Skip to main content

Research Repository

Advanced Search

All Outputs (28)

Playgrounds of Resistance: A Patchwork Ethnography of Sex Workers’ Sociopolitical Collectivisation in South & West India (2025)
Thesis
Krishnakumar, J. Playgrounds of Resistance: A Patchwork Ethnography of Sex Workers’ Sociopolitical Collectivisation in South & West India. (Thesis). SOAS University of London

Sex workers in India have long battled singular, stereotypical representations of themselves as victim-criminals, or, as ‘key populations’ in India’s HIV/AIDS Targeted Intervention programmes since the late 1980s through the 1990s. This thesis engage... Read More about Playgrounds of Resistance: A Patchwork Ethnography of Sex Workers’ Sociopolitical Collectivisation in South & West India.

Robots in the Wild: An Ethnography of Robot-Human Interactions outside the Laboratory (2023)
Preprint / Working Paper
Gygi, F. (in press). Robots in the Wild: An Ethnography of Robot-Human Interactions outside the Laboratory. Aubervilliers

This exploratory research project looks at how robots interact with the French public in the ‘wild’; that is, outside of the controlled environment of the laboratory or the psychological experiment. The aim was to understand concrete human-robot inte... Read More about Robots in the Wild: An Ethnography of Robot-Human Interactions outside the Laboratory.

The Afterlives of Dolls: On the Productive Death of Terminal Commodities (2023)
Journal Article
Gygi, F. (in press). The Afterlives of Dolls: On the Productive Death of Terminal Commodities. Ars orientalis, 52, 197-221. https://doi.org/10.3998/ars.3993

Can dolls die? This paper examines memorial services for dolls (ningyō kuyō) in Japan as conduits to disposal. Dolls, once bought, are widely understood to be terminal commodities: they can only be passed down to a narrow group of relatives and often... Read More about The Afterlives of Dolls: On the Productive Death of Terminal Commodities.

High fun: An ethnography of HIV risk and stigma among gay and bisexual men in urban India (2023)
Thesis
Rijneveld, C. J. High fun: An ethnography of HIV risk and stigma among gay and bisexual men in urban India. (Thesis). SOAS University of London

This thesis is an ethnography of HIV risk and stigma among gay and bisexual men in urban India, a demographic that is underrepresented in HIV/Aids research. It explores the effects of the biomedicalization of the HIV/Aids epidemic over the past decad... Read More about High fun: An ethnography of HIV risk and stigma among gay and bisexual men in urban India.

Embrace me as I am: Japanese Pornography for Women and the Fan Community surrounding Male Porn Stars (2023)
Thesis
Kodaka, M. Embrace me as I am: Japanese Pornography for Women and the Fan Community surrounding Male Porn Stars. (Thesis). SOAS University of London

This exploratory research looks at female fans of male porn actors in Jôsei-muke Adult Videos (AV) in Japan. Jôsei-muke is a pornographic genre aimed at heterosexual women that features good-looking male porn actors called eromen and lovemen. This ne... Read More about Embrace me as I am: Japanese Pornography for Women and the Fan Community surrounding Male Porn Stars.

Falling in and out of love with stuff: Affective affordance and horizontal transcendence in styles of decluttering in Japan (2022)
Journal Article
Gygi, F. (in press). Falling in and out of love with stuff: Affective affordance and horizontal transcendence in styles of decluttering in Japan. Japanese Studies, 42(2), 195-212. https://doi.org/10.1080/10371397.2022.2108777

The last decade has seen the rise of Japanese methods of decluttering, adding everyday stuff to the increasing number of things that the modern subject must manage to gain a sense of wellbeing. This article examines Danshari by Yamashita Hideko and t... Read More about Falling in and out of love with stuff: Affective affordance and horizontal transcendence in styles of decluttering in Japan.

Introduction: Gender as Work (2022)
Book Chapter
Gygi, F., & Hansen, G. M. (2022). Introduction: Gender as Work. In The Work of Gender: Service, Performance and Fantasy in Contemporary Japan (1-35). NIAS Press

The Work of Gender: Service, Performance and Fantasy in Contemporary Japan (2022)
Book
Gygi, F., & Hansen, G. M. (Eds.). (2022). The Work of Gender: Service, Performance and Fantasy in Contemporary Japan. NIAS Press

Gender and sexuality in Japan has long been a field of academic study, with gender mainly being examined either as masculinities, femininities or as deviating sexualities. In recent years, however, widespread interest in manga, anime and cosplay amon... Read More about The Work of Gender: Service, Performance and Fantasy in Contemporary Japan.

Japanese Bangkok and Bangkok’s Japanese: the structures and practices of transnational belonging in a global city (2022)
Thesis
Mitski, A. I. Japanese Bangkok and Bangkok’s Japanese: the structures and practices of transnational belonging in a global city. (Thesis). SOAS University of London

In recent decades, Bangkok’s Japanese community has undergone an unprecedented growth, with its official numbers skyrocketing to over 70 thousand (Japanese MOFA data 2015) and the unofficial ones thought to exceed 100 thousand. The majority of that i... Read More about Japanese Bangkok and Bangkok’s Japanese: the structures and practices of transnational belonging in a global city.

"Each Life Has its Place": Transgender Existence in Contemporary Kansai (2022)
Thesis
Gamberton, L. "Each Life Has its Place": Transgender Existence in Contemporary Kansai. (Thesis). SOAS, University of London

My PhD dissertation is an ethnography of transgender identities in Japan with a focus on Kyoto and Osaka. To date, Japan has not figured as an area of interest in Anglophone Trans Studies; nor has transness been the subject of much scholarly attentio... Read More about "Each Life Has its Place": Transgender Existence in Contemporary Kansai.

Hôtes et otages : Entasser des objets chez soi dans le Japon contemporain (2019)
Journal Article
Gygi, F. (2019). Hôtes et otages : Entasser des objets chez soi dans le Japon contemporain. L'Homme (Paris. 1961), 231/2, 151-172. https://doi.org/10.4000/lhomme.35567

Material culture studies often use a framework defined by appropriation, in which human actors can make circulating objects their own by investing them with meaning. But what happens when a present given to you cannot entirely become yours ? This art... Read More about Hôtes et otages : Entasser des objets chez soi dans le Japon contemporain.

Things that Believe: Talismans, Amulets, Dolls, and How to Get Rid of Them (2019)
Journal Article
Gygi, F. (in press). Things that Believe: Talismans, Amulets, Dolls, and How to Get Rid of Them. Japanese journal of religious studies, 45(2), 423-452. https://doi.org/10.18874/jjrs.45.2.2018.423-452

This article looks at religious and semi-religious paraphernalia in everyday life from the perspective of disposal. Recent research in religious studies and anthropology has focused on the ways in which beliefs are performed through religious objects... Read More about Things that Believe: Talismans, Amulets, Dolls, and How to Get Rid of Them.

Robot Companions: The Animation of Technology and the Technology of Animation in Japan (2018)
Book Chapter
Gygi, F. (2018). Robot Companions: The Animation of Technology and the Technology of Animation in Japan. In M. Astor-Aguilera, & G. Harvey (Eds.), Rethinking Relations and Animism: Personhood and Materiality (94-111). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203709887

Contemporary Japan is often described in utopian terms as a place where humans and nonhumans live and work together in harmony. This acceptance of nonhuman others is explained by some anthropologists as stemming from an “animist unconscious” (Allison... Read More about Robot Companions: The Animation of Technology and the Technology of Animation in Japan.