Ep98. The Shape of Sex, Leah DeVun

Ep98. The Shape of Sex, Leah DeVun

I sat down with Leah DeVun to discuss her book, The Shape of Sex: Nonbinary Gender from Genesis to the Renaissance. We talk about how widespread thinking and writing about non-binary individuals was during the first centuries of the CE and again in the C12th-14th, and the way non-binary bodies actually shaped the way a host of categories and boundaries (not just gender) were demarcated. We talk in detail about the shift in the C12th/13th and the way non-binary sex shaped the project of establishing a non-human other, justifying violence towards Jews and Muslims, and determining who could live in a Christian territory. We also talk about the figures of "Adam androgyne" and the "Jesus hermaphrodite", and how they function as "anchors of eschatological time." Finally, Leah discusses how this study can inform our present, not only by showing that the consideration of non-binary, trans*, and intersex bodies are not novel to our period, but how this consideration cuts through claims of 'natural and immutable' in our own day.

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Ep66. Intersex and the Church, Sara Gillingham

Ep66. Intersex and the Church, Sara Gillingham

I sat down with Sara Gillingham to talk about her experience in the church as someone born with intersex traits. We discuss her work with theologians and church leaders in developing conversations and resources, the way the diverse experiences of those born with intersex traits can sometimes be obfuscated in order to be aligned with more ‘hot-button’ church debates, and the frustration of church leaders continuing to make a meal of what are, ultimately, some rather basic hopes.

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Ep56. Intersex, Theology, and the Bible. Susannah Cornwall

Ep56. Intersex, Theology, and the Bible. Susannah Cornwall

I sat down with Susannah Cornwall, Associate Professor in Constructive Theologies at the University of Exeter, to talk about her edited volume Intersex, Theology, and the Bible: Troubling Bodies in Church, Text, and Society (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015). We discuss gender reveal parties, the limits of gender binaries, the ethics of performing ‘surgical corrections’ on infants, why theology often overlooks intersex people, and intersex's capacity to positively trouble unquestioned norms and dubious assumptions in religion and beyond.

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