Gender ≠ Sex (sex)

[standing_alone]

Often people use the words gender and sex interchangably. I don't think they are so interchangable and here's my reasoning (it's the reasoning of others as well, but I'm just pointing out it's an opinion):

To me "sex" is the actual sexual gentitalia that a person is born with. Someone can be born with with the female genitalia or someone can be born with the male genitalia. I'm not even going to go into intersexed people (at least yet anyways, maybe further on if this becomes a big debate), since that gets complicated.

To me "gender" is the "sex" that someone personally identifies with. So, for instance, someone's "sex" can be male while this person's "gender" is female. This person can be born with male genitalia, but they identify more with the "gender roles" of someone born with female genitalia.

To me, "sex" is "biological" while "gender" is "psychological." Since I have no reason if those are the correct terms I want to apply, I will restate it: "Sex" is physical - it's the sexual genitalia that one is born with. "Gender" is more in the mind - a person identifies with the "gender roles" (something that is society/cultrual defined) of a certain "sex."

So someone's "sex" and "gender" can be the same or someone's "sex" and "gender" can be different.

Forgive me for making a thread on this - I did it more so since I have to write a literary analysis paper based on queer theory and this is one of the things I'm covering, so I wanted to set it all "straight" in my mind (basically since I should be writing my paper now instead of being on RF ).

So what are your thoughts on this? Are "sex" and "gender" interchangable terms? Or are "sex" and "gender" completely different? Am I just a crazy fool that hasn't a clue what she's talking about?

[Scuba Pete]

For probably 99%+ of the world's population, the two are interchangeable. Possibly more, but I am not fomiliar with any studies that show that type of demographic. I am not into making rules that center around "exceptions" rather than the "rule".

[Seyorni]

Gender is a linguistics term for a certain type of noun-class. It is a technical, scientific term. Languages may have genders such as high, medium and low status; animate and inanimate; man-made, domestic or wild, and many others.

English is perhaps unique among Indo-European languages in having linguistic genders that correspond to the sex of the referent. It is this quirk that has allowed people, in recent decades, to misapply the term as a euphemism for "sex."

Why we should feel the need for a euphemism in this open and enlightened age is another question.
During the "repressed" 40s and 50s when you needed to express the idea of sex, you just screwed up your courage, took a deep breath, and said "sex."

[Buttercup]

I guess we need to define the parameters of what you will accept as reasonable explanations for either side first.

The dictionary for example has noun and verb definitions for sex and gender.

And I think it depends on the sentence structure. I you are talking about a transsexual person...I will understand what you mean when you use the word "gender identified."

The use of gender for expressing male or female seems to be a newer practice. I don't remember it being used much even 10 years ago.

But, to me either one is fine. I know whenever I fill out a form or application, the box usually asks what sex you are, not gender.

There's my ramblings on the subject.

[standing_alone]

Originally Posted by Seyorni

Gender is a linguistics term for a certain type of noun-class.

Uh huh. I'm aware of that. Something that always made German a little more complicated to me.

This is just something we discussed in literary analysis on Thursday night in our response to queer theory and I need to write a paper on. I really am not very enlightened on the topic. But your post is definately helpful, I can use that information in my analysis essay, if you don't mind.

[Pah]

Gender and sex are sometimes used synomomously but there is a distinction in the meaning of the two. Sex (male/female) is only determined unambigiously by the relative size of the gamete. Gender is for defining man or woman. The two categories are not identical in all cases.

Chromosonally, determination is mixed. Yesterday, I met a woman with XXY chromosones classified at birth as male and listed so on a driver's licence. Some indiviuals carry 48 and 49 chromosones (48,XXYY - 48, XXXY 49,XXXXY) as opposed to the much more prevelant 46, XY.

It should also be noted that internal and external morphology develop at different times and from different causations in fetal development. There is no guarentee that they agree.

Man/woman is a social construct. Male/female is biological.

[Seyorni]

Originally Posted by NetDoc

For probably 99%+ of the world's population, the two are interchangeable. Possibly more, but I am not fomiliar with any studies that show that type of demographic. I am not into making rules that center around "exceptions" rather than the "rule".

How can this be true when the correspondence only exists in English?
Even in languages such as German, that have genders labeled masculine, feminine and neuter, the genders don't correspond to the sex of the referents.

In languages with genders of long-and-thin, large-heavy and insubstantial... well, the whole thing just goes out the window.

[standing_alone]

Pah, thank you for your informative post as well. Those may be great points to add to my paper as well, if you don't mind.

[Pah]

Originally Posted by NetDoc

For probably 99%+ of the world's population, the two are interchangeable. Possibly more, but I am not fomiliar with any studies that show that type of demographic. I am not into making rules that center around "exceptions" rather than the "rule".

When it comes to law and the OP topic has great applicablity to law, equality and justice demand that the "exception" be accommodated.

Biology requires that any explanation of it accomdates the "exception".