ABSTRACT

In discussing the globalisation of ‘alterity’ in emerging democracies, including Taiwan, Cindy Patton suggests that, ‘“Queer”, if it is to have any utility, is best understood, not as a model of identity and practice that can be imitated or molded to a local setting, but as evidence of a kind of unstoppable alterity that flies, like a stealth bomber, beneath the annihilating screen of nation’ (2002, 210). This chapter studies the travel of queer theory, like a stealth bomber in Cindy Patton's quotation, to Taiwan from the mid-1990s. It begins by dealing with the translingual aspect of this transcultural flow, raising questions about translation and translatability while situating the discussion in the context of postcoloniality in Taiwan. It goes on to highlight the difficulties of delimiting the field of queer studies in Taiwan by providing an analysis of the issues of cultural production and institutional practices that have engendered queer theory's travel to Taiwan. By way of conclusion, it problematises the field of queer studies in and on Taiwan, foregrounds its own positionality in this circuit of production of cultural knowledge, and reflects on the tactics and politics of intervention in the field of queer studies.