Lessons from the Intersexed [Paperback]

Suzanne J. Kessler (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 1998

"This is a brave book. Kessler says things that need to be said, and she says them clearly, concisely, and with respect for the people whose lives are most affected by the questions she confronts. A must read for anyone concerned with intersex issues." --Holly Devor, author of Gender Blending: Confronting the Limits of Duality and FTM: Female-to-Male Transsexuals in Society. "While the physician's response to an infant with ambiguous genitalia has been to produce categories like the 'successful vagina' and the 'good enough penis,' Kessler takes her cues from intersexuals themselves. This book is a brilliant and long overdue call for the reevaluation of gender variability." --Judith Halberstam, author of Female Masculinity "Fascinating in what it tells us not only about situation in which sex assignment is uncertain but about the astonishingly weak empirical foundations on which the medical orthodoxies of binary sex and gender are built. A must for anyone interested in the ways widely accepted social beliefs and scientific explanations generate and reinforce each other." --Ruth Hubbard, author of The Politics of Women's Biology and Exploding the Gene Myth From the moment intersexuality--the condition of having physical markers (genitals, gonads, or chromosomes) that are neither clearly female nor male--is suspected and diagnosed, social institutions are mobilized in order to maintain the two seemingly objective sexual categories. Infants' bodies are altered, and the "ambiguous" is made "normal." As Kessler argues, the way the medical and psychological professions manage intersexuality is guided by our culture's beliefs about gender and genitals rather than by the needs of the child. Interviews with pediatric surgeons and endocrinologists as well as parents of intersexed children and adults who were treated for this condition in childhood lead Kessler to propose several new approaches for physicians in dealing with parents and children. Beyond the medical sphere, the author also evaluates a political vanguard intent on gaining acceptance by physicians and society at large of an intersexed identity. Lessons from the Intersexed explores the possibilities and implications of suspending a commitment to two "natural" genders. It addresses gender destabilization issues arising from intersexuality and compels a rethinking of the meaning of gender, genitals, and sexuality. Suzanne J. Kessler is professor of psychology at Purchase College, State University of New York. She is coauthor of Gender: An Ethnomethodological Approach.

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Rutgers University Press; 1 edition (July 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0813525306
• ISBN-13: 978-0813525303
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #442,724 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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100 of 105 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A landmark book on gender theory and activism, August 24, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Lessons from the Intersexed (Paperback)

This an excellent book on the "gender theory". It is also a starting point for new gender activism. Kessler tells us the intersexed "real lives stories" of pain and suffering. She deconstructs the medical retoric as to how doctors "enforce gender" while inflicting both physical and psychic harm on their intersexed patiennts. She compares the gential reconstruction imposed on the intersexed with that begrundingly provided to (m-to-f) transsexual women and suggested to women with genital cancer. Kessler shows a how we might change gender for the benifit of all. She says: "Institutionalized mutilations occur because the gentials too are taken too seriously...If we want people to respect particular bodies, they need to be taught to lose respect for ideal ones." She suggest that genital piercing, people creating "custom" gentials or men growing breast for their own self pleasure are initial steps to breaking down the connetion between body and gender. From that the two gender system will break down.

Her book has a large number of foot notes and cross references to other works. She is well read and very current. The text is some 131 pages. The footnotes are another 30 pages. The glossary is 4 pages. The bibliography is 10 page. And the index is another 12. This a very well researched book with innovative ideas.

Her closing words are: "We must use what ever means to we have to give up on gender. The problems of intersexuality [and gayness, transsexuals, transvities, ect] will vanish and we will, compensate intersexuals for all the lessons they have provided."

1 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars BORN BETWEEN THE SEXES, September 25, 2010

By 

James L. Park "James Leonard Park" (Minneapolis, MN USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Lessons from the Intersexed (Paperback)

Suzanne J. Kessler
Lessons from the Intersexed

(New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1998) 193 pages
(ISBN: 0-8135-2529-2; hardcover)
(ISBN: 0-8135-2530-6; paperback)
(Library of Congress call number: RC883.K47 1998)

Intersex people were physically ambiguous at birth with respect to their sex:
They were born neither clearly male nor clearly female.
And since it became possible in the 20th century,
they were usually given medical treatments
to make them more definitely one sex or the other.

But the author of this book takes a different stand:
Kessler believes that doctors should not interfere with what nature has created.
She believes that 'gender' is a social construct.

Her consistent use of the word "gender" to refer to the sex of an individual
--whether that person is a male or a female--
continues the confusion so common in our everyday thinking about sex and gender.
When we discuss the gender-personality of an individual person,
whether that person has 'masculine' or 'feminine' character traits,
we are clearly dealing with learned emotional responses.
Likewise, when we refer to the sex-role of an individual,
we a discussing external behavior expected in any society
because the individual is either a male or a female.
Both gender-personalities and sex-roles are fluid and flexible.
These are cultural constructs--the results of experiences since birth.
But the biological sex of any animal organism is not a social construct.
Most animals are clearly male or female.
Only a few have any ambiguity with respect to their biological sex.
These are the intersex individuals.

For a comprehensive discussion of such confusions,
see the present reviewer's book:
Variations of Sex & Gender:
Six Phenomena Frequently Confused.
(Search the Internet for this title: "Variations of Sex and Gender".)

As this reviewer sees it, Lessons from the Intersexed makes more sense
if we readers substitute the word "sex" whenever the author uses the word "gender".
The author's use of the word "gender" is part of her over-all political purpose
of claiming that one's sex is as flexible as one's gender-personality or one's sex-roles.

This book is written from the perspective of the organized groups of intersexuals.
Most babies born with some sexual ambiguity
are now diagnosed and treated from birth
so that they can be as close as possible to whichever sex they most resemble.
The parents of these intersex babies make a decision based on science.
And their children are raised as either boys or girls.
They grow up wanting to be as 'normal' as possible.
Because they want to fade into the general population as regular men or women,
they have no use for the political movement of intersexuals.
Such individuals do not figure in this book.

Before medical treatments for sexual birth defects was possible
or when the facts were not recognized early enough,
some people grew into adulthood as intersex individuals.
Each found his or her own way to cope with his or her body as given.
And sometimes they joined social and political groups
with others who have some variation of biological sex.

Some of the interviews for this book took place in 1985.
So they reflect the experiences of the interviewees some years before that time.
Kessler describes a rather rudimentary method for treating intersex babies:
Sex was assigned on the basis of the external genitals alone:
If it is large enough and can be enlarged, it is called a penis.
And the baby is a boy.
If it is small and can be reduced, it is called a clitoris.
And the baby is a girl.
The family doctor of decades ago had no way to discover
whether the baby was XX (female) or XY (male),
or some other patterns of genes that created an intersex baby.

But modern science has much better tools now:
instead of depending on the appearance of the external genitals alone,
we can now decide the sex of the baby on the basis of sex-chromosomes.
A simple blood-test can disclose the exact chromosomal make-up of the new child.

Once the biological sex of the child is determined and announced,
the socialization processes begin.
All the relatives treat the new baby as either a boy or a girl.
If there was some ambiguity of biological sex present from birth,
the doctor might have given a simple, one-sentence explanation.
But when individuals born intersex become teen-agers,
they usually want more explanation of their differences from their peers.
They might consult the scientific literature about their birth defects.

But if they join groups for intersexuals,
they will usually have developed their own mythologies,
which explain what they are and how they should live.

In some state laws in the United States that deal with sex-change operations,
the sex of an individual is defined by reproductive capacity:
When a born-male is changed into a female,
he must lose the capacity to father children.
Likewise, when a born-female is changed into a male,
she must lose the capacity the bear children.

Intersex individuals who have grown into adulthood
with little or no physical modifications
might also adopt the same convention:
Their male/female self-designation might depend on their reproductive capacities.
Are they closer to normal biological males or normal biological females?
When unusual imprinted sexual fantasies and homosexual variations are added,
the situation becomes even more complex.
See Variations of Sex & Gender: Six Phenomena Frequently Confused.

Kessler is concerned about changing the size and appearance of the external genitals.
She takes the position that doctors should do nothing.
Herein she goes against most modern medical advice.
She has talked mainly with intersex individuals who had problems later
because of decisions that were made when they were babies.
So she concludes that these individuals
would have been better off if the doctors had done nothing.

If her research had included people who were very satisfied
with their sex as assigned (and perhaps surgically corrected)
when they were still infants,
she would not be so completely against operations to correct birth defects.
If she interviewed only intersex individuals
who believe they were damaged or mutilated as infants or children,
how could she come to any other conclusions than
that operating on intersex babies should be banned?

However, we do have lots of experience with the 'do nothing' option:
Thru-out most of human history (and pre-history),
it was simply not possible to do anything about birth defects.
People just learned to live with whatever abnormalities they had from birth.
In other words, the 'default' decision for most of the human race was do nothing.

Until the middle 20th century, there was no way to investigate
the causes and prognosis of any abnormality.
But now doctors can carefully compare each variation
with what is known about that variation in other individuals.

A good scientific research project would be a follow-up survey
of all children who received some medical treatment
because of various sexual birth-defects.
What percentage had each identified kind of defect?
What percentage of each class was pleased with the results as adults?
What percentage of each class was displeased with the results
--and in what specific ways were they dissatisfied?
There are now probably thousands of adults in the US
who were treated for birth-defects related to sex.

Adults have a right to make their own decisions about sex.
But parents must decide for their infant children.
And they will usually depend on medical advice.
So far, there are few medical experts who support the do-nothing option.
But will further research find cases in which it would be best to do nothing?

Readers of this book will notice a strong author-bias against doctors.
She worries that doctors will not be concerned enough
about the sexual enjoyment of people who have had genital surgery,
which would be especially relevant when 'reducing' a clitoris.
The author seems to want to blame doctors
for everything bad reported by intersexuals.
She has read the medical literature,
but she basically uses it to discredit doctors.

The author mostly ignores the underlying
genetic and hormonal causes of the birth abnormalities.
About 70 different variations from normal biological males or females
have now been identified.
These are really mistakes of nature,
not distortions caused by doctors.
Doctors seek to correct these mistakes of nature,
not force all people to be conventional men or women.

Is the author worried that medical science
might once again be turned toward 'curing' homosexuality?

The people interviewed for Lessons from the Intersexed
mostly see themselves as victims and part of the sex-and-gender minority.
But most intersex babies were 'corrected' soon after birth.
And they went on to live unremarkable lives as men or women... Read more ›

2 of 144 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars intersting reading, but not of the awareness issues, December 30, 1999

By 

jon (new jersey, usa) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lessons from the Intersexed (Hardcover)

great reading, but i have to tell you that i am always pressed to educate people of their own nature. i have this very strong power that i now release, and i want to know more about the kind of humans that stay so private, they cannot enjoy life as some of us could. and for this, i take serious my friends earthly time. doesn't anyone stop the analysis?.....being a Y2K person for so many years, this must be an issue for the next mil........jon here, just wondering...