Kagema (陰間) is a Japanese term for historical young male sex workers. Kagema were often passed off as apprentice kabuki actors (who often engaged in sex work themselves on the side) and catered to a mixed male and female clientele. For male clients, the preferred service was anal sex, with the client taking the penetrative role;^[1]: 109 homosexual fellatio is almost unmentioned in Edo period (1603–1867) documents.^{[1]: 121–122}

Kagema who were not affiliated with an actual kabuki theatre could be hired through male brothels or teahouses specializing in kagema.^{[1]: 69–72} Such institutions were known as kagemajaya (陰間茶屋, lit. 'kagema teahouse'). Kagema typically charged more than female sex workers of equivalent status,^{[1]: p111 and associated notes} and experienced healthy trade into the mid-19th century, despite increasing legal restrictions that attempted to contain sex workers (both male and female) in specified urban areas and to dissuade class-spanning relationships, which were viewed as potentially disruptive to traditional social organization.^{[1]: 70–78, 132–134}

Many such sex workers, as well as many young kabuki actors, were indentured servants sold as children to the brothel or theater, typically on a ten-year contract.^{[1]: 69, 134–135} Kagema could be presented as yarō (young men), wakashū (adolescent boys, about 10–18 years old) or as onnagata (female impersonators).^{[1]: 90–92}

This term also appears in modern Japanese homosexual slang.

Gallery

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  A kagema sits upon his elder patron's lap. Miyagawa Isshō, Spring Pastimes, 1750

See also

References

Bibliography

• Bernard Faure "The Red Thread" 1998.