Editing Gender (section)

=== Social construction of sex hypotheses ===
[[File:WomanFactory1940s.jpg|thumb|"[[Rosie the Riveter]]" was an iconic symbol of the American [[Home front during World War II|homefront]] in [[World War II|WWII]] and a departure from restrictive, "feminine", [[gender role]]s due to [[Total war|wartime necessity]].]]{{Main|Social construction of sex}}
The [[World Health Organization]] states "As a social construct, gender varies from society to society and can change over time."<ref name="WHO 2023">{{cite web |title=Gender and health |url=https://www.who.int/health-topics/gender#tab=tab_1 |access-date=7 April 2023 |publisher=[[World Health Organization]]}}</ref> Sociologists generally regard gender as a social construct. For instance, [[Ann Oakley]], a professor of sociology and social policy, says "the constancy of sex must be admitted, but so also must the variability of gender."<ref>Oakley, Ann (1972). ''Sex, Gender and Society''. London: Temple Smith. p. 16 {{ISBN|0-85117-020-X}}.</ref> Lynda Birke, a feminist biologist, maintains "'biology' is not seen as something which might change."<ref>Birke, Lynda (2001). "In Pursuit of Difference: Scientific Studies of Women and Men," Muriel Lederman and Ingrid Bartsch eds., ''The Gender and Science Reader'', New York: Routledge. p. 320.</ref> 

However, there are scholars who argue that sex is also socially constructed. For example, gender studies writer [[Judith Butler]] states that "perhaps this construct called 'sex' is as culturally constructed as gender; indeed, perhaps it was always already gender, with the consequence that the distinction between sex and gender turns out to be no distinction at all."<ref>Butler (1990) p. 7.</ref><br />
They continue:<blockquote>It would make no sense, then, to define gender as the cultural interpretation of sex, if sex is itself a gender-centered category. Gender should not be conceived merely as the cultural inscription of meaning based on a given sex (a juridical conception); gender must also designate the very apparatus of production whereby the sexes themselves are established. [...] This production of sex as the pre-discursive should be understood as the effect of the apparatus of cultural construction designated by gender.<ref>Butler (1990) p. 10.</ref></blockquote>

Butler argues that "bodies only appear, only endure, only live within the productive constraints of certain highly gendered regulatory schemas,"<ref>Butler (1993) p. xi.</ref> and sex is "no longer as a bodily given on which the construct of gender is artificially imposed, but as a cultural norm which governs the materialization of bodies."<ref>Butler (1993) pp. 2–3.</ref>

With regard to history, Linda Nicholson, a professor of history and [[women's studies]], argues that the understanding of human bodies as sexually dimorphic was historically not recognised. She states that male and female genitals were considered inherently the same in Western society until the 18th century. At that time, female genitals were regarded as incomplete male genitals, and the difference between the two was conceived as a matter of degree. In other words, there was a belief in a gradation of physical forms, or a spectrum.<ref>{{cite journal |author=Nicholson, Linda |year=1994 |title="Interpreting Gender". Signs |journal=Journal of Women in Culture and Society |volume=20 |issue=1 |pages=79–105 |doi=10.1086/494955 |jstor=3174928 |s2cid=225085688}}</ref> Scholars such as [[Helen King (classicist)|Helen King]], [[Joan Cadden (historian)|Joan Cadden]], and Michael Stolberg have criticized this interpretation of history.<ref>Helen King. 2013. ''The One-Sex Body on Trial: The Classical and Early Modern Evidence.'' Farnham: Ashgate. 978-1-4094-6335-1</ref> Cadden notes that the "one-sex" model was disputed even in ancient and medieval medicine,<ref>Joan Cadden. 1993. ''Meanings of Sex Difference in the Middle Ages: Medicine, Science, and Culture.'' Cambridge University Press.</ref> and Stolberg points out that already in the sixteenth century, medicine had begun to move towards a two-sex model.<ref>Michael Stolberg. 2003. "A Woman Down to her Bones. The Anatomy of Sexual Difference in the Sixteenth and Early Seventeenth Centuries." ''Isis,'' 94: 274-299.</ref>

In addition, drawing from the empirical research of [[intersex]] children, [[Anne Fausto-Sterling]], a professor of biology and [[gender studies]], describes how the doctors address the issues of intersexuality. She starts her argument with an example of the birth of an intersexual individual and maintains "our conceptions of the nature of gender difference shape, even as they reflect, the ways we structure our social system and polity; they also shape and reflect our understanding of our physical bodies."<ref>Fausto-Sterling (2000) p. 45.</ref> Then she adds how gender assumptions affects the scientific study of sex by presenting the research of intersexuals by John Money et al., and she concludes that "they never questioned the fundamental assumption that there are only two sexes, because their goal in studying intersexuals was to find out more about 'normal' development."<ref>Fausto-Sterling (2000) p. 46.</ref> She also mentions the language the doctors use when they talk with the parents of the intersexuals. After describing how the doctors inform parents about the intersexuality, she asserts that because the doctors believe that the intersexuals are actually male or female, they tell the parents of the intersexuals that it will take a little bit more time for the doctors to determine whether the infant is a boy or a girl. That is to say, the doctors' behavior is formulated by the cultural gender assumption that there are only two sexes. Lastly, she maintains that the differences in the ways in which the medical professionals in different regions treat intersexual people also give us a good example of how sex is socially constructed.<ref name="Fausto-Sterling, Anne 2000">Fausto-Sterling (2000)</ref> In her ''[[Sexing the Body]]: gender politics and the construction of sexuality'', she introduces the following example:<blockquote> A group of physicians from Saudi Arabia recently reported on several cases of XX intersex children with [[congenital adrenal hyperplasia]] (CAH), a genetically inherited malfunction of the [[enzyme]]s that aid in making [[steroid hormones]]. [...] In the United States and Europe, such children, because they have the potential to bear children later in life, are usually raised as girls. Saudi doctors trained in this European tradition recommended such a course of action to the Saudi parents of CAH XX children. A number of parents, however, refused to accept the recommendation that their child, initially identified as a son, be raised instead as a daughter. Nor would they accept feminizing surgery for their child. [...] This was essentially an expression of local community attitudes with [...] the preference for male offspring.<ref>Fausto-Sterling (2000) pp. 58–59.</ref></blockquote>

Thus it is evident that culture can play a part in assigning gender, particularly in relation to intersex children.<ref name="Fausto-Sterling, Anne 2000" />