Cyberqueers in Taiwan: Locating Histories of the Margins

In this paper I direct the focus to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) online communities in Taiwan. On the one hand, I argue that such online communities in Taiwan are worthwhile researching and deserve special academic attention because they touch upon Taiwan’s perpetual difference in the world as a de-facto, thereby questioning how a transnational perspective permanently influences or even changes the way national identity is or is not formulated. On the other, against the backdrop of globalisation, I highlight the fact of under-theorisation of issues and politics of sexuality dissidence in a non-western, non-dominant location and culture such as Taiwan. As I start to bridge the current gap of such insufficiencies in unevenly distributed research interests in some parts of the world rather than others, I also make a point of fighting against surveillance and control in cyberspace. Ultimately, such studies on Taiwanese LGBT online communities are not possible without continuous attempts and efforts in trying to keep freedom of expression and anonymity to certain extent