Drawing on over a decade of ethnographic fieldwork in northwest China, Casey James Miller offers a novel, compelling, and intimately personal perspective on Chinese queer culture and activism. In Inside the Circle: Queer Culture and Activism in Northwest China, Miller tells the stories of two courageous and dedicated groups of queer activists in the city of Xi’an: a grassroots gay men’s HIV/AIDS organization called Tong’ai and a lesbian women’s group named UNITE. Taking inspiration from “the circle,” a term used to imagine local, national, and global queer communities, Miller shows how everyday people in northwest China are taking part in queer culture and activism while also striving to lead traditionally moral lives in a rapidly changing society. The queer stories in this book broaden our understandings of gender and sexuality in contemporary China and show how taking global queer diversity seriously requires us to de-center Western cultural values, historical experiences, and theoretical perspectives.
List of Figures and Tables
1 Introduction: Queer Stories, Chinese Stories
2 The View from Inside the Circle: Queer Gender and Sexuality in Northwest China
3 “Falling Leaves Return to Their Roots”: Queer Love, Kinship, and Personhood
4 “Living in the Gray Zone”: Queer Activism and Civil Society
5 “Dying for Money”: Conflict and Competition among Queer Men’s NGOs
6 From Rainbow Flags to Mr. Gay World: Transnational Queer Culture and Activism
Conclusion
List of Names
Glossary of Chinese Characters
Acknowledgments
Notes
References
Index
