The promise of glitching bodies in sport: a posthumanist exploration of an intersex phenomenon

Abstract

This paper is about glitching bodies-bodies that break, crash and confuse the conventions of pre-programmed and binary gender patterns. Exploring the promise of an intersex phenomenon; hyperandrogenism in women's sport, I discuss how glitching bodies and a feminist posthumanist understanding of gender can contribute to the field of gender and queer sport studies. Responding to calls for research enacting how non-binary bodies challenge the dualistic gendered ontologies that have structured the performative practices of sport in highly exclusive ways this paper is a travelogue into a messy nature-cultural phenomenon. It is partly a theoretical and methodological exploration and partly an analytic endeavour. The phenomenon of hyperandrogenism is explored and untangled by engaging in a diffractive analysis where I 'plug in' the concepts of intra-activity and glitch. I argue that a feminist posthumanist understanding of gender and diffraction as a methodological practice helps us move away from habitual and normative readings that zero in on either male or female, either nature or culture and either material or discursive. This implosion of binaries in turn opens up for alternative ways of thinking and being bodies in sport (studies). Just as Foucault stated that there can be no reason without madness, Gombrich wrote that order does not exist without chaos, and Virilio stated that technological progression cannot exist without its inherent accident, I am of the opinion that flow cannot be understood without interruption, or functioning without 'glitching'. This is why we need glitch studies. Rosa Menkman This paper explores the promise of an intersex 1 phenomenon; hyperandrogenism in women's sport. It is a travelogue 2 into a messy phenomenon that breaks, crashes and confuses the conventions of pre-programmed and binary gender patterns, that is a glitching phenomenon. The paper is in part a theoretical and methodological exploration and in part an analytic endeavour. Like Lather (2007) I think that strolling down unchartered terrain and getting lost once in a while is a way of coming to know. But although getting lost can make you see things you never saw before, I do not wish the readers to get completely disorientated, and I will therefore describe the structure of the paper. Following a brief background, I present the phenomenon of hyperandrogenism that I will explore and untangle. Secondly, I situate my analysis within posthuman feminist theory, arguing for a reintroduction of nature and the material as a vital, and agential, element within the field of gender and queer sport studies. Next, I set up the scene for diffraction as a methodological practice and introduce the concepts I use as tools to ARTICLE HISTORY

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