Abstract Hong Kong lesbians have identified multiple spaces in an urbanized environment to assert their lesbian visibility and to negotiate lesbian identity politics. I define Hong Kong lesbians as self-identified women who have had significant intimate relationships with other women and who are living in Hong Kong. One maps her own spaces to survive, to live, to love and to gather one another for emotional well-being. Due to the density in population, the lack of physical land space and the Hong Kong’s government high land- price policy, living conditions in Hong Kong do not offer much privacy for lesbians if they live with their families. As a result, Hong Kong lesbians often locate alternate spaces to develop support networks with other women. Some lesbians consider these spaces to include lesbian karaoke bars and cafés located in high-density areas such as Causeway Bay (Tung Lo Wan). Lesbian commercial spaces function as temporal sites of resistance for Hong Kong lesbians to validate their lesbian identities, to form social networks and to question their political subjectivities. Others might choose to reject the notion of lesbian spaces and instead assert their lesbian visibility along the line of everyday life, thereby disturbing the notion of heteronormativity within social worlds. They might have chosen to be who they are no matter where they are, albeit in spaces of intimacy, familial and acquaintance. Based on life history interviews with 30 lesbians living in Hong Kong, I attempt to map the complex relations between lesbian subjectivities and spatialities as they emerge, develop, interact and negotiate with each other in their everyday lives. Drawing on theories encompassing urban sociology, feminism, queer theory and cultural studies, I propose to understand Hong Kong lesbian culture through an analysis of spaces, in their multiplicities and ambiguous codings, in their formulas of resistance, and in their everyday affect on Hong Kong lesbians. Keywords: Lesbians, Hong Kong, urban sociology, identity, life history. Acknowledgements The writing of this thesis is a confluence project of all sorts. It is as if I have come full circle. My family has been crucial to my project. As a matter of fact, they have indulged in me my constant relocations from here to there. In particular, my mother and her many ways of acknowledging in public about having a lesbian daughter has been very touching and fascinating. My siblings, Karen (and Sam, Ethan & Sidney), Owen and Emma have been sweet and supportive even though the physical distance renders it hard for us to be with each other. My father has been supportive of my intellectual endeavour by providing a much-needed space for me to write. Without it, it would have been challenging to finish what I have begun. My supervisor, Travis Kong, has been encouraging, patient, kind and has provided me with meaningful thoughts both for my thesis and for my soul. Yau Ching has been a dear friend beyond words, time and place. I made the decision to return to Hong Kong for my studies because of these two persons. I also thank my supervisor Ho Chi Kwan for her support and guidance during this process. I owe my deepest gratitude towards the interview participants. Their insights, courage and interest in my project have been invaluable. I have been very fortunate to have fierce support from many friends. Shirley, for being patient with me. Queenie, for all our conversations, both deep and shallow. Margie and Celia, for being caring and thoughtful. Alan, for being my boyfriend. Man Chui, your activism and intellect have often inspired me to venture just one step further. Thom Gamble, my long-lost pal, your reappearance meant the world to me. Please don’t say “doei doei” to me again! Last but never the least, I have been more than fortunate in life to have met Lucetta Kam Yip-Lo. Her love and virtuosity in all matters have spoiled me relentlessly. (Not to mention the precious nourishment from her mother’s marvellous cooking.) For you and me, Le monde est grand, mais en nous il est profound comme la mer. - R. M. Rilke (The world is large, but in us it is deep as the sea) Table of Contents Profile of Interview Subjects viii Chapter 1: Introduction Hong Kong Lesbian Identities: The City, Its Spaces and Their Effects 1 Chapter 2: Sexual Identities: Coming to Terms with Lesbian Desires 42 Chapter 3: Being Oneself in Many Worlds: Lesbians in Everyday Spaces 75 Chapter 4: Performative Bodies: Are you a TBG, TB or Pure? 106 Chapter 5: Spaces of Intimacy: Being In and Out of Love 137 Chapter 6: Politics and Postcoloniality: Hong Kong Tongzhi Movement 165 Chapter 7: Tung Lo Wan: Lesbian Haven and Everyday Life 200 Chapter 8: Demand for Cultural Representation: Emerging Independent Video 230 on Lesbian Desires Conclusion 256 Bibliography 262 Appendices A : The Research Pendulum: Multiple Roles and Responsibilities as a 280 Researcher B: Interview Guide 290 C: An Intimate Dialogue with Yau Ching’s Ho Yuk: Let’s Love Hong Kong 294 D: Profile of Hong Kong Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender and Queer 306 Friendly Organizations viii Profile of Interview Subjects Name Age Education Social Sex Occupation Living (Pseudonym) Class Partners Situation (Natal Family) Alex 27 University Middle Female Reporter Grandmother Kitman 28 University Middle Female Social Parents Worker Lik Lik 34 Form Five Working Female / Graphic Own Male Designer Felix 40 University Middle Female Café Owner Grandmother and partner Jo 27 University Middle Female / Financial Own Male Advisor Beatrice 42 Form Six Working Female Manager Own (Hospitality) Ku Tsai 21 Form Five Working Female Sales Parents, Grandmother, Two Sisters. Elizabeth 51 Form Six Middle Female Project Mother and Manager Two Aunts. Bik Bik 20 University Middle Female Student Student Flatmates Phil 33 Form Four Working Female Insurance With Partner Sales Wai Wai 28 University Working Female Ad. Sales With Partner Emmy 33 Arts Middle Female Performance With Partner College Artist Ah Lok 15 Form Four Working Female Student Parents Yuki 16 Form Five Working Female / Student Parents Male Katherine 27 University Middle Female / Performance Parents Male Artist Nick 25 University Middle Female Store Owner Parents and Brother Leslie 22 University Middle Female Laboratory Parents, Assistant Sister and Brother Anne 30 University Working Female Café Owner With Family and Partner (Alternate) Sandy 26 University Middle Female Café Owner With Partner Christie 25 University Middle Female / Store Owner Father Male Eileen 51 University Middle Female Librarian Own Miki 17 Form Five Working Female Student Parents and Brother Julia 24 University Middle Female Designer Father and Brother Nikki 34 University Middle Female Reporter With Partner Ah Hoi 29 Form Five Working Female Editor With Partner Gum Gum 43 University Middle Female District Own Council Member Eunice 40 College Working Female Nursing Mother Dip. Home Taro 22 Form Five Middle Female Personal Parents and Assistant Sister Edith 43 College Working Female Administrator Mother and Dip. Sister Napoleon 26 Form Five Working Female Seeking Parents and Employment Sister Chapter 1 Hong Kong Lesbian Identities: The City, Its Spaces and Their Effects In those days, I will follow others to go to those parties. You have to go with someone to attend parties. At these parties, there were people we all knew and thought were lesbians. Actually, it’s not really a secret to us but it’s not open to others. (Eileen, fifty-one years old) YY was so much fun!1 It was like being in our own world. Everyone is lyun (孿). We went there every weekend, met the same people, sang the same songs, sat at the same table and hung out to do the same things. It was like a safety zone to us. We were so happy to be there. It was such a friendly place. (Emmy, thirty-three years old) I went to my first les bar when I was fifteen or sixteen. I went with a group of classmates. It was no big deal. But it was quite a safe place cos’ I won’t bump into my family. Not like walking around on the streets. It’s a nuisance. I have such a big family. (Bik Bik, twenty years old) Introduction Space is a ubiquitous term. The term often conjures up physical images as with actual material spaces and architectural structures. Discussions on queer spaces are not only limited to physical landscapes such as patterns of residential neighbourhoods, work locations, leisure sites or commercial establishments frequented by lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders. “Queer spaces” increasingly take into account various sites such as cyberspace, cultural forums and cognitive mappings.2 Theorizing everyday spaces, in particular, meant spaces that we traversed on our daily routines such as supermarkets, bus stops, pedestrian subways, elevators and on the streets. Academic 1 YY is the short term for a disco called Yin Yang Disco. Located on Ice House Street in Central, YY is popular with gay clientale in the nineties. It has since been closed. 2 As Moira Rachel Kenney suggests, “The experience of being part of, and subject to, the life of the city, combined with the search for specific spaces that permit and affirm one’s own way of being, are the key elements in such maps” (Kenney, 2001, p.10). 1 scholarship on the area of sexualities and spaces has been investigated by cultural geographers, ethnographers, cultural studies theorists and sociologists in the past decade (Castells, 1983; Lauria & Knopp, 1985; Winchester & White, 1988; Bell, 1991; Adler & Brenner, 1992; Massey, 1994; Bouthillette, 1997; Stein, 1997; Valentine, 2000; Valentine and Skelton, 2003, Massey, 2005).3 These studies centre on how gender plays a major role in the way gays and lesbians mediate their daily lives in North American and European urban centres.