Patrick Carland-Echavarria

Research Statement

My research is interdisciplinary and can be divided into three interrelated areas of focus:

LGBTQ Politics and Communities in Contemporary Japan

How has the growing visibility of LGBTQ+ people in Japan impacted contemporary culture and politics? Since the 2010s, LGBTQ+ politics and media have become increasingly prominent in Japan and intertwined with larger debates about diversity, tolerance, and demographics. My first stream of research examines how Japanese LGBTQ activism and media has evolved and responded to changing social and economic conditions.

Example Works

Queer Translators and Postwar Japanese Literary Translation

Why were queer authors and translators so prominent in the global renaissance of Japanese literary translation from the late 1940s to the early 1970s? How did early postwar Japan’s relative legal and cultural tolerance appeal to queer foreigners at a time of intensifying homophobia around the world? My second stream of research examines this intersection of postwar queer history and Japanese literary translation after World War II.

Example Works

Depictions of Queerness in Modern Japanese Art

How have modern Japanese artists from Western style painters to contemporary graphic artists and mangaka depicted and imagined queerness in their works? What can the works of visual artists tell us about conceptions of gender and sexuality in modern Japanese history? My third stream of research reconsiders modern Japanese art history from a queer perspective by considering how gay artists like as Takabatake Kashō, Naitō Rune, and Nakahara Jun’ichi reshaped modern aesthetics and ideals of beauty (utsukushisa) and cuteness (kawaisa).

Example Works