All original material © Alice Domurat Dreger, 1996-2009.

This page provides links to some of what I’ve written and edited with regard to sex and gender This page doesn’t link all of my work on these topics--just the ones I would recommend off the top.


Important material on sex anatomy:

  1. •For a primer on why you can’t be born “with both sets of genitals,” go here.

  2. •For an illustration of genital development, go here.

  3. •For an illustration of genital variation, go here.

  4. •For an essay about why “sex testing” in sports is illogical, go here.


Intersex and disorders of sex development (DSDs):

“Intersex” and “DSDs” are terms used to talk about when a person is born with a sex anatomy that (someone has decided) isn’t standard for males or females. Intersex involves anatomic sex anomalies, i.e., atypical sex chromosomes and/or gonads and/or sex parts. It isn’t primarily about gender identity (so it isn’t the same as transgender). Look down the page for material specifically on gender.


For what care for children with DSDs ought to look like now, see:

  1. •the Clinical Guidelines I organized and edited

  2. •the Handbook for Parents I organized and edited


For ethical critiques of the traditional treatment for DSDs, see:

  1. •Alice Domurat Dreger, "Ambiguous Sex"--or Ambivalent Medicine? Ethical Problems in the Treatment of Intersexuality, in The Hastings Center Report, vol. 28, no. 3 (May/June 1998), pp. 24-35.

  2. •When Medicine Goes Too Far in the Pursuit of Normality

  3. •Intersex in the Age of Ethics

  4. •Alice Domurat Dreger, Intersex and Human Rights: The Long View, in Ethics and Intersex, ed. by Sharon Sytsma (Springer, 2006): 73-86.

  5. •Alice Dreger and Bruce Wilson, commentary on Culture Clash Involving Intersex, The Hastings Center Report, vol. 33, no. 4 (July/August 2003), pp. 12-14.

  6. •Joel Frader et al., Health Care Professionals and Intersex Conditions, in Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine (a subsidiary journal of JAMA) v. 158, n. 5 (May 2004): 426-428.

  7. •Is a Small Penis in the Hand Worth Three in the Bush?

On the history of intersex and of intersex activism, see:

  1. •Progress and Politics in the Intersex Rights Movement: Feminist Theory in Action, with April Herndon

  2. •Hermaphrodites and the Medical Invention of Sex

  3. •Intersex in the Age of Ethics

  4. •My account of working in the intersex rights movement

  5. •A Brief History of Intersex, for the San Francisco Human Rights Commission

On terminology issues, see:

  1. •my blog, Why “Disorders of Sex Development”? and the links at the end of that.

  2. •Alice Dreger, Cheryl Chase, Aron Sousa, Joel Frader, and Philip Gruppuso, Changing the Nomenclature/Taxonomy for Intersex: A Scientific and Clinical Rationale , in Journal of Pediatric Endocrinology and Metabolism, 2005; 18: 729-733. [Contact me for a reprint.]

  3. •Alice D. Dreger and April Herndon, Progress and Politics in the Intersex Rights Movement: Feminist Theory in Action, in GLQ: Gay and Lesbian Quarterly, for a special issue edited by Iain Morland (“intersex and after”)


On gender:

Even though intersex is primarily about biological sex (parts) and not about gender (self and social identity), if you work on intersex and you’re a feminist (as I do and I am), you end up talking about gender. If you’d like to see what I’ve written about what sex and gender have to do with each other, check out my essay, Sex Beyond the Karyotype and my blog, The Social Construction of Sex and Me. If you’re interested in intersex-related issues of gender specifically, look towards the top of this page for resources.

For Bioethics Forum, I’ve also written a popular little piece about why routine neonatal male circumcision is silly (Proof that I LIke Penises), and a piece about why doctors ought to get out of the business of adjudicating gender identity (Really Changing Sex).

I’ve also written some advice to parents whose children who are said to have “gender identity disorder.” That article is available for free through this link. And I’ve written an essay arguing why and how “gender identity disorder” should be removed from the DSM.

By the way, teens with DSDs or who are transgender will find comfort and understanding in Lisa Lees wonderful young-adult novels, Fool for Love and A Queer Circle of Friends. They feature main characters who are intersex and trans.

On sex (including intersex) and

gender (including “gender dysphoria”)