AVOIDING T’IBU (OBVIOUS BUTCHNESS): INVISIBILITY AS A SURVIVAL STRATEGY AMONG YOUNG QUEER WOMEN IN SOUTH KOREA

My connection with young queer women, or ibans, in South Korea began in 2002 when I studied fancos for my master’s thesis.¹ “Fancos,” which is short for fan costume play, emerged among young women in the late 1990s when boy bands produced by the commercial star system, such as H.O.T., gained enormous popularity among teenage women. Instead of just cheering for their favorite stars, some young women began cutting their hair short, wearing young men’s clothing to emulate the boy bands’ male singers, and creating performance festivals where they even staged the singers’ performances. It is a kind of drag