The Myth of Transgender People

The conflation of sex and gender is intentional in order to give people a misunderstanding of what gender is, writes anthropologist Alex Hinton. The imposition by imperial powers of not only their own religion and culture, but also of their understanding of gender can have an impact on the way these categories are understood around the world. Some societies have a third gender such as hydras in India, while many Native American communities have a gender status called two spirit Yet others view themselves as non binary gender conceptions that intersect with systems of power like colonialism and patriarchy.