Cis-nationalism: Security, Threat, Identity Politics in the New Cold War

• In Event: Trans*ing Chineseness: Authenticity, Mobility, and Nationalism in 21st-century China

Abstract

This paper examines the intersection of national identity, national security, and the imagined militant threat of trans people. I study Mainland China’s internet users’ hostile response to trans rights in Taiwan and Hong Kong and argue that 1) the gender binary is seen as fundamental to the nation-state cultural identity; 2) the rise of new coldwarism in Chinese nationalism (C.Y. Zhang et al, 2022) frames gender and sexual human rights discourses; and 3) gender and sexual identity is closely tied with a particular type of political identity and mobility, threatening the imagined coherence of the current political order.

Presenter

• Jingchao Ma, Villanova University