Thursday, Nov. 26, 2009Talk presented class in

Human Sexuality and its Problems

Olivia Jensen

Sex, gender, transsex, transgender

about Olivia…• Born… in the deep winter of 1943 in a

farmhouse in Springbank, Alberta• Educated… in the public schools of Calgary,

Vancouver and at the University of BC• Joined McGill’s Faculty of Engineering in

1973 and then Faculty of Science in 1984• Married: 1975 – son of 29, daughter of 27,

both McGill graduates; grandson of 18 mo.• Divorced: 1989 • “Transition”: 1989 with some following

medical interventions

trans- (prefix) across, but also beyondgender †kind, sort; (gram.) any of the three ‘kinds’, masculine, feminine, and neuter, of nouns, adjectives, and pronouns. XIV . — OF. gendre (mod. genre ) — Rom. * genero , f. L. gener- GENUS .sex males or females collectively XIV (rare before XVI ); condition in respect of being male or female XVI . — (O)F. sexe or L. sexus m., rel. to synon. secus n.man pl. men human being; adult male OE.; vassal, manservant XII ; (dial.) husband XIII . OE. man(n) , mon(n) , pl. menn (:- * manniz ), also manna , monna , corr. to OS., OHG. man (Du. man ; G. mann ), ON. mar (g. manns , pl. menn ), Goth. manna (g. Mans ...woman OE. wfman(n) m., later fem., f. wf woman + man(n) MAN ; a formation peculiar to Eng. (not in the oldest OE. records). Assim. of -fm- to -mm- is evident in late OE. sp., and rounding of wim- to wum- , wom- in XIII .

Some terminology (OED)...

Confusing sex with gender• Until ~1700s: gender sex

– derivative of Greek humours (genders)

• Biological definitions: sex gender– reproductive possibility – morphology (penis or not?)– chromosomal (XX or XY or ????)

• Cultural definitions: – Why such simple bimodality in western culture? How

recent is this enforced bimodality?

• Colloquially now, sex gender

The world begins to agree...

I first started selling this political story in the late 1980s. Then, it was iconoclastic but now the world is coming onside...

More careful definitions?

• Technical/psychological definitions:– Sex: male or female among several common

sexes... (of the physical) -- based in biology…

– Gender: man or woman among several common genders... (of the spirit) – source in biology?

A possible biological basis * for gender?* hypertext web links

The common bimodal attachment of each sex to one of but two genders leads to identity conflict.

• If we hold to any simple bimodality of sex and gender, not all of us will find a coherent place.

... problems?

Some of us just don't fit

AIS• Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome (perhaps as many

as 1 in 13000 “apparently female” births)– XY chromosomes – chromosomally “male”– morphologically “female”– procreatively “neither”

• Olympic “sex testing” found XY women in– Barcelona: 5 of 2406 competitors– Atlanta: 8 of 3387– Sydney and following: no further testing

Intersex Society of NA

Ambiguous births...

The intersexed:

– Proportion of “genitally abnormal” babies born1 in 100

– Number of “surgically normalized” babies:

1 to 2 in 1000and almost always: “feminizing” surgeries

Sexes• How to define sex:

– Sex is evermore (in legal and bio-medical domains) determined by the sex chromosomes.

– If so, one cannot possibly change sex!

• If sex is determined by chromosomes, then, what are the common sexes? … – male (XY) – female (XX)– and, obviously, all the others?…

…Sexes

• Other sexes?

– Turner’s (X0)

– Klinefelter’s (XXY, XXXY and variants)

– “super-male” (XYY)

– mosaics (XXY+XX,…)…

... this can be legally problematical?

Littleton vs. PrangeTexas 4th Court of Appeals

• Christie Lee Littleton's wrongful death – malpractice suit; defendant Dr. Mark Prange–Littleton's husband died in surgery due to

apparent malpractice–Court held Littleton's suit invalid as her

marriage was invalid in Texas because she was legally male (XY chromosomes!)

–Court held to “chromosomal sex”

...then, what of AIS?

Chromosomal sex map

# Y chromosomes

# X

ch

rom

osom

es

Gender 101...

• Julianne Imperato-McGinley discovers that gender is “inherent”

Her study of male pseudo-hermaphrodites in the Dominican Republic showed that the strength of the “nature of gender” overwhelms a “nurtured gender”.

Genders…

• How to define gender?: – A fundamental sense of self or identity probably

already well established in utero.

– Gender is expressed, especially, in the mode chosen for social interaction; it does not follow that ones gender is simply a social construct.

– Mode or style is chosen to fit, best, in adaptation to ones essential sense of gender. Modes and styles are the social constructs.

…Genders

• Common genders?– Man (boy) – Woman (girl) – …The plains Indians of North America

describe as many as 7 possible and distinct genders.

That we live, now, in a simplistically bimodal society much complicates ones choice of mode and “expression” of gender.

Gender transposition field?Pillard & Weinrich (1987)

Transgender…

• Those who don’t/can’t conform to the gender that commonly accords with their sex…transvestites, two-spirited, perhaps drag queens and kings, and transsexuals.– M-to-F transsexual: an XY person (male)

chooses to live with a social role more commonly appropriated to an XX person (female)

– F-to-M: XX lives with gender role normally appropriated to XY

An incoherent sex-gender accord?An illness? A neuro-atypical disorder?

No! …we simply face a lack of acceptable genders!

What gender models do we have?

• Here is the major problem facing a transgendered individual and, perhaps, many intersexed as well.

• How does one define ones place in and mode of interaction with the rest of a normalizing society?

• If one only has a choice between man and woman, which should one choose?

• Might each of us find or seek to create another more appropriate model for ourselves?

… unfortunately, gender and sex do seem to matter...

• Gender and sex and the confusion of gender with sex pervades our legal systems and our social organization...

• We are only, now, unravelling the legalistic and social mess that has accumulated in the past few centuries...

Some examples…

All this introduction… now back to the story and some personal

politics…• Many transgendered people choose to live in the

“other” gender... “another” gender! • Many choose medical, hormonal,

psychotherapeutic and other procedures in establishing comfort in this “other” gender.

• Very few retreat to “former” gender… Pauli’s estimate: 1.6%.

• Many, perhaps most, establish successful post-transition lives… See Lynn Conway’s website.

…but,

• Can we really find our place?

– I don’t think that either of “the two genders” is our place…

– I suggest that our gender is somewhere else…, distinct from that of ordinary man or woman…

– I call myself a transsexual woman… and the adjective is absolutely important!

Discussion?

• I am open to answering almost any question that you might have concerning transsexuality and gender…

• You should know, though, that what I offer as answer might be better received as just one transsexual woman’s opinion...