Military Masculinity and Nationhood in the Yaoi Novel A Tale of Thousand Stars
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Abstract
This article hopes to explore Bacteria’s A Tale of Thousand Stars (2016) with special reference to military masculinity and nationhood under the signifying system of the military romance. It is found that military masculinity is constructed through the image of man in uniform, desired muscularity along with the role of protecting Alpha. The characteristics validate the re-emergence of militarism in Thai popular culture after the coup d’état in 2014. The connotation of nationhood is rooted within uke’s vulnerable body conjuring the military protection. It also employs courtly love trope to illuminate seme’s loyalty to certain national institutions. In creating military masculinity and nationhood, the novel represents the otherness of periphery and the ethnic group through the urban vs rural dichotomy. Furthermore, the gendered rural space gives birth to uke’s new life: from feminized geo-body to masculinized body subjugating the rural world which embodies ethnic otherness, femininity, and childlike naivety.
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References
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