Visual metamorphoses: Photographic representations of intersexuality between ars erotica and scientia sexualis

• Grant number: 24/09382-8
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• Start date: October 01, 2024
• End date: March 31, 2028
• Field of knowledge: Linguistics, Literature and Arts - Arts - Photography
• Principal Investigator: Maria Cristina Correia Leandro Pereira
• Grantee: Matheus Silva Dallaqua
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The Western interest in intersexuality, much like with other historical phenomena, has thefortuitous condition of renewal, bequeathing a profusion of sources of the most variedtypologies and temporalities. Since the myth described by Ovid in the first century,representations of these bodies with ambiguous genitalia have been widely produced andreproduced in different media, contexts, and discourses, both visual and textual. Thisresearch project aims to delve into this field of study, focusing on the visual constructionof the intersexual body in the 19th and 20th centuries in scientific, artistic, ethnographic,and meta-images photographs, to understand the production and circulation of visualrepresentations of these subjects in different temporalities and contexts. The presentresearch aims, therefore, to unveil the dynamics of power, of normative discourses, andsocial perceptions associated with these subjects, as well as their disruptive potential.Anchored in a serial methodology, the analysis of these sources will allow exploring thedifferent ways in which the intersexual body has been represented, questioning imposednarratives, and revealing the tensions and ambiguities present in the construction of thediscourses about sexual dimorphism, gender, masculinity, and femininity.