Some people (whether physically intersex or not) do not identify themselves as either exclusively female or exclusively male. Androgyny is sometimes used to refer to those without gender-specific physical sexual characteristics or sexual preferences or gender identity, or some combination of these; such people can be physically and psychologically anywhere between the two sexes. This state may or may not include a mixture or absence of sexual preferences.
A hermaphrodite is a plant or animal that has both male and female reproductive organs.
"Disorders of sex development" (DSD) is a term that has both supporters and opponents. It is defined to include congenital conditions in which development of chromosomal, gonadal, or anatomical sex is atypical.
A number of critics of traditional terminology, including the Intersex Society of North America, intersex activists, and some medical experts have moved to eliminate the term "intersex" in medical usage, replacing it with disorders of sex development in order to avoid conflating anatomy with identity. Members of the Lawson Wilkins Pediatric Endocrine Society and the European Society for Paediatric Endocrinology accepted this term in their "Consensus statement on management of intersex disorders" published in the Archives of Disease in Children and in Pediatrics.
Other intersex people, activists, supporters, and academics have contested the adoption of the terminology and its implied status as a "disorder", seeing this as offensive to intersex individuals who do not feel that there is something wrong with them, regard the DSD consensus paper as reinforcing the normativity of early surgical interventions, and criticising the treatment protocols associated with the new taxonomy. Alternatives to categorising intersex conditions as "disorders" have been suggested, including "variations of sex development". Organisation Intersex International questions a disease/disability approach, argues for deferral of intervention unless medically necessary, when fully informed consent of the individual involved is possible, and self-determination of sex/gender orientation and identity.
Whether or not they were socially tolerated or accepted by any particular culture, the existence of intersex people was known to many ancient and pre-modern cultures. An example is one of the Sumerian creation myths from more than 4,000 years ago. The story has Ninmah, a mother goddess, fashioning mankind out of clay. She boasts that she will determine the fate – good or bad – for all she fashions. Enki, the father god, retorts as follows.
:Enki answered Ninmah: "I will counterbalance whatever fate – good or bad – you happen to decide." Ninmah took clay from the top of the abzu [ab = water, zu = far] in her hand and she fashioned from it first a man who could not bend his outstretched weak hands. Enki looked at the man who cannot bend his outstretched weak hands, and decreed his fate: he appointed him as a servant of the king.
:... [Three men and one woman with atypical biology are formed and Enki gives each of them various forms of status to ensure respect for their uniqueness] ...
: Sixth, she fashioned one with neither penis nor vagina on its body. Enki looked at the one with neither penis nor vagina on its body and gave it the name Nibru [eunuch(?)], and decreed as its fate to stand before the king."
During the Victorian era, medical authors introduced the terms "true hermaphrodite" for an individual who has both ovarian and testicular tissue, verified under a microscope, "male pseudo-hermaphrodite" for a person with testicular tissue, but either female or ambiguous sexual anatomy, and "female pseudo-hermaphrodite" for a person with ovarian tissue, but either male or ambiguous sexual anatomy. In Europe, the term 'intersexual' was first to be used before the Second World War. The first suggestion to replace the term 'hermaphrodite' with 'intersex' came from British specialist Cawadias in the 1940s. This suggestion was taken up by specialists in the UK during the 1960s, by both those who rejected Money's framework (then emerging from the USA), and those who endorsed that approach.
Since the rise of modern medical science in Western societies, some intersex people with ambiguous external genitalia have had their genitalia surgically modified to resemble either female or male genitals. Since the advancements in surgery have made it possible for intersex conditions to be concealed, many people are not aware of how frequently intersex conditions arise in human beings or that they occur at all. Contemporary social activists, scientists and health practitioners, among others, have begun to revisit the issue. Awareness of the existence of physical sexual variation in human beings has increased.
Some groups, such as ISNA, and some clinicians, such as those at University College Hopsital London have questioned the practice of performing genital corrective surgery on intersex children. Dialogue between what were once antagonistic groups of activists and clinicians has led to changes in medical policies and how intersex patients and their families are treated in some locations. There are intersex groups, such as OII who argue that the various degrees of intersex are natural human variations that should not be subject to correction.
The writer Anne Fausto-Sterling coined the words herm (for "true hermaphrodite"), merm (for "male pseudo-hermaphrodite"), and ferm (for "female pseudo-hermaphrodite"), and proposed that these be recognized as sexes along with female and male. Her terms were "tongue-in-cheek"; she no longer advocates these terms even as a rhetorical device. The activist Cheryl Chase criticized these terms in a letter to The Sciences, also criticizing the traditional standard of medical care. Chase announced the creation of the Intersex Society of North America.
Opponents maintain that there is no compelling evidence that the presumed social benefits of such "normalizing" surgery outweigh the potential costs. Opponents claim this led to the degrading interpretation that females are essentially castrated males. This view overlooks the embryological origin of the penis/clitoris.
Defenders of the practice argue that it is necessary for individuals to be clearly identified as male or female in order for them to function socially. However, many intersex individuals have resented the medical intervention, and some have been so discontented with their surgically assigned gender as to opt for sexual reassignment surgery later in life. The Declaration of Montreal first demanded prohibition of unnecessary post-birth surgery to reinforce gender assignment until a child is old enough to understand and give informed consent. This was detailed in the context of existing UN declarations and conventions under Principle 18 of The Yogyakarta Principles, which called on states to:
Intersex advocates and experts have critiqued the necessity of early interventions, citing individual's experiences of intervention and the lack of follow-up studies showing clear benefits. Specialists at the Intersex Clinic at University College London began to publish evidence in 2001 that indicated the harm that can arise as a result of inappropriate interventions, and advised minimising the use of childhood surgical procedures.
Photographs of intersex children's genitalia are circulated in medical communities for documentary purposes; an example of this appears in the medical section 3.2.1 below. Problems associated with experiences of medical photography of intersex children have been discussed along with the ethics, control and usage.
"The experience of being photographed has exemplified for many people with intersex conditions the powerlessness and humiliation felt during medical investigations and interventions".
Sax's strict definition of intersex is most relevant to family practice and psychological research. Other interest groups serve different communities and concerns and so broaden the definition of intersex in these fields.
For instance, the Intersex Society of North America (ISNA) definition states that the following conditions "sometimes involve intersex anatomy":
See also
According to the ISNA definition above, 1 percent of live births exhibit some degree of sexual ambiguity. Between 0.1% and 0.2% of live births are ambiguous enough to become the subject of specialist medical attention, including surgery to disguise their sexual ambiguity.
According to Fausto-Sterling's definition of intersex, on the other hand, 1.7 percent of human births are intersex. She writes,
According to Leonard Sax the prevalence of intersex "restricted to those conditions in which chromosomal sex is inconsistent with phenotypic sex, or in which the phenotype is not classifiable as either male or female" is about 0.018%.
Ambiguous genitalia appear as a large clitoris or small penis and may or may not require surgery.
Because there is variation in all of the processes of the development of the sex organs, a child can be born with a sexual anatomy that is typically female, or feminine in appearance with a larger-than-average clitoris (clitoral hypertrophy), or typically male, masculine in appearance with a smaller-than-average penis that is open along the underside. The appearance may be quite ambiguous, describable as female genitals with a very large clitoris and partially fused labia, or as male genitals with a very small penis, completely open along the midline ("hypospadic"), and empty scrotum.
Fertility is variable. According to some, the distinctions "male pseudohermaphrodite", "female pseudohermaphrodite" and especially "true hermaphrodite" are vestiges of 19th century thinking. According to others, the terms "male pseudohermaphrodite", and "female pseudohermaphrodite" are used to define the gender in terms of the histology (microscopic appearance) of the gonads.
In 2003, researchers at UCLA published their studies of a lateral gynandromorphic hermaphroditic zebra finch, which had a testicle on the right and an ovary on the left. Its entire body was split down the middle between female and male, with hormones from both gonads running through the blood. This is an example of mosaicism or chimerism.
This extreme example of hermaphroditism is quite rare.
Intersex activist Cheryl Chase is an example of someone with ovotestes.
For instance, a karyotype display of a tissue sample may determine which of the causes of intersex is prevalent in the case.
# Treatments: Restore functionality (or potential functionality) # Enhancements: Give the ability to identify with “mainstream” people, e.g., breast enlargement surgery However, there are other categorisation systems of management of intersexed, which falls into neither category.
In any case, the most common procedure is surgery.
As convention, surgery is performed at birth. Intersex advocates such as Anne Fausto-Sterling in her Sexing the Body argue surgery on intersexed babies should wait until the child can make an informed decision, and label operation without consent as genital mutilation.
The common pathway of sexual differentiation, where a productive human female has an XX chromosome pair, and a productive male has an XY pair, is relevant to the development of intersexed conditions.
During fertilization, the sperm adds either an X (female) or a Y (male) chromosome to the X in the ovum. This determines the genetic sex of the embryo. During the first weeks of development, genetic male and female fetuses are "anatomically indistinguishable," with primitive gonads beginning to develop during approximately the sixth week of gestation. The gonads, in a "bipotential state," may develop into either testes (the male gonads) or ovaries (the female gonads), depending on the consequent events. Through the seventh week, female and male fetuses appear identical.
At around eight weeks of gestation, the gonads of an XY embryo differentiate into functional testes, secreting testosterone. Ovarian differentiation, for XX embryos, does not occur until approximately Week 12 of gestation. In normal female differentiation, the Müllerian duct system develops into the uterus, Fallopian tubes, and inner third of the vagina. In males, the Müllerian duct-inhibiting hormone MIH causes this duct system to regress. Next, androgens cause the development of the Wolffian duct system, which develops into the vas deferens, seminal vesicles, and ejaculatory ducts. By birth, the typical fetus has been completely "sexed" male or female, the hormones and genital development remaining consistent with the genetic sex.
X/Y | Name | ||||||||||
XX || | Congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) | The most common cause of sexual ambiguity is congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH), an endocrine disorder in which the adrenal glands produce abnormally high levels of virilizing hormones. |
|
In people without a Y chromosome (i.e., XX), this can range from partial masculinisation that produces a large clitoris, to virilisation and male appearance. The latter applies in particular to Congenital adrenal hyperplasia due to 21-hydroxylase deficiency, which is the most common form of CAH. |
|
Congenital adrenal hyperplasia due to 17 alpha-hydroxylase deficiency>17α-hydroxylase deficiency are born with female internal and external anatomy, but, at puberty, neither the adrenals nor the ovaries can produce sex-hormones, inhibiting breast development and the growth of pubic hair. |
|
See below for XY CAH 17α-hydroxylase deficiency. | |||
XX || | Progestin-induced virilisation | In this case, the male hormones are caused by use of progestin, a drug that was used in the 1950s and 1960s to prevent miscarriage. These individuals normally have internal and external female anatomy, with functional ovaries and will therefore have menstruation. They develop, however, some male secondary characteristics and they frequently have unusually large clitorises. In very advanced cases, such children have initially been identified as males.< | |||||||||
| | Freemartinism | This condition occurs commonly in all species of [[Bovinae | |||||||||
XY || | Androgen insensitivity syndrome (AIS) | People with AIS have a Y chromosome, (typically XY), but are unable to metabolize androgens in varying degrees. |
|
Cases with typically female appearance and genitalia are said to have complete androgen insensitivity syndrome (CAIS). People with CAIS have a vagina and no uterus, cervix, or ovaries, and are infertile. The vagina may be shorter than usual, and, in some cases, is nearly absent. Instead of female internal reproductive organs, a person with CAIS has undescended or partially descended testes, of which the person may not even be aware. |
|
In mild and partial androgen insensitivity syndrome (MAIS and PAIS), the body is partially receptive to androgens, so there is virilization to varying degrees. PAIS can result in genital ambiguity, due to limited metabolization of the androgens produced by the testes. Ambiguous genitalia may present as a large clitoris, known as clitoromegaly, or a small penis, which is called micropenis or microphallus; hypospadias and cryptorchidism may also be present, with one or both testes undescended, and hypospadias appearing just below the glans on an otherwise typical male penis, or at the base of the shaft, or at the perineum and including a bifid (or cleft) scrotum. | |||||
XY || | 5-alpha-reductase deficiency (5-ARD) | The condition affects individuals with a Y chromosome, making their bodies unable to convert testosterone to dihydrotestosterone (DHT). DHT is necessary for the development of male genitalia in utero, and plays no role in female development, so its absence tends to result in ambiguous genitalia at birth; the effects can range from infertility with male genitalia to male underdevelopment with hypospadias to female genitalia with mild clitoromegaly. The frequency is unknown, and children are sometimes misdiagnosed as having AIS.< | Individuals can have testes, as well as vagina and labia, and a small penis capable of ejaculation that looks like a clitoris at birth. Such individuals are usually raised as girls. The lack of DHT also limits the development of facial hair. | ||||||||
| | Congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) | In individuals with a Y chromosome (typically XY) who have Congenital adrenal hyperplasia due to 17 alpha-hydroxylase deficiency, CAH inhibits virilization, unlike cases without a Y chromosome. | |||||||||
XY || | Persistent Müllerian duct syndrome (PMDS) | The child has XY chromosomes typical of a male. The child has a male body and an internal uterus and fallopian tubes because his body did not produce Müllerian-inhibiting factor during fetal development. | |||||||||
Other || | Unusual chromosomal sex | In addition to the most common XX and XY chromosomal sexes, there are several other possible combinations, for example Turner syndrome (Turner syndromeXO), Triple X syndrome (XXX), Klinefelter's Syndrome,Kallmann's syndrome, (XXY/XXXY), XYY syndrome (XYY), de la Chapelle syndrome (XX male), Swyer syndrome (XY female), and there are many other individuals who do not follow the typical patterns (such as individuals with four or even more sex chromosomes). | |||||||||
Other || | Mosaicism and chimerism | A mix can occur, where some of the cells of the body have the common XX or XY, while some have one of the less usual chromosomal contents above. Such a mixture is caused by either mosaicism or chimerism. In mosaicism, the mixture is caused by a mutation in one of the cells of the embryo after fertilization, whereas chimerism is a fusion of two embryos. |
|
In alternative fashion, it is simply a mixture between XX and XY, and does not have to involve any less-common genotypes in individual cells. This, too, can occur both as chimerism and as a result of one sex chromosome having mutated into the other. |
|
However, not all cases of mosaicism and chimerism involve intersex. |
Intersex Intersex Intersex Intersex
ar:خنوثة br:Etrereizhadezh bg:Интерсексуалност ca:Intersexualitat de:Intersexualität es:Intersexualidad fr:Intersexuation ko:남녀중간몸 hi:मध्यलिंगता hr:Interseksualnost it:Intersessualità he:אינטרסקס ka:ინტერსექსუალობა la:Intersexualitas mk:Интерсексуалност nl:Interseksualiteit ja:半陰陽 no:Interseksualitet pl:Obojnactwo pt:Intersexualidade ro:Intersexualitate ru:Интерсексуальность simple:Intersexuality fi:Intersukupuolisuus sv:Intersexualism th:ภาวะเพศกำกวม tr:İnterseksüellik uk:Гермафродитизм vi:Người lưỡng tính zh:阴阳人This text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
The World News (WN) Network, has created this privacy statement in order to demonstrate our firm commitment to user privacy. The following discloses our information gathering and dissemination practices for wn.com, as well as e-mail newsletters.
We do not collect personally identifiable information about you, except when you provide it to us. For example, if you submit an inquiry to us or sign up for our newsletter, you may be asked to provide certain information such as your contact details (name, e-mail address, mailing address, etc.).
When you submit your personally identifiable information through wn.com, you are giving your consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information as set forth in this Privacy Policy. If you would prefer that we not collect any personally identifiable information from you, please do not provide us with any such information. We will not sell or rent your personally identifiable information to third parties without your consent, except as otherwise disclosed in this Privacy Policy.
Except as otherwise disclosed in this Privacy Policy, we will use the information you provide us only for the purpose of responding to your inquiry or in connection with the service for which you provided such information. We may forward your contact information and inquiry to our affiliates and other divisions of our company that we feel can best address your inquiry or provide you with the requested service. We may also use the information you provide in aggregate form for internal business purposes, such as generating statistics and developing marketing plans. We may share or transfer such non-personally identifiable information with or to our affiliates, licensees, agents and partners.
We may retain other companies and individuals to perform functions on our behalf. Such third parties may be provided with access to personally identifiable information needed to perform their functions, but may not use such information for any other purpose.
In addition, we may disclose any information, including personally identifiable information, we deem necessary, in our sole discretion, to comply with any applicable law, regulation, legal proceeding or governmental request.
We do not want you to receive unwanted e-mail from us. We try to make it easy to opt-out of any service you have asked to receive. If you sign-up to our e-mail newsletters we do not sell, exchange or give your e-mail address to a third party.
E-mail addresses are collected via the wn.com web site. Users have to physically opt-in to receive the wn.com newsletter and a verification e-mail is sent. wn.com is clearly and conspicuously named at the point of
collection.If you no longer wish to receive our newsletter and promotional communications, you may opt-out of receiving them by following the instructions included in each newsletter or communication or by e-mailing us at michaelw(at)wn.com
The security of your personal information is important to us. We follow generally accepted industry standards to protect the personal information submitted to us, both during registration and once we receive it. No method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage, is 100 percent secure, however. Therefore, though we strive to use commercially acceptable means to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee its absolute security.
If we decide to change our e-mail practices, we will post those changes to this privacy statement, the homepage, and other places we think appropriate so that you are aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances, if any, we disclose it.
If we make material changes to our e-mail practices, we will notify you here, by e-mail, and by means of a notice on our home page.
The advertising banners and other forms of advertising appearing on this Web site are sometimes delivered to you, on our behalf, by a third party. In the course of serving advertisements to this site, the third party may place or recognize a unique cookie on your browser. For more information on cookies, you can visit www.cookiecentral.com.
As we continue to develop our business, we might sell certain aspects of our entities or assets. In such transactions, user information, including personally identifiable information, generally is one of the transferred business assets, and by submitting your personal information on Wn.com you agree that your data may be transferred to such parties in these circumstances.