Gender is no longer simply code for women or the feminine and its scholarship is no longer the province of females or even self-declared feminists. Indeed, gender has become a rather notably ambiguous signifier. Where this is acknowledged rather than covered over by tidy definitions, the ambiguity that attends the term is rendered productive, I believe.
Virginia Burrus, “Mapping as Metamorphosis: Initial Reflections on Gender and Ancient Religious Discourses”, in Mapping Gender in Ancient Religious Discourses, ed. Todd Penner & Caroline Vander Stichele (Leiden & Boston: Brill, 2007), 2.