Intimate Assemblages: Sexual Technologies and The Politics of LGBT Identity in Indonesia

Abstract

Drawing on discourse analysis of historical archives; in-depth interviews with activists, representatives of international humanitarian organisations and government officials; and the author’s own activist experience, this thesis examines the emergence of LGBT identity politics in Indonesia. It is particularly concerned with the use of sexual technologies by local LGBT activists as a form of counter discourse to the prevailing state heteronormativity and the conservatism of religious organisations. The term “sexual technologies” here refers to sexuality discourses that activists deploy in generating and transforming existing practices to achieve their political and social goals. The analysis traces the proliferation of sexual and gender identities (from gay, lesbian, LGBT, to SOGIE minorities) and simultaneously uncovers strategic adoptions of transnational sexual technologies by local activists, which have resulted in the emergence of transnational identities in local settings. Specifically, the thesis investigates several key moments in Indonesia’s recent socio-political development to identify shifts in the way homosexual and transgender identities have been constructed through the use of specific technologies. While there is a body of scholarship that addresses transnational influences on Indonesian homosexual and transgender cultural subjectivities, little has been written about the role of local LGBT activisms in politicising those subjectivities. This investigation makes use of the conceptual framework of “intimate assemblages” to denote the ways transnational encounters with sexual technologies have not only enabled activists to resist homophobic discourses, but also generate new and unexpected practices, such as the local consolidation of gender and sexual minorities, the emergence of gender/sexuality experts, and the professionalisation of activisms themselves. These developments characterise the contemporary gender and sexuality politics in Indonesia.