On Gender Assignment: some reflections
Great to read on Gender assignments amidst science - philosophy engagements! From a phenomenological view, I tend to disagree with some of the points you have raised, though I agree with the general spirit of the write-up. Given the theory of rebirths, I suspect whether gender assignments ( I would rather call it assignments determined by the sex, not gender, gender determinations have elements more from the society than the psychophysical - spiritual organism) are involuntary, to my mind the sex determined assignments are deeper than what we presume. And therefore, the spirit in its onward journey upward can little afford to ignore the sex distinctions, which is clearly specified in our tantric literature, though the other schools by and large are silent towards it, probably subscribing to the general theory prevalent in India ( though meaninglessly refuted by many contemporary thinkers ) that a female need to be reborn as male to attain perfection. I agree that our Puranas abound with exceptions to this. Well, we really need to look at the impact of sex distinctions, closer and deeper when it comes to darsana. On this occasion, I remember swami Sri Hariprasad ji was to take up a webinar on this, somehow it did not materialize. I have written a theme note for him for this.
In Kerala things are. really bad, but we hope after the second lockdown the situation might improve a bit.
Regards
Prof. Sreekala M Nair
Department of Philosophy,
Sree Sankaracharya University of Sanskrit, Kalady.
(Former Professor, Nalanda University)
Joint Secretary, Indian Philosophical Congress.