Queer Theory - Role of Biology

Role of Biology

Queer theorists focus on problems in classifying individuals as either male or female, even on a strictly biological basis. For example, the sex chromosomes (X and Y) may exist in atypical combinations (as in Klinefelter syndrome ). This complicates the use of genotype as a means to define exactly two distinct sexes. Intersexed individuals may for many different biological reasons have ambiguous sexual characteristics.

Scientists who have written on the conceptual significance of intersexual individuals include Anne Fausto-Sterling, Ruth Hubbard, Carol Tavris, and Joan Roughgarden.

Some key experts in the study of culture, such as Barbara Rogoff, argue that the traditional distinction between biology and culture as independent entities is overly simplistic, pointing to the ways in which biology and culture interact with one another.

Read more about this topic:  Queer Theory

Famous quotes containing the words role of, role and/or biology:

    I wish glib and indiscriminate critics of industrialists had some conception of the problems that have to be met by factory management.... General condemnation of employers is a favorite indoor sport of the uninformed intelligentsia who assume the role of lance- bearers for labor.
    Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)

    The addition of a helpless, needy infant to a couple’s life limits freedom of movement, changes role expectancies, places physical demands on parents, and restricts spontaneity.
    Jerrold Lee Shapiro (20th century)

    The “control of nature” is a phrase conceived in arrogance, born of the Neanderthal age of biology and the convenience of man.
    Rachel Carson (1907–1964)