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Gender Identity
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nature/nurture differentiation. While most Gender Identity Clinic decided that David
European languages eagerly adopted gender would be raised as a girl, and eventually
as an American neologism, Stoller’s inten- castrated. However, since David – by then
tion that the term be a rendering of the renamed Brenda – resisted the prescribed
Freudian phrase seelischer Geschlechtscharak- treatment, the medical staff in charge decided
ter [mental sexual character] (Stoller 1968: to allow him to “return” to live according
viii) was overlooked. Indicatively, similar to the gender the therapy was supposed to
expressions abound throughout the writ- suppress. Eventually, Money’s approach was
ings by German-Jewish sexologist Magnus seriously questioned, especially with regard
Hirschfeld (1868–1935), who theorized to his assumptions that what is masculine
gender and gender identity issues under and what is feminine remains essentially
systemic assumptions quite different from malleable in early childhood, and that social-
those of Stoller. As a philosophical monist, ization plays the decisive role in the formation
Hirschfeld avoided binaries, not least in his of gender identity. Since, despite the over-
approach to the individual’s self-perception whelming evidence to the contrary, the clin-
and self-understanding. He resorted, instead, ical records insisted on Brenda’s successful
to a biopsychological scheme of continu- gender adaptation, the case of David Reimer
ously complexified descriptive layers, each became a crucial factor not only in disproving
one of which features, without exception, Money’s constructionist gender theory, but
a non-repeatable combination of mascu- in compromising his professional credibility.
line and feminine traits. Thus, according to In her book Undoing Gender, feminist
Hirschfeld, what would now be categorized and gender theorist Judith Butler contends
as the individual’s gender identity is not that the perplexities of David Reimer’s
determined by excluding one of the terms self-perception and self-understanding
of the man/woman binary, but in relation effectively disrupt the binary scheme of
to an open-ended system of as yet only par- gender, which, as she underlines, consti-
tially realized male/female conjunctions. By tutes an imitative reiteration of the sexual
deconstructing binary sexuality and recon- disjunction (Butler 2004: 57–101). Argu-
ceptualizing the identity parameters of sex ing likewise in Gender Trouble with regard
and gender, Hirschfeld effectively anticipated to the nineteenth-century hermaphrodite
core insights put forward decades later by Herculine Barbin (Butler 1999: 180), Butler
postmodern critics of gender. claims in general that “[t]here is no gender
Prior to the establishment of gender studies identity behind the expressions of gender;
as an academic discipline in the early 1990s, that identity is performatively constituted
a spirited debate was taking place concerning by the very ‘expressions’ that are said to
the roles of nature and nurture in deter- be its results” (Butler 1999: 33). As But-
mining gender identity. A focal point of the ler further maintains, gender identity is a
discussion was the medical, psychiatric, and “regulatory fiction” (Butler 1999: 180) that
legal case of David Reimer (1965–2004), who eludes true/false, real/distorted predications
was born with XY chromosomes but whose by constructing “the illusion of a primary
penis had been severely damaged at the age of and interior gendered self,” and, at times,
8 months in the course of a failed operation even by parodying “the mechanism of that
to rectify phimosis. To alleviate the burdens construction” (Butler 1999: 176). Gender
of the accident, psychologist and sexologist being the imitation of a non-existing original,
John Money (1921–2006) and the staff at his Butler easily dispenses with the notion of
GENDER I DENT I T Y 3
a pre-discursive “sex,” which reveals itself of “being an identity” (Bornstein 1995: 243),
as being not only a mere construction, but indicating that only those who are not an
one that is essentially undistinguishable from identity are capable of dealing playfully with
the “gender” it allegedly grounds. By “ex- the identities of their choice. Mindful that “we
posing [the] fundamental unnaturalness” of rarely think about the concept of belonging
sex (Butler 1999: 190) and dismantling the to something as being owned by something”
replicative rationale of actually “groundless” (Bornstein 1995: 125), Bornstein ultimately
gender identities, Butler contributed to over- pleads for a Zen Buddhism-inspired idea of
coming the “troubles” that hinder the creative “no-gender.” As Bornstein’s autobiography
proliferation of non-mimetic genders. reports, “I was born a male and now I’ve got
Testimonial and autobiographical con- medical and government documents that say
tributions by transgender authors have I’m female – but I don’t call myself a woman,
anticipated or corroborated key aspects of and I know I’m not a man” (Bornstein
Butler’s critical analysis of gender identity. 2012: x).
In her 1983 seminal essay “Genderbending:
Playing with Roles and Reversals,” Pat Cal- SEE ALSO: Gender; Gender and the State;
Gender Diversity; Hirschfeld, Magnus; Sex;
ifia – now a bisexual trans man known as
Sexuality and the Law; Sexual Identity;
Patrick Califia – unsettled received assump-
Transgender and Transsexual
tions about gender identity by denying the
need for transsexuals to become “real women”
REFERENCES
or “real men,” instead of just being transsex-
Bornstein, Kate. 1995. Gender Outlaw: On Men,
uals. As Califia provocatively asks: “After all,
Women, and the Rest of Us. New York: Vintage
aren’t there some advantages to being a man Books.
with a vagina or a woman with a penis … ?” Bornstein, Kate. 2012. A Queer and Pleasant Dan-
(Califia 1994: 178). Further undermining ger. A Memoir. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.
the alleged self-evidence of binary gen- Butler, Judith. 1999. Gender Trouble: Feminism and
der identities, female-to-male transgender the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge.
author Leslie Feinberg (1949–2014) suc- First published 1990.
Butler, Judith. 2004. Undoing Gender. New York:
cinctly resumed the intricacies of his gender,
Routledge.
contending: “It’s not my sex that defines me, Califia, Pat. 1994. Public Sex: The Culture of Radical
and it’s not my gender expression. It’s the fact Sex. Pittsburgh, PA: Cleis Press.
that my gender expression appears to be at Feinberg, Leslie. 1996. Transgender Warriors: Mak-
odds with my sex” (Feinberg 1996: 101). ing History from Joan of Arc to Rupaul. Boston,
Following a similar line of critical thought, MA: Beacon Press.
playwright and queer theorist Kate Bornstein Stoller, Robert. 1968. Sex and Gender: On the
rejected in Gender Outlaw the two core bina- Development of Masculinity and Femininity.
New York: Science House.
ries that organize gender in Western culture:
“I identify as neither male nor female, and
FURTHER READING
now that my lover is going through his gen-
Herdt, Gilbert, ed. 1994. Third Sex, Third Gender:
der change, it turns out I’m neither straight
Beyond Sexual Dimorphism in Culture and His-
nor gay” (Bornstein 1995: 4). As a conse- tory. New York: Zone Books.
quence, Bornstein seeks to subvert the idea