“The Shape of Sex” with Leah DeVun

Nonbinary Jesus. Did that get your attention? If so, this episode is for you. Historian extraordinaire Leah DeVun joins me to talk about the pre-modern history of nonbinary gender, about intersex brides, transitioning saints and what terms such as androgyne and hermaphrodite might tell us about conceptions of sex, gender and sexuality. Leah explains how thinking about nonbinary gender was and is a way of interrogating what it means to be human.

Join us for this journey into nonbinary history and religion and, if you just can’t get enough, follow @ldevun (IG), @DevunLeah (Twitter) and @queerlitpodcast on Instagram.

References:

The Shape of Sex: Nonbinary Gender from Genesis to Renaissance (Columbia UP, 2021)
TSQ special issue: Trans*historicities, co-edited by Leah DeVun and Zeb Tortorici (2018)
Resemblance (2022-)
https://www.leahdevun.com/resemblance
Lamya H.’s Hijab Butch Blues
Gladstone’s Library
Trans/Formations (SCM Press, 2009)
Androgyne
Hermaphrodite
Judith Butler’s Who’s Afraid of Gender
Eleanor Rykener
Rolandina Ronchaia
Berengaria Castelló of Castelló d'Empúries
Joseph of Schönau
Genesis P-Orridge
Throbbing Gristle
Psychic TV

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1. How does Leah define the term nonbinary? How is this similar to or different from other definitions you have come across?
2. Leah explains that thinking about nonbinary gender has an impact on categories other than gender. What does this imply and what would be examples?
3. Why does Leah say that focusing on a nonconforming individual should not be the only way to write nonbinary history?
4. Leah explains that when we learn about nonbinary people of the past, we usually meet them on the worst day of their life. What does this mean and how should this influence the way in which we read source texts?
5. Please look up one of the people Leah mentions in the episode and learn a little more about them.