What can the lived experiences of performing artists in Java, Indonesia tell us about the production and negotiation of gender and local identity?

Drawing from ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Malang, East Java, author Christina Sunardi demonstrates ways individual performers have navigated cultural norms of masculinity and femininity to produce gender and place-based identity on- and offstage. Focusing on dancers who have participated in the performance of cross-gender dance, Fashioning Femininities, Making Masculinities provides insight into the lived experiences of men and waria performing female-style dance and women performing male-style dance.

Exploring onstage-offstage gender negotiations, gender fluidity, gender pluralism, and spirituality, this book is ideal reading for students of Gender and Sexuality Studies, Ethnomusicology, Dance Studies, Performance Studies, Southeast Asian Studies, and Cultural Anthropology.

Christina Sunardi PhD is Chair of the Department of Dance and Associate Professor of Ethnomusicology at the University of Washington, Seattle, USA.