Unmaking Sex: The Gender Outlaws of Nineteenth-Century France by Anne Linton

Abstract

Reviewed by: Unmaking Sex: The Gender Outlaws of Nineteenth-Century France by Anne Linton Céline Brossillon Linton, Anne. Unmaking Sex: The Gender Outlaws of Nineteenth-Century France. Cambridge UP, 2022. ISBN 978-1-316-51182-4. Pp. 250. Anne Linton's book offers an important contribution to the history of sexuality by discussing intersex people, "individuals whose bodies, or senses of self, challenged binary sex" (2), otherwise known as "hermaphrodites" in the nineteenth century, in medical archives (first part of the book) and literature, both high and low (second half of the book). The archival research Linton has undertaken is massive, bringing to light over 200 newly uncovered case studies of gender ambiguous people from 1800 to 1920. She also analyzes how long-forgotten popular fiction influenced several well-known texts, allowing Linton to propose fresh readings of famous authors like Balzac, Gautier, and Zola. Unmaking Sex is the first book to explore why "hermaphrodism" was a central theme in nineteenth-century medicine and literature, and to discuss the social anxieties around those "gender outlaws" (2). Because of the Napoleonic Code (1804) which required the sex of the baby to be recorded on the birth certificate within three days of birth, Linton claims that many scholars have assumed that the nineteenth-century French had a very rigid binary vision of its individuals, but she shows that some doctors and authors actually challenged the concept of "True Sex" (the one-body-one-sex rule) as they realized that some individuals fell outside of this binary. Linton believes the literature supports the claim made by some doctors that the observation of the external body might not tell the whole story about someone. Some therefore advocated for adding a "neuter sex," "doubtful sex," or "third sex" category to article 57 of the civil code to better acknowledge the variation of bodies. Even though Balzac, Gautier, and Zola seem forward-thinking, she warns us not to "assign too revolutionary and subversive a status to our novelists" as they "also announce that non-normative identities have no place in nineteenth-century France" (134). A growing medical discourse connecting external signs of "doubtful sex" with mental deficiencies throughout the nineteenth century allows Linton to establish a link between the discourses around intersex and Zola's theory of degeneration, a connection which had been overlooked in scholarship. "Hermaphrodism" was sometimes therefore perceived as the result of "degenerate heredity," linking "doubtful sex" and teratology, and "hermaphrodism" with homosexuality. Throughout her book and then more specifically at the end, Linton draws parallels between those nineteenth-century sources and contemporary concerns and debates around intersex individuals in the United States. She discusses how medical protocols to assign gender at birth have been met with growing resistance and criticism since early sex assignment surgeries and treatments are considered damaging to the child. Mental health rather than sex assignment, and a more patient-centered medicine, are the path forward. Since France is the focus of the book, addressing the state of the debate around intersex [End Page 195] individuals from a medical, legal, and literary standpoint in France would have been a nice way to loop the loop, even though the discussion of the case of the United States is also invaluable. [End Page 196] Céline Brossillon Ursinus College (PA) Copyright © 2023 American Association of Teachers of French