Using two examples, this paper provides insight into the questionat the centre of subproject 1 and its approach in investigating gender ambiguity, the blurring of the distin-ction between men and women, in the media discourse of the Federal Republic of Germany. The first example is located at the beginningof the period under investigation. It refers to a debate that took place in the late 1960s and early 1970s about intersex athletes from Eastern Bloc countries who achieved great suc-cess in international sporting events.Various articles from the German quality press (Die ZeitandFrank-furter Allgemeine Zeitung) are the primary sources for this passage. The second example is located at the end of the period under investigation,at the turn of the millennium. A mass-produced publication is evalua-ted: an illustratedSTERNarticlethat tells the story of a boy who was raised as a girl due to genital mutila-tion, but later returned to the male role. For both examples, the forms and accompanying circumstancesof gender-based differentiation are analysed, with a particular interestin the respective roles of medicine and science on the one hand, and the handling of the self-perceptions of the affected people on the other.