Newsweek article: 'The Frozen Closet' | Page 3 | Golden Skate

Newsweek article: 'The Frozen Closet'

Joined
Aug 16, 2009
As you say, kabuki is not directly related to figure skating, but I found your description providing a very nice hint to understand the cultural attitude of Japanese society.
Adding to your explanation, kabuki actors consist of only guys, and the culture of kabuki is traditionally handed down to the next generation from fathers to sons for hundreds of years(with some exceptions, though). Therefore kabuki actors are socially supposed to get married and have children, including those who specialize in female roles, so dressing in women’s clothes and playing a woman’s role never mean they are gay.
Kabuki is one of the most unique forms among many other forms of Japanese culture, and society of kabuki actors are considered to be quite atypical in Japan. But I think it can make a good example because I think I can point out that being androgyny on the stage or a man wearing costumes like a woman are not viewed in the negative way in Japan, because it doesn’t necessarily mean they are actually homosexual. Wearing womanish clothes is not a problem as long as they are regarded as costumes, and being “beautiful like a girl” is a compliment because he is thought to be a boy not a gay, or even if someone who appears on TV is actually a gay, he is considered to be something exceptional that would do nothing with lives of ordinary people, since very few people come out that they are homosexual in Japanese society. But if a man begins to make himself look as a woman in his real life, probably people around him will see him in a negative way.

Thanks for the insights. It helps with the understanding of what a gender-different costume implies. As I thought, it gives an extra range of expression without making any statement about the performer's inner nature or indeed the society's view of homosexuality.

One equivalent I can think of in Western arts these days is the "pants role" in some operas. This is the role of usually a young man that is played by a female singer. It is probably a remnant from the days when only men played onstage, a tradition that kabuki maintains today. The fact that a woman plays the part of a man or boy is no reflection either on the nature of the onstage character or on the sexuality of the singer. It's a convention of the art form. One of the most beautiful manifestations of this tradition is the early twentieth-century opera Der Rosenkavalier, by Richard Strauss, where the sublime final trio is made up of three women's voices, but the characters involved are two woman and a man.

In the opposite direction, in ballet there is a tradition that Cinderella's stepsisters are portrayed by male character dancers, at least at the British Royal Ballet. (I think that British pantomime also features some kinds of cross-dressing roles.) It's interesting that so often, a female dressed as a male implies freedom, whereas a male dressed as a female implies comedy.

Onstage, the most famous boy-played-by-a-girl role is that of Peter Pan, both in the original Barrie play and in the musical version. Again, this role is considered to transcend gender.

All of these thoughts are helpful because they show that there can be many ways for artists to express themselves, with or without any reflections on sexuality, if the culture of the society has room for such expression.
 

Ace

Rinkside
Joined
Feb 20, 2014
Only men are gay? No lesbians in figure skating? That's what we'd be given to believe in this article! No mention of what it might be like to be a queer woman trying to get ahead in figure skating, in any country, not just the US.

Unfortunately it is a tired stereotype created by homophobes that men who do artistic sports rather than "manly" sports are gay. Most figure skaters aren't gay, though they might be more than in other sports. We don't know for sure. But the homophobic idiots who think gay or bisexual me aren't interested in most sports and lesbians and bisexual woman play sports like football and never girly sports like figure skating are offensive.

We don't know how many women or men are gay or bisexual in this sport.
 
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