Hermafrodyty

• Authors: Magdalena Cabaj

Title variants

EN

Hermaphrodites

• Languages of publication: PL

Abstracts

EN

This article discusses the intersex as an emancipatory figure with a great subversive potential. In the first part, I reveal the mechanisms of exclusion of hermaphrodites from the social ontology. For a long time, they have been treated as monsters standing at the intersection between „the impossible and the forbidden“ (Foucault). In the 18th century, the attempts at taming this sort of monster usually meant denying its existence: hermaphrodites were simply considered as pseudo-hermaphrodites. Later, in the 20th century, the same attempts produced the use of technology aimed at diminishing the physical traits of hemaphroditism, and the intersex persons have been condemned to the highly recommended sex reassignment surgeries. In the second part, I give examples of how the problem of intersexuality has been used to further the homosexual (Foucault) and feminist (Cixous) emancipation. These tendencies have led to the marginalization of the very phenomenon in question, that is, the intersex.

• Publisher: Fundacja Res Publica Nowa im. H. Krzeczkowskiego
• Journal: Res Publica Nowa
• Year: 2013
• Issue: 3

Contributors

author

Magdalena Cabaj