Normative Interventions and Inclusive Practices

Drawing on the work of philosopher and ethicist Eva Feder Kittay (Thoughts on the desire for normality. In: Parens E (ed) Surgically shaping children: technology, ethics, and the pursuit of normality. The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, pp 90–110, 2006), This chapter explores contemporary tensions relating to atypical sex and the two routes to normality that have emerged. The first involves normative interventions which eliminate or render atypical sex invisible by making atypical sex bodies conform to dualistic notions of sex. The second involves modifying the concept of normal to include atypical sex. This chapter also provides the reader with an initial sense of how normative meaning and objective facts are grounded differently and how these differences can sometimes conflict which is further explored in later chapters.