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Analysis Of Suzanne Kessler's The Medical Construction Of Gender

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In “The Medical Construction of Gender” by Suzanne Kessler, Kessler argues that gender is socially constructed. She conducts an ethnography on intersex babies, the doctors and parents involved, and how society puts constraints on genders. Kessler uses different anthropological methods to prove her argument. One method Kessler uses is a humanistic approach when she puts quotations around “true hermaphrodite” and “natural/normal genitalia” (p.52). This shows that while staying objective, Kessler is also trying to humanize these intersex babies by suggesting that there is no such thing as normal genitalia. On the other hand, Kessler exposes doctors and parents who are not treating the intersex babies fairly: “The mere fact that this doctor refers

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