Gender Mosaic

Influential neuroscientist Professor Daphna Joel explains why there is no such thing as a male or female brain and no neural basis for differentiating people based on sex.

This timely manifesto calls for a future free from gender-based assumptions about human potential. Written by the internationally renowned neuroscientist whose game-changing research debunks the myth of male and female brains

For generations we’ve been taught that women and men differ in profound ways. Women are supposedly more sensitive and cooperative, whereas men are more aggressive and sexual, because this or that region in the brains of women is larger or smaller than in the brains of men, or because they have more or less of this or that hormone.

This story seems to provide us with a neat biological explanation for much of what we encounter in day-to-day life. It’s even sometimes used to explain, for example, why most teachers are women and most engineers are men. But is it true?

Using the ground-breaking results from her own lab and from other recent studies, neuroscientist Daphna Joel shows that it is not. Instead, argues Joel, every brain – and every human being – is a mosaic, or mixture, of ‘male’ and ‘female’ characteristics.

With urgent practical implications for the world around us, this is a fascinating look at gender – how it works, its history and its future – and a sorely needed investigation into the false basis of our most fundamental beliefs.

Perfect for readers of Mary Beard’s Women & Power, Cordelia Fine’s Testosterone Rex, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s We Should All Be Feminists and Gina Rippon’s The Gendered Brain.

‘Brilliantly accessible. Gender Mosaic takes you on a fascinating scientific journey that will transform how you think about sex, gender and the brain.’ Cordelia Fine, author of Testosterone Rex

(p) 2019 Octopus Publishing Group