘all-comprehensive' sexual liberty. The question arises whether his defence of pæderasty, or ‘the love of boys', and hence of adult-child sexual relationships, on the same principle makes his defence of male same-sex relationships problematic. This paper investigates the extent to which, under Bentham's principle, adults would not be legally punished for having consensual sexual relationships with children, or rather with adolescents. It concludes that Bentham’s position in relation to sexual relationships between adult males and under-age females followed the provisions of the English law of his time, while his position in relation to sexual relationships between adult males and under-age males is little different from the provisions of the law of our own time. Bentham was, moreover, concerned about the reputational damage suffered by unmarried mothers, and hence recommended the decriminalizing of infanticide. In the post-Malthusian age, Bentham, like many of his contemporaries, had become concerned about the potential suffering caused by over-population. His aims in this respect would be met by the forms of contraception and abortion available today.

“I feel like a ‘cyber‐gypsy’”: BL fanfiction writers in China's changing landscape of fandom culture

AbstractIn 2020, Archive of Our Own, a renowned fanfiction website, became inaccessible in China due to mass reporting by a celebrity's fans upset about him being portrayed as having a gender identity disorder in a fanfiction. This event led to increased regulation of Boys' Love (BL) content on many Chinese fanfiction platforms, posing challenges for writers. This study interviews Chinese BL fanfiction writers post‐incident and explores their strategies for navigating the shrinking creative space. It argues that China's current fandom culture is capital‐driven, data‐centric, and commercial, fostering a “fanquan (fan circle)” culture that redefines the meaning of “being a fan.”

Moral consumption and fujoshi fetishism among boys love (BL) series fans in Brazil

Moral consumption and fujoshi fetishism among boys love (BL) series fans in Brazil

Mainstreaming queerness in Thai boys’ love narratives: Impact on gay identity perceptions in Bangkok’s society

The intricate interplay between media representation and experiences of minority groups in Southeast Asia necessitates a comprehensive analysis of popular culture’s impact on marginalized communities. This mixed-method study investigates the portrayal of homosexual male characters in contemporary Thai Boy’s Love (BL) series and its connection to the authentic experiences of gay men in Bangkok. Through interviews with the casting team and producers of a prominent BL series, the research aims to elucidate the creative process underpinning these portrayals. The study further examines the perceptions and identity development of gay men as depicted in BL narratives, and how heterosexual women viewers interpret this representation. A questionnaire involving 330 participants of diverse orientations indicates that 78.6% of gay men consider BL narratives to be misrepresentative, while 69% of heterosexual women perceive them as accurate, raising concerns about the influence of media representations on identity formation within the gay community. Moreover, the marked disparities in beliefs regarding whether gay individuals aspire to the appearance portrayed by BL characters (with 98.3% of heterosexuals, 60% of bisexuals, and 100% of lesbians concurring, in contrast to 71.8% of gay respondents dissenting) emphasize the significance of diverse and accurate representation in shaping identities and self-perception.

Correction to: Boys’ Love (BL) Literacy Products Consumption as Leisure and its Impact on perceptions of LGBTQ + People: a Case Study of the Chinese BL Fan Community in North America

Correction to: Boys’ Love (BL) Literacy Products Consumption as Leisure and its Impact on perceptions of LGBTQ + People: a Case Study of the Chinese BL Fan Community in North America

“It is universal love beyond homosexuality and gender difference”: critical media discourse analysis of boys’ love dramas in Japan

ABSTRACT Through a critical media discourse analysis of boys’ love (BL) dramas in Japan, this study analyses how cultural works on same-sex romance have been publicised and perceived in the Japanese society. Text was collected from comments from the production team and actors on the official websites of productions, introductions, commentaries, and interviews in the media, and comments from fans on the official websites. Norman Fairclough’s (2003) three-dimensional model was used to examine how discourse practice is contextualised in relation to the wider society and culture. This study shows that the BL category is stigmatised as something to be overcome, and the discourse of “going beyond” is used favourably, making the underlying homophobia and misogyny unquestionable. The study criticises the potential for “universalisation” beyond “transcending” BL and gender, emphasising the importance of the commonality and universal messages as human beings, while bleaching out the unique aspects of experience due to gender and/or sexual orientation. It is essential to critically examine the sociocultural implications of the production and consumption of BL drama, focusing on whether it fosters positive change in society, rather than altering the genre to conform to a notion of “universal love” to appeal to a wider audience.

Boys’ Love (BL) Drama Series Review System for Opinion Mining with Sentiment Analysis

This research portrays same-gender relationships in media, specifically through the drama series of BL (Boys’ Love) and GL (Girls’ Love). Entertainment companies from Thailand, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, and Vietnam are prominent producers of these series for the global market. While Thai BL dramas have been produced since 2014, they achieved significant popularity and recognition starting in 2017. The proposed system collects user review comments on the BL drama series produced by four countries from 2014 to June 2023. These reviews are compiled into a dataset named H/BL page via Facebook. The dataset comprises 276 series collected from two websites: Dramatist and BLWatcher. Sentiment analysis is utilized to classify user opinions and emotions related to these BL drama series. This technique identifies phrases and emotions within the text, categorizing them as objective (factual), positive (indicating happiness and satisfaction), or negative (indicating unhappiness, disappointment, or rejection) using the Information Gain (IG) method. The system aims to classify opinions on BL drama series and assess public sentiment towards same-gender love.

Representation of Male Love in East Asia and West: “Fetish vs Activism”

Alice Oseman, the author of an LGBTQ+ young adult graphic novel that focuses on the lives and romance of two boys, has made a comment that caused some controversy on the internet. This comment by Oseman illustrates a somewhat common view held by Western society toward East Asian Boys Love (BL) genre. That is: BL novels and webcomics being highly sexual, fetish works with little literary value. This research note tries to analyze what could be the reason behind this commonly held view by the West, illustrated by Oseman’s comment through analyzing BL genre, Oseman’s work Heartstopper, the differences and tendencies within the works from East Asia, China specifically, and the West.

Boys’ Love (BL) Literacy Products Consumption as Leisure and its Impact on perceptions of LGBTQ+ People: a Case Study of the Chinese BL Fan Community in North America

Boys’ Love (BL) Literacy Products Consumption as Leisure and its Impact on perceptions of LGBTQ+ People: a Case Study of the Chinese BL Fan Community in North America

Fans speak for whom? Imagined ‘official’, internalised hegemony and self-censorship

This study elucidates the concept of ‘official’, frequently used as a counterpart to fans in pop culture fandom using the case of Thai Boys Love drama fandom in Japan. It is necessary to examine the relationship between fandom and hegemony without assuming the potential of participatory culture and fandom as a counterculture. Therefore, this study focuses on how fans construct norms based on the concept of ‘official’ and internalise this power. Furthermore, it explores the meanings and respective boundaries of ‘unofficial’ and ‘official’ as constructed by fans. The results of the participation observations and interviews as an acafan revealed that the unofficial fan club, mass media and other entities were ‘officialised’ and the boundary between ‘official’ and unofficial was challenged by both fandom and the ‘official’ side. The mass media plays the role of the owner of cultural content and provider of norms, and fans expect each other to follow them through the constructed and ambiguous concept of ‘official’. The hegemony of ‘official’ is constructed by the voluntary consent of fans, and internalising these hegemonies leads to self-censorship and self-regulation. Blind overconfidence in fan-created ‘official’ may reinforce these structures and undermine the freedom and independence of fans.

Exploring debates over “boys love” media in the Philippines: from misogynistic backlash to queer emancipation

ABSTRACT As a genre originally emerging from Japanese women’s popular culture and developing into a transnational phenomenon, debates over “Boys Love” (BL) media have increased in recent years. Within this article, we explore debates over BL through a case study of its reception in the Philippines, situating our analysis within the broader context of the Philippines’ heteropatriarchal culture. Drawing upon critical discourse analysis of traditional and new media discussions responding to the rise of BL fandom in the Philippines and qualitative interviews with 31 LGBTQ+ fans of BL, we reveal tensions between those who view BL positively and negatively. Through a feminist and reparative queer reading of our data, we contrast cisgender gay men’s dismissal of the genre as always already problematic due to its emergence from women’s culture with LGBTQ+ Philippine fans’ positioning of BL as an emancipatory media genre that combats homophobia. Ultimately, we argue that attempts by certain critics in the Philippines to downplay the queer emancipatory potentials of BL emerges from a misogynistic rejection of the contributions of women to Philippine queer culture. We conclude by calling for a more nuanced appreciation of BL’s queer interventions which recognises the genre’s deconstructive force.

Inter-Asia referencing and orientalist consideration of the transnational fandom of Thai boys’ love drama in Japan

ABSTRACT This study focused on the Japanese cyber-fandom of Thai boys’ love (BL) dramas, examining how their perception of Thailand was transformed through viewership and participation in fandom activities and how it affected the fans themselves and the broader Japanese society. In the Japanese cyberfandom of Thai BL dramas, people with diverse gender identities and sexualities intermingle, learn, and become aware of their changing gazes toward Thai and Japanese culture, queerness, and other related issues. Through a qualitative analysis of audience ethnography and interviews with 25 participants, this study shows that Thailand’s culture contrasts with others, particularly the cultures of the West, and an Oriental gaze from the Japanese point of view has emerged in this context. A movement beyond the national Thailand–Japan framework has also emerged, which explores the multifaceted nature of BL dramas within a single-issue context. Thus, Thai BL drama fandom extends beyond an Oriental perspective, practising inter-Asian referencing and reflecting on the national framework by watching BL dramas and participating in fandom. In other words, this study presents new possibilities for BL: (1) overcoming an oriental perspective and reflecting on a national framework for the acceptance and consumption of BL content and (2) cultural experience and real social connection through fandom activities and discourse through inter-Asian referencing in practice.

Beyond Words

Beyond Words