Image from Tug.Com.
The “nature/nurture” debate, regarding sexual identity, came up in my British and American Essays class. We discussed the short story by Maxine Hong Kingston, “On Discovery”. In short this narrative essay is about a man that searches for the Gold Mountain, when he stumbles upon the Land of Women. He is captured and through various forms of torturous molding is turned into a woman. I just read this article on Yahoo! of two babies that were switched at birth. I think they could be an interesting nature/nurture case study. My mom told me that my older brother was switched shortly after birth. My mom had to seriously insist that she did not have a baby girl with red hair (even though my parents had hoped for a girl after two earlier boys), but in fact a baby boy with black hair. Luckily my brother had a little mole close to his ear which my mom identified and which eventually led the nurses to believe her. While my brother never was switched at birth, I’ve often felt like I must have been switched at birth. My personality is just so different from the rest of my siblings that I couldn’t imagine coming from the same gene pool. Was it not for my auburn hair, matching that of my mom’s, and later the tone of my voice matching those of my brothers, I would have been inclined to take the switched-at-birth hypothesis seriously.
well i often feel the same, I am so different from my biological sister and my biological parents.
ReplyDeleteI just said God will have to tell me when I get to heaven.
I read that story. That's crazy, yet it can happen so easily if nurses aren't careful.
ReplyDeleteI grew up living with my mother, sister, and aunt. I relate to my sister the most since we have a lot of the same interests. She does have a very melancholy personality, and mine is more sanguine/phlegmatic.