Queer Performative Politics in Africa and Asia

<p>Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and trans* advocacy groups and activists alike are penetrating the oppressive systems of state and society in Africa and Asia with each passing day. Unique, indigenous forms of activism and collective action are taking place with one goal in mind: recognition. In societies purporting to have no lesbian, gay, bisexual, or trans* populations, groups of people are emerging to say otherwise. This paper confronts Queer and postcolonial theory, international relations, globalization and performance studies, and ethnography, in order to pursue a comprehensive framework for understanding homosexual rights in Asia and Africa by searching for indigenous strategies of performative politics in the forms of Queer activism and collective action. The findings conclude that a deconstruction of the homosexual identity to a Queer identity is necessary in order to carry out any accurate survey of non-Western sexual identities with regards to their respective state and society relationships. Moreover, the Queer identity excludes political activities considered to be homo-normative in Western society, thus allowing indigenous cultures to alter and construct different mechanisms of visibility in the form of performative politics to achieve their goals towards state and social recognition.