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Kathleen Lowrey vs. transgender people

Kathleen Lowrey is an American-born anthropologist and anti-transgender activist based in Canada. Lowrey specializes in specializing in South American and comparative ethnography.

Background

Kathleen Bolling Lowrey earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1993. Lowrey then attended University of Chicago, earning a master’s degree in 1997 and a doctorate in 2003.

In 2003–2004 Lowrey was a visiting assistant professor in sociology and anthropology at Warren Wilson College, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at the Center for International and Comparative Studies at Northwestern University in fall 2004. In 2005, Lowrey was visiting assistant professor of sociology at Randolph-Macon Woman’s College. Lowrey joined the University of Alberta Department of Anthropology as an assistant professor in 2005, and was promoted to associate professor in July 2011.

Since 1997, Lowrey has conducted continuous ethnographic fieldwork in the South American Gran Chaco region of Bolivia and Paraguay. Lowrey’s research interests encompass lowland South American anthropology, ethnohistory, economic anthropology, disability studies, and feminism.

Lowrey’s monograph Shamanism and Vulnerability on the North and South American Great Plains was published in 2020 by the University Press of Colorado.

Anti-trans activism

In 2023, Lowrey was scheduled to speak at the American Anthropological Association (AAA) and Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA) annual joint conference on a panel titled “Let’s Talk About Sex, Baby: Why biological sex remains a necessary analytic category in anthropology.” Planned panelists were:

Below is an excerpt from their description of the panel:

While it has become increasingly common in anthropology and public life to substitute ‘sex’ with ‘gender’, there are multiple domains of research in which biological sex remains irreplaceably relevant to anthropological analysis. Contesting the transition from sex to gender in anthropological scholarship deserves much more critical consideration than it has hitherto received in major diciplinary fora like AAA / CASCA. This diverse international panel brings together scholars from socio-cultural anthropology, archaeology, and biological anthropology who describe why in their work gender is not helpful and only sex will do. This is particularly the case when the work is concerned with equity and the deep analysis of power, and which has as an aim the achievement of genuine inclusivity. With research foci from hominin evolution to contemporary artificial intelligence, from the anthropology of education to the debates within contemporary feminism about surrogacy, panelists make the case that while not all anthropologists need to talk about sex, baby, some absolutely do.

[…] Sex identification—whether an individual was male or female – using the skeleton is one of the most fundamental components in bioarchaeology and forensic anthropology. Anthropologists have improved their ability to determine sex since their initial studies on skeletal remains, which depended on subjective assessment of skeletal robusticity to say whether someone was male or female. An understanding of physical differences in the pelvis related to childbirth, hormonal impacts on bones, and extensive comparative studies have provided anthropologists with an array of traits, such as those in the Phenice Method, to determine sex using just bones. The use of DNA to identify sex in skeletons by their 23rd chromosomes enables anthropologists to say whether infants are male or female for use in both criminal abuse cases and archaeological cases, such as in recognizing infanticide practices. Anthropologists’ ability to determine whether a skeleton is male or female is not dependent on time or culture; the same traits can be used to make a sex estimate in a forensic case in Canada, or to estimate sex in a Paleoindian dated around 11,500 years ago in Brazil. As anthropologists study more remains from more cultures and time periods, sex identification has improved, because sex differences are biologically determined. In forensics, however, anthropologists should be (and are) working on ways to ensure that skeletal finds are identified by both biological sex and their gender identity, which is essential due to the current rise in transitioning individuals and their overrepresentation as crime victims.

Following outcry, the panel was canceled by AAA and CASCA, who released a joint statement titled “No Place For Transphobia in Anthropology.”

References

AAA and CASCA boards (September 28, 2023). No Place For Transphobia in Anthropology: Session pulled from Annual Meeting program. https://www.cas-sca.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/No_Place_For_Transphobia_in_Anthropology_EN_FR.pdf alt url https://americananthro.org/news/no-place-for-transphobia-in-anthropology-session-pulled-from-annual-meeting-program/

Quinn, Ryan (October 4, 2023). ‘Let’s Talk About Sex,’ or ‘Let’s Platform Transphobia’? Association Cancels a Panel. Inside Higher Ed https://www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty-issues/diversity-equity/2023/10/04/anthropological-assoc-cancels-lets-talk-about-sex

Urquhart, Evan (October 2, 2023). Anthropology Rejects Attempt to Inject Culture Warring into Major Conference. Assigned Media https://www.assignedmedia.org/breaking-news/anthropology-rejects-attempt-to-inject-culture-warring-into-major-conference

Labine, Jeff (June 9, 2020). U of A professor says she was dismissed over views that biological sex trumps transgender identity for policy decisions. Edmonton Journal https://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/u-of-a-professor-says-she-was-dismissed-over-views-that-biological-sex-trumps-transgender-identity-for-policy-decisions

Anti-trans coverage

Heterodox Academy (November 8, 2023). [UNCANCELED] Let’s Talk About Sex Baby: Why Biological Sex Remains A Necessary Analytic Category in Anthropology. https://heterodoxacademy.org/events/uncanceled-lets-talk-about-sex-baby-why-biological-sex-remains-a-necessary-analytic-category-in-anthropology/

Krauss, Lawrence M. (October 11, 2023). The Sex of Skeletons: To suggest that a spirited discussion of the importance of sex and gender in archeology threatens “scientific integrity” is to misunderstand the nature of science. Quillette https://quillette.com/2023/10/11/scary-sexy-skeletons/

Young, Cathy (October 5, 2023). Toxic culture on the right or left is wrong. Newsday https://www.newsday.com/opinion/columnists/cathy-young/culture-wars-transphobia-lgbt-gender-transgender-anthropology-i0un1yec

Lukianoff, Greg; Eduardo, Angel (October 3, 2023). Canceling the anthropology talk doesn’t stop the talk. The Eternally Radical Idea https://eternallyradicalidea.com/p/canceling-the-anthropology-talk-doesnt

Patel, Vimal (September 30, 2023). Anthropology Conference Drops a Panel Defending Sex as Binary. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/30/us/anthropology-panel-sex-binary-gender-kathleen-lowery.html

Staff report (September 27, 2023). Anthropology groups cancel conference panel on why biological sex is “necessary” for research. Retraction Watch https://retractionwatch.com/2023/09/27/anthropology-groups-cancel-conference-panel-on-why-biological-sex-is-necessary-for-research/

Resources

University of Alberta (ualberta.ca)