Paper short abstract:

The aim of this paper is to examine the findings of my ethnographic fieldwork in a dansō (Ftm crossdresser) escort company in Akihabara where I worked from September 2015 to July 2016. I investigate how dansō create their male self and what relationships develop between crossdressers and clients.

Paper long abstract:

The aim of this paper is to examine the findings of my nine months' ethnographic fieldwork in a dansō escort company in Akihabara, Tokyo. Dansō is a Japanese word that means "male dress" and it can also be used as a noun to describe a girl or a woman who dresses up like a man. Since 2006, mainly in the Tokyo area but not only, dansō escort service companies started to offer their services to customers, giving them the possibility to enjoy a romantic date with a crossdresser woman. From September 2015 to July 2016 I worked on a voluntary basis in a dansō escort company, and I had the opportunity to observe on a daily basis dansō escorts in their working duties and in their free time. Moreover, I was also able to meet customers in the frame of paid dates and public events held by the company while presenting myself as a crossdresser too. Adopting as methodological tools face to face interviews, participant and non-participant observation and auto-ethnography, the phenomenon of dansō escorting will be represented in its whole, with a focus on the issues of personal identity, gender expression, and cross-dress escorting as an emotional labour, and I will propose an explanation about the role those crossdressers play in contemporary Japan, - i.e. a way of self-interpretation which avoids the male/female and the hetero/homosexual categorization - a new fashion trend, the creation of a place to perform a new gender identity. My thesis is that dansō, while providing a commodified intimacy to those customers who fear to be refused or do not want to be involved in a full-time relationship, could also be a safe point to experience different gender declinations for those who cannot define themselves in a heteronormative dyadic description of gender roles.