Gender as Lint Collector

ABSTRACT

The conceptualization of femininity and masculinity beyond normative viewpoints is one of the most difficult challenges to the psychoanalytic field. It is challenging to think of gender beyond the binary phantasies of a stabilized body – male/female. And yet, binaries are unstable. While new subjectivities such as transgender and non-binary challenge our conception of gender, increased debates in the field regarding demands for gender transitioning, particularly among children and adolescence, reveal an implicit investment and limiting heteronormative ideology that is animated in the tacit alignment of gender with biology. In this brief paper I conceptualize gender in a way that is consistent with a psychoanalytic view of the body and psyche as being out of joint. The psychoanalytic conceptualization of the relationship between the body and its ever-flourishing meanings, as uneven, positions gender as closely linked with sexuality. Conceptualizing gender as a libidinal experience, not easily separated from the unruliness of sexuality, allows us to encounter new and creative formations that exceed our limited conception of human nature.

KEYWORDS:

• Gender
• sexuality
• libido
• bi-sexuality
• nature

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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Oren Gozlan

Dr. Oren Gozlan is a psychoanalyst in private practice. He is the Chair of the Scientific Committee, and Faculty at the Toronto Institute of Psychoanalysis, the Toronto Institute of Contemporary Psychoanalysis and the Canadian Institute for Child and Adolescent Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy. He is a member of the IPA committee for Gender Diversity and Sexuality. His book ‘Transsexuality and the Art of Transitioning: A Lacanian Approach’ won the American Academy & Board of Psychoanalysis’ annual book prize for books published in 2015. He is also the winner of the Symonds Prize for 2016 and the Ralph Roughton Award for 2022. His edited collection titled: “Critical Debates in the Transsexual Studies Field: In Transition” (Routledge) was a runner up for the 2019 Gradiva Award.