Intersex Resilience and Activism

Intersex Resilience and Activism
Seminar Series (Co-convened between Law and Social Justice and the Centre for Interdisciplinary Gender Studies).

Tuesday 6^th February 4pm-5.30pm.

Liberty Building 1.08.

Approximately 2% of the world’s population is born with intersex variations of sex characteristics. This is the same frequency as people who are born with red hair or green eyes. Despite the commonality of diversity in sex development, children with intersex traits are often medicalized and subjected to non-consensual cosmetic procedures to “normalize” their sex anatomy. This presentation explores the impact of such medicalization, the rise of intersex support and advocacy, and the push for clinical reform.

Speaker: Sharon Preves, Hamline University
Sharon Preves (she/her) is a medical sociologist at Hamline University, in St. Paul, Minnesota (United States), where she directs the Public Health program and is a member of the Department of Social Justice and Social Change. Her research on intersex has been published widely, most notably in her book Intersex and Identity: The Contested Self. She is in the process of writing a second, revised and expanded edition of this book that includes follow up interviews with some of the original research participants twenty-five years later as well as with second and third generation intersex activists and support group members. She is a member of the Medical Advisory Group for interACT Advocates for Intersex Youth.

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