Embodiment, Plasticity, and the Re/Production of Gender, Sex, and Race in Human Biology

Abstract

abstract: This article historically situates human biology research by engaging with feminist science and technology scholars to show plasticity, how a key mechanism of embodiment, is used to re/produce sex and gender binaries in anthropological research and beyond. It first defines embodiment and demonstrates its reliance on plasticity and then reviews how and why plasticity has been taken up in human biology research. The article then engages with the works of feminist, trans, and queer scholars who have examined the connections among embodiment, plasticity, and the creation of Western binarized sex and gender. Further, the article presents how the re/production of a sex and gender binary is entwined with the justification of racial hierarchies through plasticity. While deterministic frameworks are often the most criticized in biology for harmful racist and sexist understandings of race and gender, plasticity and gene × environment interaction frameworks are not without fault. Even with large shifts in scientific understanding—in this case, from determinism to plasticity—science, in particular human biology, can still be a tool to create and maintain racist, patriarchal, cis- and heteronormative systems. The author concludes with recommendations and possible pathways forward for embodiment and plasticity research in human biology, suggesting that human biology research should engage with feminist science and technology critiques to be mindful of how our concepts might be re/producing harm.