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Female-to-male (FtM) transgender individuals’ multimodal and interactional practices in Japanese

  • Chie Fukuda EMAIL logo
Published/Copyright: May 7, 2024
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Abstract

This study explores the multimodal and interactional practices of female-to-male (FtM) transgender individuals in Japanese, focusing on their identity construction. Most previous studies on transgender identity in Japanese contexts examine male-to-female (MtF) transgender individuals’ linguistic practices, particularly the use of so-called Japanese women’s language. In contrast, this study explores how FtM individuals use not only linguistic but also other semiotic resources to construct and negotiate their gender and sexual identities. The study utilizes empirical data such as YouTube videos and draws on multimodal conversation analysis (CA) and membership categorization analysis (MCA) to analyze the participants’ accomplishment of social actions. The findings demonstrate the use of various resources for identity construction and how the participants challenge and/or conform to hegemonic gender ideologies. The study also unveils both the diversity among FtM transgender people (inter-individual variation) and the fluidity and complexity of identities that can exist within one person (intra-individual variation).


Corresponding author: Chie Fukuda, Independent Researcher, 1655 Makaloa Street Apt. 503, Honolulu, HI 96814, USA, E-mail:

Acknowledgments

I am grateful to the two reviewers, Gavin Furukawa, Ayumi Miyazaki, Lynn Lethin, Sean Forte, Laurie Durand, and participants in the CA data sessions at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa for their invaluable comments, advice, and assistance. Any remaining errors or misinterpretations are entirely my own.

Appendix:

Transcription conventions:

[Wo]rd

Overlapping talk

Wo::rd

Phonological lengthening (each colon is approx. 0.1 s)

Wo-

Sound cutoff

Word

Emphatic stress

((bows))

Non-verbal actions and comments

(h)

Breath within a word

(1.2)

Silence in seconds and tenths of a second

(.)

Micro-pause (less than 0.2 s)

.

Falling intonation

,

Continuing intonation

?

Rising intonation

( )

Inaudible sound, word, or phrase

°Word°

Reduced volume (double circles indicate greater reduced volume)

> word <

Faster than the speaker’s surrounding speech

Interlineal gloss abbreviations:

Cop

Copula

EMP

Emphatic marker

FIL

Filler

INT

Interjection

IP

Interactional particle

LK

Linking marker

Nom

Nominalizer

O

Object marker

PM

Pragmatic marker

Q

Question marker

QT

Quotative marker

S

Subject marker

Tag

Tag question

Top

Topic marker

Point of analysis

Embodied conduct notation in transcripts:

+ +

Descriptions of embodied movement are delimited between two identical symbols.

* *
+->

The action described continues across subsequent lines until the same symbol is

->+

reached.

---

Full extension of the movement is reached and maintained.

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Received: 2023-11-01
Accepted: 2023-12-14
Published Online: 2024-05-07
Published in Print: 2024-05-27

© 2024 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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