Conceptual Engineering of Gender Identity
Emma Batistoni

Abstract:
Gender identity is typically understood as one’s innate sense of themselves as some gender, and being trans as identifying as a gender other than one’s assigned gender at birth. I argue that a lack of explanation as to what it is to have a sense of oneself as some gender has two major shortcomings: it is not useful in gender questioning experiences, and it does not show that gender identities merit respect. I therefore propose an ameliorative analysis of the concept of gender identity that aims to fix these defects, starting from primitive commitments to trans rights, to taking self-identification as sufficient to gender categorization, and to first-person authority over gender self-identification. My novel insight is a social constructivist perspective on gender identity and on the experience of transitioning, and my main contribution is twofold. First, I argue that sex and gender ought to be viewed as social properties that are conferred to us by others, following Ásta, and that under this view, we can meaningfully say that transitioning may alter both sex and gender. I contrast this view with gender-critical understandings of sex as an immutable binary natural kind, showing that these conceptualizations can only serve the purpose of marginalizing and excluding trans and intersex people, and I tentatively suggest that these philosophical views may be partially grounded in factually wrong worldviews.
Second, I defend an account of gender identity as self-identification that is non-deflationary in the sense explicated by Florence Ashley: gender identity is the gender that one self-identifies as, and it is constituted by the personal significance that one assigns to their gender subjectivity, meaning the totality of their experiences onto which some understanding of gender is imposed upon. Under my proposed social constructivist understanding of sex, gender, and transitioning, I suggest to flesh out Ashley’s original account by adding sexed embodiment, understood as a collection of sex-stereotypical traits, and gendered social positioning, understood as one’s conferred gender status, as components of one’s gender subjectivity. I argue that this account of gender identity is consistent with first-person authority over gender self-identification, is useful in gender questioning experiences, and shows that gender identities merit respect.