Anne Fausto-Sterling - Sexing the Body: Gender Politics and the Construction of Sexuality, Updated Edition

Copyright 2000 by Anne Fausto-Sterling

Chapter Ten 2020 by Anne Fausto-Sterling

Afterword 2020 by Anne Fausto-Sterling

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Second paperback edition: June 2020

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Fausto-Sterling, Anne, 1944 author.

Title: Sexing the body : gender politics and the construction of sexuality / Anne Fausto-Sterling.

Description: Second edition. | New York : Basic Books, 2020. | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2020008744 | ISBN 9781541672895 (paperback) | ISBN 9781541672901 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: Sex differences. | Gender identity. | Sex differentiation. Intersexuality. | Sex (Biology) | Sex role.

Classification: LCC HQ1075.F39 2020 | DDC 571.8/82dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020008744

ISBNs: 978-0-4650-7713-7 (hardcover); 978-0-4650-7714-4 (first trade paperback); 978-1-5416-7289-5 (second trade paperback); 978-1-5416-7290-1 (ebook)

E3-20200519-JV-NF-ORI

For the ever delightful and always stimulating Paula.

You excite my heart and my mind.

Sexing the Body was first published in 2000. In my previous book, Myths of Gender: Biological Theories About Women and Men (1985), I had exhorted scholars to examine the personal and political components of their scholarly viewpoints. Individual scientists are inclined to believe one or another claim about biology based in part on scientific evidence and in part on whether the claim confirms some aspect of life that seems personally familiar. As someone who has lived part of her life as an unabashed heterosexual, part as an unabashed lesbian, and part in transition, I was certainly open to theories of sexuality that allow for flexibility and the development of new behavior patterns, even in adulthood. I did not find it surprising, however, that someone who always felt either heterosexual or homosexual might be more open to theories that posit a biologically determined sexuality that unfolds as one grows into adulthood.

In 1985, however, I had little understanding of how cultural points of view insinuated themselves into the production of scientific knowledge and I felt a need to explore this question in greater detail. The result was a ten-year foray into the field of science and technology studies (STS), an area of inquiry that explores how science itself workshow it produces reliable knowledge even if that knowledge contains cultural biases. As I explored STS ideas, the concepts that led to Sexing the Body took shape in my head. What could it mean to think that biology itself might be socially constructed (as the argument would have been phrased during the 1990s)? How would someone steeped in the concepts developed by STS researchers conceptualize sex, gender, hormones, and genitalia? In 2000 I put forward my thoughts on such topics in Sexing the Body. My goal was to to convince readers of the need for theories that allow for a good deal of human variation and that integrate the analytical powers of the biological and the social into the systematic analysis of human development. Now, twenty years later, Im delighted to have the opportunity to update the book and especially to further develop my thoughts on how humans acquire different identities and ways of being in the world.

Much has changed in the past two decades, from the rapid spread of same-sex marriage to the proliferation of new gender identities and labels. Nevertheless, for this new edition of Sexing the Body, I have chosen not to alter the books original nine chapters. These, I think, still form a coherent argument. Furthermore, they were written at a particular moment in my own intellectual development and focused around the hotly debated arguments in which the field of sex/sexuality and gender studies engaged during the 1990s. It would confuse me and the reader to try to integrate how I think about these same issues in 2020 into text written over twenty years ago. Instead, I have added a new , A Sea of Gender, which offers a contemporary, 2020 roadmap for understanding how gender/sex develops in individuals, and how big-picture patterns of difference and sameness emerge. Then, in a new afterword, I follow into the present some of the topics examined at length in the original chapters. I describe, for example, recent attempts to (again) limit competitive athletics to only certain kinds of womenlooking especially at the International Olympic Committees ban on long-distance women runners who have naturally high testosterone levels. I update the reader on the intersex rights movement and changes in clinical treatment of infants born with mixed genitalia, and I review a rapidly growing literature on gender/sex differences and similarities in the brain.

For a book written for a general audience, this volume has an unusually large notes and bibliography section. That is because, in essence, I have written two books in one: a narrative accessible to a general audience, and a scholarly work intended to advance discussion and arguments within academic circles. At times the scholarly discussion can become arcane or devolve into side issues that deflect attention from the main narrative. Furthermore, academics often demand detailed evidence in the form of quotes from original sources or detailed accounts of a particular experiment. One of the ways I have used the notes is to carry on the scholarly discussions without distracting the general reader. Although one need not do so to follow my general argument, I nevertheless urge everyone to read the notes, as they add both depth and diversity to the text.

Furthermore, Sexing the Body is a highly synthetic work, and thus most readers, be they academicians or members of a general audience, will be unfamiliar withand quite possibly skeptical ofat least some of the areas on which I touch. For this reason, as well, I chose to footnote heavily, indicating that claims I make even in passing have substantial backing in the academic literature. Then, too, readers intrigued with particular topics can use the notes and bibliography as a resource for further reading of their own. This, I fear, is the teacher in me. My biggest desire in writing this book is to stimulate discussion and reading on the part of my readers, so the rich and up-to-date bibliography draws on significant literatures in fields ranging from science studies to feminism to sexuality studies to human development to systems theory and biology.

I have also included a fair amount of artwork, and again this is unusual for a book of this type. Some of the illustrations consist of cartoons or humorous drawings describing events discussed in the text. I was inspired to take this route by others who have conveyed scientific ideas using cartoons. Many people think of science as a humorless profession, and feminists are always accused of lacking a sense of humor. But this feminist scientist finds humor everywhere. I hope that some of the illustrations encourage readers suspicious of the cultures of science and of feminism to see that it is possible to be deeply serious about ones profession while maintaining a sense of humor.