US EPA

7413814 

Journal Article 

From ‘Sex’ to ‘Gender’: Origins and Paths of Theorisation 

Palazzani, L; , 

2012 

1-33 

10.1007/978-94-007-4991-7_1 

http://link.springer.com/10.1007/978-94-007-4991-7_1
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The origin of the word ‘gender’, as opposed to the word ‘sex’, is controversial. For some it dates back to psychosexology (J. Money, R.J. Stoller) and psychoanalysis (S. Freud); for others to social psychology and sociology (theories of ‘doing gender’, gender socialisation and social constructionism); still others date it to feminism. The reconstruction of the origin and use of the term ‘gender’ across different disciplines reveals how, even in the heterogeneity of thematisations, a theoretical common thread emerges: the progressive removal of ‘gender’ from ‘sex’ against the theory of biological determinism which presupposes the identification of sex and gender. This separation is introduced with arguments, for different reasons and purposes. Gender is increasingly being characterised as the category of malleability and variability as opposed to the fixity and immobility of sex. Such progressive separation marks the irrelevance of sex and nature, which is placed at the margins. The estrangement from nature assumes different meanings: that of being the solution to empirical problematicity, but also of liberation from the female condition.