""Congenital Agenesis of Gender Ideation" by K.N. Sirsi and Sandra Botkin" is a 1998 science fiction short story by American writer Raphael Carter. It was first published in the anthology Starlight 2.
Rather than being a conventional narrative, "Congenital Agenesis of Gender Ideation" is presented as a scientific paper in which two researchers describe a rare condition whereby individuals are unable to perceive gender — or, rather, are able to so accurately perceive subtle differences in gender and sex (being able to distinguish, simply by looking at a photograph, categories as disparate as 'born with hypospadias', 'takes supplemental sex hormones after a hysterectomy', and 'has a high androgyny score on the Bem test') that they find the terms 'male' and 'female' hopelessly inadequate.
"Congenital Agenesis of Gender Ideation" won the 1998 James Tiptree Jr. Award[1] and was a semi-finalist for the 1998 Theodore Sturgeon Award.[2]
Gardner Dozois considered it to have "some very intriguing ideas", but to be "as dry as the form it is mimicking" (i.e., academic literature).[3] Strange Horizons observed that the story's "premise seems simple" but relies on a notion which is "both challenging and invasive."[4] At the SF Site, Paul Kincaid called it "extraordinary."[5]