Assistant Professor Dr Saowanit Chunlawong
– Faculty of Liberal Arts, Thammasat University
This article aims to explore Nai Kap Dak Lae Klang Wong Lom (Trapped), a novel by Prachakom Lunachai, using queer reading and crip theory to reveal the relation between disability and queerness. The result shows that the characters’ disabled-bodies were not only the obstacles of working, but also of making relationship. These disabled-bodies reduced their masculinity and constructed queerness. The story unveils the power of Patriarchy which oppresses the heterosexual man, insists the normative man as the able-man, both of the abled-body and abling sex. Who was disabled is queer and trapped in the normative of patriarchal society.
Keywords: Thai novel, queer, disability, masculinity
(Presented in the Spectrosynthesis II : LGBTQ in Thai Literature (ความหลากหลายทางเพศในวรรณกรรมไทย), 26 January 2020, Bangkok Art & Culture Centre, Bangkok, organized by the Institute of Thai Studies, Chulalongkorn University and the Bangkok Art & Culture Centre)