International Research Journal of Education and Technology

Narratives of intersex and transgender embodiment occupy a crucial space within medical humanities, where literary testimony intersects with clinical discourse, ethics, and gender identity formation. The Truth About Me by Revathi and Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides present distinct yet convergent representations of bodily difference, social marginalization, and the search for selfhood beyond binary gender frameworks. Through close textual analysis, this study examines how both works negotiate medical authority, narrative voice, and embodied truth. Revathi’s autobiographical testimony foregrounds lived trauma within institutional and familial structures, while Eugenides’ novel situates intersex identity within diasporic history and genetic discourse. Reading these texts through medical humanities and gender theory reveals how narrative becomes a site of resistance against diagnostic reductionism and normative gender ideology. Ultimately, both works reposition the body not as pathology but as a locus of meaning, agency, and ethical recognition.

Keywords: medical humanities, intersex, transgender identity, embodiment, narrative medicine, gender theory