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Articles

Vol. 15 No. 1 (2026): Countering Coloniality in Music and East Asia

Queer Sinophone Ear: Countering Dual Colonialities in a Performative Theory of Listening

  • Gavin S. K. Lee
DOI
https://doi.org/10.59998/1-2026-15-2760
Published
2026-06-25

Abstract

This article sheds light on the intertwined nature of Sino- and Eurocolonialities, advocating for a nuanced, intersectional approach that has so far eluded Sinophone studies. Dual colonialities constitute a framework necessary for approaching complex cases such as Chinese minority musical modernism that is subject to both colonialities, objections to Chinese appropriations of Western music that may be Eurocolonial or anti-nativist (de-Sinocolonial), and minority, queer or human rights voices that disalign with Sinocoloniality. The three-part argument of the article commences with an analysis of how the author’s own voice and accent in both English and Standard Chinese has been variously privileged and derogated in multiple countries, with dual colonialities shaping his bilingual experience. Thereafter, the article turns to an autoethnography of how the author as a youth constructed a closeted gay inner world in homophobic Singapore by queering U.S./U.K. boy bands, exhibiting Eurocoloniality in a bid to survive a hostile environment. The final part of the article advances an argument for de-Eurocoloniality that involves the dismantling of musical hierarchies and the possible (as opposed to mandated), democratically chosen “return” to the music of one’s ethnic heritage while resisting nativism in a de-Sinocolonial stance. Dual colonialities provide a framework that highlights their quotidian conjunction and thus theoretical necessity in analysis, critically accommodates the disambiguation of phenomena with multiple resonances, and giving attention to not just hegemonic forces but decolonial listening, anti-nativism, and marginalized peoples within China.