The Body/Secret Dynamic

Intersexed subjects experience their bodies through therepercussions of treatment policies implemented in their bodies at birth and throughouttheir lives. Secrets and secrecy comprise a major element of the treatment policy towardintersexed subjects in Israel and act as a disciplining and normalizing force in thelife experience of intersexed subjects. This article presents case studies of intersexedadults, subjects through whom we can learn about both historical and contemporarytreatment policy toward intersexed people as well as about the perpetual conflictbetween the particular corporeal existence of individuals and the experience of thesecret and secrecy in their lives. The purpose of this article is to shed light on thedynamics that exist between the secret and intersexed bodies and the paradoxicalconsequences of body/secret relations