Abstract
There is a line in the musical Fiddler on the Roof that refers to the rituals and customs of Orthodox Jewish life in pre-Revolutionary Russia. Tevya the Milkman explains that by observing these codes of behaviour, and also following the rules that separate the roles played by two sexes, ‘We know who we are, and what we are, and what God expects us to be’. Although, of course, most people do not follow such rigid discipline of thought, this line does exemplify the idea that the great majority of human beings do fit into the world and society as their social background dictates, and above all as a member of the sex to which they born. They then go on to make the best life possible for themselves as a man or a woman. For people with a gender identity problem, however, this mental acceptance of their sexual identity is an impossible challenge, and it is this lack of acceptance that is the cause of continual conflict, frustration and unhappiness.
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© 1991 Rosemary Gravell and Jenny France
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Chaloner, J. (1991). Gender identity problems. In: Speech and Communication Problems in Psychiatry. Therapy in Practice Series. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-2955-6_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-2955-6_9
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