TY - JOUR
T1 - Gender and everyday evasions
T2 - Moving with Cantopop
AU - ERNI, John N.
N1 - Funding Information:
1. The work described in this study was partially supported by a Small-Scale Research Grant, from the City University of Hong Kong (Project no.: CityU 9030993). The author also thanks the Centre for Communi-cation Research at the City University of Hong Kong for its support. Furthermore, I wish to extend my heartfelt thanks to Alex Chi-kwong Lee (a popular disc jockey at Radio-Television Hong Kong 2) whose insights, wealth of knowledge about pop music, and friendship have contributed significantly to this paper. Gratitude also goes to William Tam, who has provided valuable research and translation assistance.
PY - 2007/3
Y1 - 2007/3
N2 - In this paper, gender negotiations in the production, musical forms, and consumption of Cantopop are taken as a cultural exemplar for a social and political imagination of ambivalence, which seems to be shaping popular life in Hong Kong. It has three focal points - musical forms and expressions of Cantopop (style, lyrics, iconography, affect), gender politics, and 'everyday-ness' - which converge to mark a notable cultural logic performing an enlarging sense of ambivalence about a city that has seen a shift from high moments of economic prosperity to the current postcolonial uncertainties. In other words, Cantopop signals a shift in our sensibilities, a redrawing of our affective map of everyday life after an important historical and politico-administrative shift. In a sense then, this paper explores Hong Kong's changing identity within the sight and sound of popular culture, by specifically tracing some of the ways in which gender politics is inscribed, coded, negotiated, performed, or simply flirtingly posed on the surface of popular culture.
AB - In this paper, gender negotiations in the production, musical forms, and consumption of Cantopop are taken as a cultural exemplar for a social and political imagination of ambivalence, which seems to be shaping popular life in Hong Kong. It has three focal points - musical forms and expressions of Cantopop (style, lyrics, iconography, affect), gender politics, and 'everyday-ness' - which converge to mark a notable cultural logic performing an enlarging sense of ambivalence about a city that has seen a shift from high moments of economic prosperity to the current postcolonial uncertainties. In other words, Cantopop signals a shift in our sensibilities, a redrawing of our affective map of everyday life after an important historical and politico-administrative shift. In a sense then, this paper explores Hong Kong's changing identity within the sight and sound of popular culture, by specifically tracing some of the ways in which gender politics is inscribed, coded, negotiated, performed, or simply flirtingly posed on the surface of popular culture.
KW - Cantopop
KW - Everyday life
KW - Gendered sensibilities
KW - Hong Kong
KW - Politics of in-difference
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=33847720936&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/14649370601119055
DO - 10.1080/14649370601119055
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:33847720936
SN - 1464-9373
VL - 8
SP - 86
EP - 108
JO - Inter-Asia Cultural Studies
JF - Inter-Asia Cultural Studies
IS - 1
ER -