Watch this video (you will probably have to copy and paste the address into the URL Address bar to make it work): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUTcwqR4Q4Y
The transcript is here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/horizon/dr_money_trans.shtml
This is the story of David Reimer. David was born “Bruce” – along with an identical twin brother, Brian. At 7 months of age, there was a circumcision accident in which “Bruce’s” penis was almost entirely burnt off. It was 1966, and the Reimer’s sought the best medical advice available.
Dr. John Money told the Reimer’s to raise their son as a daughter. He insisted that “she” never be told that “she” had been born male. The Reimer’s changed Bruce’s name to “Brenda” and raised her as a girl.
Money thought he had the perfect experiment to prove that gender was a product of environment, not our biology (genetics). He thought that gender was determined by nurture, not nature. He used the Reimer twins to prove his theory of “gender neutrality.”
The results were catastrophic. I won’t otherwise tell you how the story ends. Watch the video and find out. After you have watched the video and using the textbook (and other sources, if necessary), answer the following questions in one complete essay:
What is the difference between sex, gender and sexual orientation?
What does this video and your textbook suggest about sex, gender, and sexual orientation in regard to genetics and the environment {nature v. nurture}?
What do you make of the fact that “Brenda” was raised a girl and given female hormones (“she” was told they were vitamins), but grew up to marry a woman?
Remember, we all will watch the video so this assignment should not be a movie review. Students should think more deeply than a video summary. What do you think about what happened and why? Integration of textbook terms/concepts and video material as academic support and critical thinking are key here.
Note: this is an older video thus you may hear terminology that we would not use today. You might consider using more up-to-date terminology.
