Genders & Sexualities in Modern Thailand

Chiang Mai, Thailand: Silkworm Books, 1999. Softcover. Good. 8vo 8" - 9" tall. A perfectly serviceable reference copy; nothing fancy, but complete and sturdy. Extensively pencil-notated, and from the personal library of a noted sex researcher himself, Michael A. Weidemann. Contributions by the two editors and by Chris Lyttleton, Andrea Whittaker, Jiemin Bao, Scot Barme, Nicola Tannenbaum, Craig J. Reynolds, Penny Van Esterik, Prudence Borthwick, and many others. From the publisher's blurb, "Many foreign observers of the "Land of Smiles" are familiar with a narrow range of gender relations and sexual practices in Thailand, from the fanciful portrayal of 19th-century harem life in The King and I, to recent media coverage of sex tourism and AIDS. Yet serious study of patterns of sexuality, femininity, and masculinity in Thailand is relatively new. This book is a rare collection by scholars from around the world and across social disciplines who are tackling these issues. The essays urge the reader to look beyond fantasies of Thailand as an "oriental sexual paradise" or "land of sexploitation" to historical and contemporary forms of gender and eroticism. Studies of the changing opinions and practices among villagers and urbanites, the creative expressions of novelists and aristocrats, and the concerns of early women's magazines and recent AIDS-prevention campaigns, reveal the extraordinary diversity of debates about gender and sexual issues in 20th-century Thailand. Volume contains scholarly apparatus in the form of, e.g., notes, index, and bibliography. xi [1], 2-289 pp.Member, I.O.B.A., C.B.A., and adherent to the highest ethical standards. Additional postage may be required for oversize or especially heavy volumes, and for sets.