[W7] - Readings Flashcards
The three subcategories in Fausto-Sterling’s Five Sexes
Herms (named after true hermaphrodites, born with a testis and an ovary)
Merms (born with testes and some aspect of female genitalia)
Ferms (born with ovaries and some aspect of male genitalia)
Who was an early activist in terms of critiquing the practice of immediate ‘corrective’ surgery on infants with ambiguous genitalia?
Cheryl Chase
Are human beings a perfectly dimorphic species?
No.
Many are born outside of this ‘idealized’ dimorphism (intersexuals - outside of the male-female binary)
Around 1.7% of the population are intersexuals, but the rate is different depending on region.
Money and the John/Joan story
Money believed that gender identity is completely malleable for about 18 months after birth.
Money thought one case in particular proved his theory: an infant (known as John in the original study) lost his penis as a result of a circumcision accident and was surgically reassigned a female gender.
He did grow up to enjoy girly things, but ended up rejecting his assigned gender in adulthood (this is known as the John/Joan story)
McCullough’s argument for therapy over surgery
McCullough argued that the forms of intersexuality should be defined as normal - as all of them fall within the statistically expected variability of sex and gender (i.e., intersexual conditions are not themselves diseases)
McCullough urged physicians to abandon their practice of treating genital ambiguity as a medical or social emergency – the treatment should be therapy, not surgery.
How are sex and gender best conceptualized, as per Fausto-Sterling?
As points in a multidimensional space, as opposed to a masculine to feminine continuum.
F.S disagrees with her initial “5 sexes” proposition because people come in an even wider assortment of sexual identities and characteristics.
What is intersexuality often medically classified as?
As an endocrine/urological disorder, specifically a disorder of sexual development (DSD)
Both disorder and difference terminology affect intersex persons’ self perception, access to medical care, and relationships with medical professionals and with family members.
Medicalized vs. De-medicalized DSD approaches
Medicalized methodology → views DSDs as static disorders with inherent psychosocial aspects
→ considers DSD and similar conditions as needing treatment (because if something is a disorder, it needs repair)
→ emphasized function-oriented treatment based on biological norms
→ sees the child as a passive participant in identifying the problem
→ favors hospital-based support
De-medicalized methodology
→ views DSD as dynamic, with impairments that depend on context
→ focuses on fostering development, resilience, and coping strategies
→ adapts treatment to the child’s interests and capabilities
→ considers the child and family as active participants in defining the problem
→ prefers community-based support
→ emphasizes that even if we accept that some intersex cases are disorders, it does not automatically justify surgery
→ this assumption oversimplified the complex medical decisions involved in surgical intervention
van Der Have and a post-medicine definition of Intersexuality
Being intersex is “the lived experience of the socio-cultural consequences of being born with a body that does not fit with normative social constructions of male and female”
Rehmann says:
- This suggests that both biological sex and gender are social constructs
- A definition shouldn’t depend on a social constructionist view because it complicates the clear biological distinctions we use for male/female (arguments for a third sex category beyond male and female often fall short)
- Intersex individuals usually have some biological features typical of male or female
- The idea that intersex individuals are neither, both, or a third sex is biologically unsupported (since human sex is typically defined by gamete production, and there are no clear cases of individuals who are fully both sexes)
→ A modified definition could be: “the lived experience of the socio-cultural consequences of being born with a body that does not fit within the exclusive biological categories male and female”
The Start of Sex
→ At six weeks, the gonad switches on the developmental pathway to become an ovary or a testis
→ Changes to any of these processes can have dramatic effects on an individual’s sex
→ The discoveries of many gene mutations and biological interferences have pointed to a complex process of sex determination
→ According to some studies in mice, the gonad teeters between being male and female throughout life, which could possibly indicate that sex change could happen even after birth
→ On a cellular level, some people have mosaicism: they develop from a single fertilized egg but become a patchwork of cells with different genetic make-ups
→ Scientists are also finding that XX and XY cells behave in different ways, and that this can be independent of the action of sex hormones.
Where do biologists vs. society stand on the binary model?
→ biologists may have been building a more nuanced view of sex, but society has yet to catch up
→ there is still intense social pressure to conform to the binary model
→ this pressure has entailed that people born with clear DSDs often undergo surgery to ‘normalize’ their genitals, even when it may not be necessary
→ now, however, children with DSDs are treated by multidisciplinary teams that aim to tailor management and support each individual and their family
Kimmel and role containers
- A traditional definition of gender says that it is characterized by singular female or male ‘personalities’ or ‘schemas’ – what Kimmel described as ‘role containers’ –
an innate need to fill male and female gender-stereotypic traits
→ Many agree that this is too simplistic
→ More recent conceptualisations take a lead from social constructionist and post-structuralist ideas - and
propose that gender, rather than being mere role containers, is something that is repeatedly and constantly ‘done’.
Hacking and the idea of moving targets
→ Hacking explores the complex interplay between how people are classified by the human sciences and how these classifications can influence and transform the people being classified.
→ His central argument is that classifications of people are not static, they interact dynamically with those being classified, and
this often leads to new kinds of people coming into existence – what he refers to as “making up people”
The Looping Effect
The classification affects the people it describes, which in turn influences and potentially changes the classification itself
Dynamic Nominalism
Names and classifications interact with and help create the realities they describe
(not traditional nominalism like Locke and Hobbes)
Draws on Nietzsche’s idea that what we call things can be as significant as what they are, noting that naming and classifying people can create new realities.
Foucalt’s work is also crucial, especially his analysis of how historical and social contexts shape our understanding of human behaviors and identities.
