This paper examines how deviant or marginalized adolescents in contemporary East Asian cinema enact forms of middle-voiced subjectivity—actions that emerge not from clear agency or submission, but through relational structures embedded in social and institutional contexts. By introducing Koichiro Kokubun’s theory of the middle voice into the field of film studies, this paper develops a novel framework for reinterpreting adolescent subjectivity. In dialogue with Foucault’s concept of relational power, Arendt’s theory of will and action, and Butler’s notion of gender performativity, it proposes a shift away from agent/victim binaries toward a more relational, process-oriented reading of youth behavior in cinema. Focusing on Bai Xue’s The Crossing (2018), the study analyzes the protagonist Peipei, a teenage girl navigating the physical and socio-economic border between Hong Kong and Shenzhen. Peipei’s engagement in smartphone smuggling is neither fully volitional nor purely coerced; rather, it unfolds as a structurally generated action shaped by relational ambiguity and systemic pressures. A middle-voiced reading, this paper argues, enables a more nuanced understanding of adolescent agency under conditions of cultural displacement, institutional constraint, and gendered precarity—inviting a reconsideration of what counts as “deviance” in contemporary cinematic narratives.

Authors:
Yiqing Yang, Kyoto University of the Arts, Japan

About the Presenter(s)
Yiqing (Maggie) Yang is currently an MFA student at Kyoto University of the Arts. Her interests include cinema, youth subjectivity, and mobility. She is completing a film on a third-culture girl.

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