The Power of Language in the Context of Sex and Gender

While reading Queerer Bodies from Riki Wilchins Voices from Beyond the Sexual Binary, I began to notice language as a sort of power over us. It helps us to understand one another as well as feel. But what happens to a concept that words do not cover? What happens to the ones that fall through the cracks?

I would argue that language is the main source of communication that humans rely on. Of course body language and facial expressions help. However without language, there would be huge gaps in how we understand one another. We label people, places, things, actions, and emotions all to simply life. These words act as categories which have other words to describe them attached, whether we wanted it that way or not. For example, a human with a penis and XY chromosomes is a male and a human with a clitoris as well as XX chromosomes is a woman. In addition to labeling the humans’ sex, they are marked as a gender. A male is gendered a boy. The word “boy” has much meaning attached to it. Some stereotypical characteristics include being strong, being dominant, and not showing emotions. Similarly, the word for the opposite gender “female” has meaning attached. On the other hand, a female will be marked the gender girl. Consequently, qualities linked to the concept of a “girl” will also be assumed: being submissive, lacking a sex drive, silent but beautiful, etc. All of these labels, girl, boy, male, and female, have extra meaning behind them whether we intended it to or not. 

What happens there is no word for a concept? Specifically, what does a human with indistinguishable genitals be called? About 1 in every 2,000 human births have been reported to has For centuries, there was no word to describe this concept except maybe hermaphrodite. Instead, doctors would do surgery in order for the human to fit into one of the assigned words of gender and sex. Instead of creating a new word or category, the people of the time performed surgery to remove parts of the genitals. As a result, the human baby would be able to fit neatly into one of the previously created definitions of a word. Because of this gap in communication or identification, the subject became taboo. Then the word intersex came into existence. This became the designated category for all abnormal genitalia. Yet, this seems to lack the specification of what is different about the genitalia: “What is unique or private is lost to language” (Wilchins, 46). Details of a person’s experience or in this case body become lost in translation. 

Personally, I prefer to think of language as a metaphor. They are not be taken too literally but rather as a suggestion to get a listener or reader to the right direction. Words are guidelines to understanding; not law or the Truth. But there is still so much meaning attached to them. This meaning takes time to pull apart from the word. I find it fascinating how one word could provoke such feelings in a person. However we should come to understand that just because something isn’t normal doesn’t mean its broken: “We’re not the ones who are broken. It’s the model that’s broken” (Wilchins, 34).