Start Date
14-12-2021 3:10 PM
Description
Since its emergence in the late 20th century, anime, or Japanese animation, has grown in increasing global popularity, with strong ties to consumerism and fan culture. Our work will integrate Japanese cultural studies, anime studies, and queer studies as a synthesized lens with which to examine the popular television series, Ouran High School Host Club. Using existing literature on Japanese culture, particularly the club and educational system, as well as queer concepts such as Camp and queer time and space, we will offer a close textual analysis of several episodes of Ouran High School Host Club. Additional lenses include evaluation of the formal elements of animation and common anime motifs. Our paper will examine how the host club space constructs queerness by obscuring heterosexuality and gender conformance through costume and a play with sensuality and eroticism. By focusing on sequences where outside characters, who conform to the traditional power structures, interact with the queer space of the host club, we will observe how the club either transforms or defeats these characters. Through our examination of the conflict between queerness and the systems of power in Ouran High School Host Club, we will indicate further questions for analysing other anime works.
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Kiss Kiss Fall In Love: Queer Space, Gender and Sexuality vs. Traditional Systems of Power in Anime
Since its emergence in the late 20th century, anime, or Japanese animation, has grown in increasing global popularity, with strong ties to consumerism and fan culture. Our work will integrate Japanese cultural studies, anime studies, and queer studies as a synthesized lens with which to examine the popular television series, Ouran High School Host Club. Using existing literature on Japanese culture, particularly the club and educational system, as well as queer concepts such as Camp and queer time and space, we will offer a close textual analysis of several episodes of Ouran High School Host Club. Additional lenses include evaluation of the formal elements of animation and common anime motifs. Our paper will examine how the host club space constructs queerness by obscuring heterosexuality and gender conformance through costume and a play with sensuality and eroticism. By focusing on sequences where outside characters, who conform to the traditional power structures, interact with the queer space of the host club, we will observe how the club either transforms or defeats these characters. Through our examination of the conflict between queerness and the systems of power in Ouran High School Host Club, we will indicate further questions for analysing other anime works.
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Mentor: Sue Scheibler