Join us at the Holman Biotech Commons for a thought-provoking conversation with historian of science and Penn faculty member Beans Velocci as they discuss their new book, Sex Isn't Real: The Invention of an Incoherent Binary.

In Sex Isn't Real, Dr. Velocci traces how the scientific and medical classification of sex was constructed and contested across five disciplines from the mid-nineteenth through the mid-twentieth century, including gynecology, statistical sexology, and transsexual medicine. Drawing on clinical case studies, lab notes, and medical records, Velocci reveals that the categories of male and female were not discovered but made. The result is a rigorous, accessible work of history with direct implications for how we think about sex in biomedical research and clinical practice today. Holman Biotech Commons invites you to hear their perspective on how medicine's past shapes the questions we're still asking now.

Please join us for what promises to be an engaging conversation.

This event is open to the public.