The “Problematics of Culture and Theory” Seminar, held by the School of English at Aristotle University,
will be hosting an online talk by
Professor Nathan Alling Long, Stockton University, U.S.,
on Tuesday, April 23rd, at 15.00-16.15.
The title of the online talk is:
“Beyond Male and Female:
How Bodies that Defy Clear Sex Assignment Challenge Our Understanding of Sex and Gender”
The talk will take place via the Zoom platform. All those interested in attending via zoom, please submit the relevant registration form. The zoom link details for the event will be sent by email on the eve of the talk to all those who have registered for online participation.
The particular event is organized as part of the Stockton U - AUTh Bilateral Agreement and the Erasmus+ Ιnternational Exchange Program.
Problematics Seminar Coordinators:
Dr Ε. Botonaki (botonaki@enl.auth.gr) and Dr S. Emmanouilidou (semma@enl.auth.gr)
ABSTRACT
This talk reconsiders the genealogy of knowledge related to our definitions of sex (biological) and gender (social construct), to explore what Anne Fausto Sterling argues in Sexing the Body, that assigning a sex to a body is itself a social act. We will briefly discuss how common methods of determining or representing one's sex are rarely based in biology, and how even medically accepted factors (chromosomes, genitals, and gonads) are often ambiguous. Drawing on the history of the medical establishment's practice of assigning sex to people of indeterminate sex (Intersex), as well as examples of cultural reactions to Intersex people, the talk argues that not only gender, but biological sex is a concept constructed from our social biases.
BIO
Nathan Alling Long’s work has won international competitions and appears on National Public Radio (US) and in over 100 publications, including Best Small Fictions 2023, Best Microfictions 2020, Electric Lit, Tin House, Story Quarterly, and The Sun. The Origin of Doubt, his collection of fifty short fictions, was a 2019 Lambda finalist; Nathan’s current manuscript was an Iowa Fiction Award semi-finalist and Hudson Fiction Manuscript Prize finalist. Other awards include a Truman Capote Literary Trust Fellowship, Virginia Commission of the Arts grant, a Mellon Foundation grant, and four Pushcart Prize nominations. He lives in Philadelphia (US) and teaches creative writing and women, gender, and sexuality courses at Stockton University in New Jersey.
