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tweakabelle -> RE: Where does gender come from? (12/15/2011 6:45:48 PM)
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Firstly to clarify: I am not proposing any kind of determinist explanation for gender identity – be it genetic, social or interactive. I find the never-ending “Nature vs Nurture” argument dull and obsolete. Nor do I believe it is helpful to examine this issue in those terms. So rather then getting stuck in that trap, can we agree to set that issue aside temporarily and explore some other perspectives If people wish, it can always be re-visited.
Above, I asked some questions about the idea of ‘identity’. There’s some startling evidence that really ought to be included in any consideration of ‘identity’ – the guevedoche (literally: 'balls at 12', I’m told) children from the Dominican Republic.
Very briefly: These are children born into a disadvantaged remote village who present with female or female-appearing genitals at birth. They are raised as girls, until puberty, when suddenly, testicles descend and a penis grows. The villagers accept this transformation with good grace, the girls become boys and go on to marry and have children themselves.
The underlying cause of this dysfunction is a deficiency in the enzyme 5-alpha-reductase-2 which is largely responsible for the conversion of testosterone to dihydrotestosterone. Dihydrotestosterone is the chemical responsible for the development of male external genitalia and secondary sex characteristics. The flood of hormones is released at puberty causes the ‘male’ genitals to develop and appear. A similar phenomenon has been recorded in remote tribal areas of Papua New Guinea.
The first scientific study* of the guevedoche children, led by an endocrinologist, Julieanna Imperto-McGinley, focussed on the physical aspects of this phenomenon. For our purposes, the relevant finding was that gender identity followed the gender of rearing unless testosterone intervened. This finding is controversial and has criticised for many reasons and from many perspectives.
For orthodox theories of gender identity development, the signifigance of the guevedoche evidence is this: According to orthodox theories, gender identity development is thought to be complete, “fixed and immutable” by age approx 18-24 months. Traumatic changes to GI after this are held to be devastating to the individual, with potentially catastrophic psychic consequences. It destroys the individual’s oedipal development, by reversing it. According to this view, the guevedoche children shouldn’t survive their pubertal changes.
Yet the children do – not only do they survive, but they seem to make the transition almost seamlessly. By any of the everyday standards, they become successful males. This outcome directly contradicts othodox gender identity theories, which insist rigidly it simply shouldn’t happen like this – that the guevedoche experience should be impossible.
What impact do the guevedoche have on theories of gender identity development? For mine, minimally, this evidence suggests a certain malleability/fluidity/open endedness in gender identities that were supposed to have become “fixed and immutable” many years previously.
What do you think?
* http://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/NEJM197905313002201 Imperato et al
Androgens and the Evolution of Male-Gender Identity among Male Pseudohermaphrodites with 5α-Reductase Deficiency
Julianne Imperato-McGinley, M.D., Ralph E. Peterson, M.D., Teofilo Gautier, M.D., and Erasmo Sturla, M.D
For a very different perspective, here's a review of this and similar evidence by a transgender activist, who has an obvious political interest in the interpretation of this evidence.
The BBC-TV program 'The FIght To Be Male' (sic) has an interesting interview with a guevedoche man, and some staggering footage of other intersex (hermaphrodite) data. It's difficult to find, the spin is atrocious but the raw data is amazing. It ought to be available at a good University library. If you're interested, it's well worth the effort
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