Suchergebnisse

"A history of transgender femininity in New Order (1965-1998) Indonesia, contending that waria, one of Indonesia's trans feminine populations, have cultivated a distinctive way of captivating the affective, material, and spatial experiences of belonging to a modern "public" through their relationship to technology"--

AbstractIndonesia's waria commonly assert that the bodily transformations they undertake on a temporary but daily basis, which they call déndong, are central to their understanding of the self. The onerous efforts that waria make to craft their male body in line with frequently glamorous forms of feminine beauty nests within efforts to achieve visibility on the national stage. Waria also describe their gendered embodiment in terms of a personal narrative of self-actualization that sees it as one aspect of a process they call becoming. However, waria do not see déndong primarily as the expression of an individual self but assert that it is a reflection of the work of others. In this view, meeting more waria and interacting with them results in irrevocable changes to one's outer self. This article describes the historical emergence of this common understanding of selfhood and embodiment during the New Order in Indonesia (1967–98), a period characterized by the rapid growth of the mass media in the context of military rule. Emphasizing waria's own memories of this period alongside archival sources and personal photographs helps us understand how gender presentation both animates and undermines the fragile promise of national belonging in Indonesia.

AbstractThe globalization of transgender and its relationship to human rights has been accompanied by increased media interest in those so identified around the world. In Indonesia, this mostly involves the representation of male-to-female transgender-identified waria. While most mass media representations do portray them in narrow terms as the victims of violence, this does not undermine the value of transgender for waria. Seeing interaction with mass media in economic terms, many waria charge money for interviews and other media appearances. This article describes how waria understand affective labor for transnational mass media markets. They do so in terms of the historically understood association between work and visible claims for national belonging and recognition in Indonesia. Although such possibilities are situated in a context characterized by inequality, waria do consider the global scope of transgender to be of value as a way to expand their claims. A perspective that analyzes the circulation of transgender as it relates to global political economy helps clarify how the category produces uneven forms of value as it encounters diverse national and local contexts.

Tattooing among young middle-class people in Indonesia has increased noticeably since the late 2000s. I draw on ethnographic research in tattoo studios alongside interviews and magazine sources to locate the style known as kustom within its social and cultural context. I describe how kustom tattooing is the product of patterns of consumption centred on the body, drawing resources from a globalised, mass media-saturated environment. Indeed, consumers describe it as an important avenue for self-expression. By contrast, tattooists and those inside the scene describe kustom as a way of transcending geographical markers of identity: to be 'anything and everything'. This article explores this tension between self-expression and the political aims of kustom. Kustom tattooing is also novel by virtue of its absolute emphasis on 'no expertise'. It thus exposes a space where the stress on expertise and self-improvement, which characterises middle-class cultures in post-authoritarian Indonesia, gives way to creative and hybrid articulations of identity.

Abstract
This essay contains an introduction and a translation of an account provided in Indonesian by Rully Mallay, a transgender community leader and activist at the Kebaya Foundation, a shelter for people living with HIV in the province of Yogyakarta. It describes the impact of restrictions imposed to reduce the spread of COVID-19 and mobilization in response to it by those who identify as "waria" between February and September 2020. Waria played a pivotal role in mobilizing a community response in that city, providing support not only to their own community but also to other marginal groups impacted in similar ways. Harsh lockdown measures imposed to respond to COVID-19 disproportionately affected waria, cutting off access to economic and community support. This was particularly acute for the many waria without state-issued identity cards. Nevertheless, Rully expresses her hope that through the skills and adaptability they have demonstrated in their response to the public health emergency, they might achieve recognition and acceptance from Indonesian society.