Ancient Greek And Roman Culture: Binary Analysis

In this paper, I will explain the binary approach to gender in ancient Greek and Roman culture. By analyzing Ovid’s myth of Hermaphroditus in the Metamorphoses, I will explain a common misconception of nonbinary gender in ancient Greek and Roman culture. I will discuss Aristophanes’ Speech in Plato’s Symposium and Aristotle’s Metaphysics as further evidence for the pervasiveness of binary thought in antiquity. In addition, I will explain the invasion of binary thinking in states of transition by using Hippocrates’ Epidemics. Finally, Hippocrates’ On Airs, Waters, Places showcases the inconceivability of nonbinary gender in Greek and Roman thought. Overall, Greek and Roman culture used the binary approach in conversations of gender too often

Aristophanes explains that a so-called third human gender, “a combination” of male and female, used to exist (Plato). Once again, this gender is not outside of the binary but an even mix between the two elements. A nonbinary combination would include some features not considered distinctly female or male, and this notion of nonbinary options does not appear in this text either. While a fault in translation may exacerbate the prevalence of the binary, I persist that Greek and Roman thought revolved around only two, often opposing, genders. Since ancient Greek and Latin had three genders for the description of nouns (masculine, feminine, and neuter), translating the neuter gender may be difficult in English, which has almost no gender attached to nouns. However, this difficulty of conveying a noun’s gender does not mean that nonbinary gender was erased in translation. Greek and Roman thought continued to reference only two human genders during descriptions of possible neuter or third gender people, such as Hermaphroditus and Aristophanes’ third gender. Even when a possible third gender is introduced, Greek and Roman authors referenced binary gender to describe that gender and explain such gender to their audiences. Aristotle describes gender as an opposite in the Metaphysics on the same level of difference as light and darkness (986a21a). Male and female are complete

These two options could mix, as seen in the myth of Hermaphroditus; nonetheless, Greek and Romans could only comprehend this mix in terms of the two, originally separate genders. The mixing of the two genders does not disprove the fact that ancient Greeks and Romans only had a binary system for gender. As in Aristophanes’ Speech, a possible understanding of combinations does not discount the continuous reference to only two genders. Aristophanes’ supposed third gender still references the system of only two possibilities, male and female. Aristotle demonstrates that Greeks and Romans largely considered gender an opposite of those two distinct options, and this opposition was on the same level as light and darkness, as good and evil (986a21a). Those oppositions still permitted mixings but were still binary systems. Greek and Roman thought did not disprove the possible of movement between the two genders, but this movement had to be almost a complete shift. Hippocrates’ description of Phaethousa’s transformation shows that Greeks believed people could shift gender presentations, but this shift used the ideas of two genders to explain the change. Hippocrates’ description of the foreign Scythians also shows that Greeks did not comprehend a gender system with more than two parts. The Scythian Anares may have been third gender of the nomadic culture, but