Nye Robert A
Oregon State Univ.
Psychoanal Hist. 2010;12(2):195-209. doi: 10.3366/pah.2010.0005.
This article argues that "sex" which had been commonly assumed in the West to refer to a permanent set of biological and behavioural traits particular to men and women, is gradually being replaced in general usage by "gender." Though feminist theorists attempted to attach a constructivist meaning to gender, a generation of developmental theorists, clinicians and analysts has imbued the term with the determinism and biological qualities formerly ascribed to "sex." The triumph of this materialist conception of gender is not assured, but it threatens our ability to think about gender identity as a historically-constructed category.
本文认为，在西方，人们通常认为“性”指的是男性和女性特有的一套固定的生物学和行为特征，但在一般用法中，“性”正逐渐被“性别”所取代。尽管女权主义理论家试图赋予“性别”一种建构主义的含义，但一代发展理论家、临床医生和分析人士却给这个术语注入了以前归因于“性”的决定论和生物学特质。这种唯物主义的性别观念能否取得胜利尚无定论，但它威胁到我们将性别认同视为一个历史建构范畴进行思考的能力。
