From the 17th to 19th centuries, gender could be neither binary nor biological.
Generation Z refers to individuals born during the mid-1990s and early ‘00s often billed as the generation most likely to fully embrace gender fluidity. According to one report, around 56 percent of teens ages 13 to 20 know of someone who identifies themselves using gender-neutral pronouns like “ they ” or “ze.” Regarding sexual orientation, the study found that approximately one-third of the demographic has chosen to identify as neither heterosexual or homosexual, indicating that they are bisexual “to some degree.”
When it comes to matters of gender and sexuality, however, the prerogatives of this up-and-coming age group are not necessarily unprecedented. In fact, many living during Japan’s Edo period, which stretched from the early 1600s to about 1868, recognized a third gender centuries ago. That gender was known as “ wakashu,” or “beautiful youths.”
The cultural subgroup typically consisted of adolescent boys who had not yet entered into adulthood, and in the interim, were seen as androgynous, culturally permitted to present as both male and female and as the objects of desire for both men and women. That is, until they removed their forelocks in a coming-of-age ceremony known as “genpuku.”
An exhibition dedicated to the portrayal of wakashu in Japanese art is now on view for the first time in North America. Titled “ A Third Gender: Beautiful Youths in Japanese Prints,” the show features erotic prints from the 17th to 19th centuries in which gender and sexuality are depicted as playful and flexible.
The works depict a radical moment in Japanese history that often goes unacknowledged even today.
