Also known as “Book of Changes”, Yì Jīng / 易经 (English transliteration: I-Ching) is an ancient Chinese divination manual, which dates back to 1000–750 B.C., and is among the oldest of the Chinese classics. In East Asia, it is a foundational text for the Confucian and Taoist philosophical traditions. For more than two millennia, the Yì Jīng has been the essential guide to the universe for people of Chinese heritage. It is a divination tool for deciphering the cosmos, providing the guidance for moral decision-making and revealing the necessary actions and changes to achieve a better future. It is a response to the age-old question, which has remained relevant till today: Given that we have no full knowledge of ourselves and our surroundings due to the constant changes in the world, how do we act in a meaningful and responsible way? 

In this research, I approach Yì Jīng as a technology for future-imagining that uses texts, imageries, symbols and narratives to enter into deep contemplation and reflection about change and the future. While the so-called Modern West does not see Yì Jīng as a legitimate form of knowledge, I believe it can heal the existential anxiety caused by Judeo-Christian model of linear time and open up an interconnected and cyclical approach to future-making. 

However, being an ancient text, Yì Jīng is also a product of the social norms of that time. The patriarchal and heteronormative value system on which it is based and by which it operates is meant to maintain the dominance of the male ruling class. The innate queer side of Chinese cosmology has been totally erased and suppressed in the existing Yì Jīng. As queer person of today, I want to bring queerness back into Yì Jīng, so that it can also reflect queer lived experience. Using Saidiya Hartman’s concept of critical fabulation, I attempt to retell and remake its symbols, meanings and interpretations through the queer lens.

Rather than attempting to fill the gaps of queer absence in Yì Jīng, I take them as a starting point to re-align this divinatory practice, so that its inherent queerness is made visible, acknowledged and celebrated, instead of being suppressed. The focus lies in tapping on the potential of Yì Jīng to open up queer temporality and futures, that resist the west-centric or hetero-patriarchal models. The simplicity of its hexagrams and poetic quality of its oracles provide a very fertile ground for queer myths, stories and experience to take roots and flourish..

This research started in 2024 with 4 other queer persons of Chinese descent. We meet to discuss and share our ideas, thoughts and questions. 

Key research questions:

• How can I use my own queer diasporic experience to create a Queer Yì Jīng?
• How does a Queer Yì Jīng look like ?
• What possibilities can Queer Yì Jīng open up for and within me as a queer person ?
• What alternative imaginations for the future queer asian body can emerge out of Queer Yì Jīng ?