Sex and gender theories and development planning: what is new is not always better

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Asking (begging would be more a propos) for a project involvement, I asked my onetime boss and partner Litoy to include me in his planning projects. The ones that he had at the time were looking for a gender sociologist, so we got to talking about theories of gender in development.

Jokingly, he asked if I still subscribed in WID (women in development), meaning of course that that theory was passé. He proceeded to name Mosher, the UN gender framework, and if you know Litoy, some other fifty thousand “new” theories that an up to date sociologist worthy of being a member of his team should know.

Unable to resist, I asked him if he came across queer theory, and “we are souls, so we don’t have sex and we don’t have gender” theory. Obviously he didn’t. And that, dear blog followers, is the crux of this post. We can construct and deconstruct and then reconstruct theories and anti-theories about anything, in particular today about gender and its role in development planning, but in the IN YOUR FACE EMPIRICAL, i.e., FACTUAL world ( a la Weber), any theory is as good as its explanatory power. NO, NO this isn’t a postmodernist cop out. In fact, I have to confess that Giddens’ dismissal of postmodernism as bankrupt has to my mind, come blindingly prescient, and all postmodernisms have settled to “one of those”, instead of the cutting edge mantra that they used to be, but I STILL DON’T UNDERSTAND THEM.

Queer theory is notable because it is (to my mind, at least) a true Foucaldian (the community, not the person) artifact. At the very least, it calls attention to structural power and its ability to marginalize ANYTHING unusual as queer, especially gender related behaviors. But this is old knowledge. Im more interested in the we are souls theory.

Friends and old students are shocked to hear that the Bible can be a LGBT weapon, providing the barrel and ammunition for a countercultural notion of nonpolar gender, that is non masculinist, non feminist, non gay location in a gender structured world. And how can that be? Because, I reply, “in heaven, there is no marriage” or if there is it will not be consummated, because discarnate souls have no penis and no vagina, just like the angels who are androgynous, or if you prefer hermaphroditic. If Michael and Gabriel are male angels, name me one who is a female.

Working as her teaching assistant, I once asked Eun Mee Kim why the militaristic Japanese had for their ancestor, the Sun Goddess Amaterasu, and not a Sun God. And I have always marveled at the chauvinistic Germanic Aryans, the most masculine subculture in history, why they call the penetrating sun a She, and the gentle yielding moon a He. It was Tolkien who hinted at the answer: as angelic beings, the Maiar who steered the sun and the moon were “mannish” or “womanish” depending on predisposition to battle, and their spiritual power to promote it.

So, in this context, the warrior angels were seen as men, like Michael; strangely, aside from female demons, there weren’t female angels (weren’t demons fallen angels, according to Hebraic myth?) In other words, gender construction in myth, as in life, is a cultural imposition, a la Durkheim, a la Foucault, a la me.

And what does this imply for gender specialists in development planning. Only this: no matter how old your theory is, if it is able to explain and make clear to your clients, that their interests, needs and are respected and accounted for, you can use Meadian (Margaret, the woman anthropologist, not George the man psychologist) frameworks and get away with it.

Just so that youre not wooly headed about power, if your project managers demand that your theories are not older than last week, then you’d better scour the Internet for the latest, and not follow this geezer of a blogger. However, if I were a member of your thesis panel, I would give you an excellent grade for truly understanding the role of theory in your research. Truly, I would. Ask my former students and advisees. They all got an A.