Talk:transgender

Multiple Senses

• I cleaned up the merging of the various senses, but this word is confused enough in popular usage that I think the multiple senses should be explicitly listed. Nicoleta

• I'm going to put back up the multiple senses until we can get more discussion. Proposed merged definition: "Pertaining to someone whose gender identity or expression is not aligned with their biological sex; sometimes used as a general, inclusive term, and sometimes as synonymous with or opposed to more specific terms such as transsexual, crossdresser, etc." Nicoleta

You may put them up, but all Wiktionary definitions are supposed to be attestable. If something isn't challenged, there may not be any attestation shown: it is time consuming to attest a definition. Rarely, colloquial terms may be deemed "in widespread use" by acclamation. Otherwise, a challenged sense needs attestation. We are not inherently interested in making distinctions that are not attestable. Wordy definitions are extremely hard to attest. I strongly recommend making sure that you start with one or two senses and find quotations that show them in use. It is amazing what one can learn by attesting. DCDuring TALK 20:27, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Translations

Translations are under the adjectival definition, but seem to be nominal? Can we split these up under adjectives vs. nouns? The Ido translation I put in is adjectival; the noun is transgenro. Nicoleta

English doesn't always make that distinction. Quite often, English adjectives are used as if they were nouns, so we tend not to create separate sections as a noun for these unless there is a demonstrated pattern of use as a noun. For example, "the poor", "send me your poor", etc., are common usage so poor will also get a Noun section. We otherwise do not do this, since practically any English descriptive adjective can be used as if it were a noun. Also, please note that new talk sections are generally added at the bottom of the talk page, rather than the top. People may not spot your comments if you create new sections at the top instead. --EncycloPetey 03:36, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Euphemistic Usage

Is "euphemism" the proper term to describe using "transgender" in lieue of "transsexual"? Transsexualism in and of itself isn't something that necesarily should be or needs to be euphemized, it's society's cultural stigma on the "-sexual" suffix that makes the word sometimes avoided (as well as its association with the psycho-medical community), same as the usage of "gay/lesbian" as opposed to "homosexual." Is there a better word to use besides "euphemism" to describe this sense? "Euphemism" I feel puts too negative a context on "transsexual." Nicoleta

Feedback

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My name is René. I am a person of transsexual experience. I am a transsexual female & I strongly feel that I need to correct your definition regarding the word "transgender" (noun).

I believe that a transgender — which is derived from the word "gender" meaning sex — or a transsexual is a person born with the physical characteristics of one sex who emotionally and psychologically feels that they belong to the opposite sex. I cannot be so concerned about whether I should be in a man's or a woman's clothing. I, however, have always yearned to be a female. Thus, subjecting myself to hormone replacement therapy, and hopefully undergo surgical reassignment surgery in the offing. In fact, transsexuality is so often referred to as "gender dysphoria". Otherwise, known as a state of unease or general dissatisfaction of a person's own birth gender.

While I believe that a transvestite — which is derived from the word "vest" meaning article of clothing — or a cross-dresser is a person, typically a man, who derives pleasure from dressing in clothes considered appropriate to the opposite sex. A man can dress in a woman's clothing while he remains completely comfortable & satisfied in his biological gender (i.e. drag queen).

And an intersex or hermaphrodite is a totally different classification as it is a person or animal having both male and female sex organs or other sexual characteristics. This is concerned with the anatomical or sexual anomaly of a person's biology, particularly the reproductive organs.

I don't have to lose faith in the credibility of your definitions. Pardon my directness, but I'm easily upset when something on the Internet is incorrect. So I certainly hope you do something about it now. Thank you.

A dictionary (like Wiktionary) is not written to provide "truth". A dictionary describes the way that words are used. So, if "Earth" was used regularly to mean "a flat surface of which everyone lives", then that is what we'd write, even if it doesn't match the "truth" about the shape of the Earth. So, our definiton of (deprecated template usage) transgender isn't written to educate people about the "truth", but to describe what most people mean when they use that word. --EncycloPetey 01:35, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Yes – but we need citations here to back up the definitions. Ƿidsiþ 06:57, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Definition merges

I agree that there aren't five definitions, but maybe there are two. Can transgender refer to someone who has had a sex change operation, but also to someone who hasn't? That might count as two definitions. Mglovesfun (talk) 06:28, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

• The term was coined in an attempt to describe both of those things and more -- basically anyone with a "non-cisgendered" identity. But various groups have sought to restrict the meaning in various specific ways, and I don't think it's helpful or even possible to unpick them all. Ƿidsiþ 06:35, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Right. Mglovesfun (talk) 06:40, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

As with many words like this, it is very difficult to find true adjective citations that could not be read as attributive use of a noun. There are not very many citations for this word following "become" or "seem", used comparatively or superlatively, or graded (as modified by "too" or "very". Examples showing use as a predicate after a form of "be" requires a great deal of care and are likely to be debatable. It is difficult to establish for sure that this is a true adjective at all, rather than attributive use of a noun, however awkward the wording of the noun senses might be.

Perhaps we should also see what citations can be found that unambiguously exhibit true nominal use: use following determiners and/or articles without a following noun, plurals, etc. Starting with the grammar will keep us in dictionary rather than encyclopedic territory. DCDuring TALK 11:27, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

The 1992 quote and the 2010 Guardian cite both seem unambiguously adjectival to me. Ƿidsiþ 15:36, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

RFV discussion

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Adjective. The usual wordy encyclopedic definitions that seem to heavily overlap the noun definitions. We need cites to show that this is an adjective for each of the five senses claimed to be adjectives. It is likely that at least some senses are only attributive use of the noun. Also, the senses are wordy/encyclopedic and therefore it is almost impossible to confirm that all aspects of given definition are invoked in a given quotation. DCDuring TALK 09:45, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Isn't a word that's used attributively to modify a noun, an adjective by definition? Or am I missing something here? —CodeCat 14:57, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

See [[Wiktionary:English adjectives]].​—msh210℠ 15:29, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

• I merged all the defs: DC is right, that kind of desire to pick out shades of desired meaning cannot be supported by citations. Ƿidsiþ 06:26, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

I have added a citation showing unambiguously adjectival use. One of the citations (1998) seems to be a mention, not a use. The 2010 NYTimes citation could be read as attributive use of a noun. DCDuring TALK 11:57, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

I consider this well and truly verified. Ƿidsiþ 14:41, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Verb form?

This entry, along with transgendered and transgendering, suggest that transgender has a verb form. I know that queer terminology is rapidly evolving, and there are multiple speech communities (for instance, very young trans folks often disagree with very old trans folks on a lot of issues, because we're still in the process of figuring out how we view ourselves). But among everyone that I talk to, the verb form of these is never used, it sounds very strange and is considered incorrect.

I think the reason it sounds odd is that most trans people view themselves as being trans since birth. You can talk about the process of a trans person coming out (transition), but that's only an outward expression of an inward desire. It's really odd to say "Jill came out to her friends and transgendered at age 18". Instead you would say "Jill transitioned at age 18".

Wiktionary doesn't have a page for gayed, and the gays page doesn't mention a verb form. That's because most people view someone as being gay since birth. --Hirsutism (talk) 14:09, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

The verb transgender isn't very common, but it is attested, i.e., it has been used in books, as can been seen from google books:"transgendering". Uses seem to fall into three categories: uses by potentially well-meaning people with outdated (or now-outdated but perhaps then-current) understandings of gender,   uses like this by people with transphobic understandings of gender,   and literal uses like this one which isn't about trans people at all but is instead talking about transgendering a Cabinet by firing the men in it and hiring women. As a descriptivist dictionary, Wiktionary describes words people have actually used, even if the philosophy behind the words doesn't correspond with reality (compare berdache, feminazi), but we do try to tag the words if they're rare, or pejorative, or what have you. For now I've just tagged it as "uncommon". Some of the uses are clearly not pejorative (e.g. the one about the Cabinet), but others (e.g. Jeffreys') could be read as pejorative; do you think the verb should be tagged as "sometimes pejorative" or "sometimes offensive"? I'm not sure... - -sche (discuss) 03:33, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

I might say it's proscribed/disputed. There are some more recognized sources saying this now: [1] [2], though many are talking about the adjective form than the verb form. --Hirsutism (talk) 16:52, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

It seems to me that the references are only discussing transgendered (as in "he's a transgendered person" or "they're transgendereds"), and not transgender (verb) per se (as in "the transgendering of the mystical voice").

I'm surprised to see that Wiktionary's entry on transgendered did not yet note how restricted its use is; I have overhauled it and added those links to the references.

transgender#Verb itself could perhaps use a "chiefly academic" label, but otherwise seems fine. It doesn't seem to be proscribed. - -sche (discuss) 01:58, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Comparative?

Does anyone have any evidence for transgender being used as a comparative adjective? It seems absurd to me. Arguments about who gets to consider themselves transgender notwithstanding, you're either trans or not, no one's "more transgender" than another trans person and I'm quite certain there's no "most transgender" person, even theoretically. Unless someone brings up some evidence to the contrary, I'm going to change that to uncomparable. J0lt C0la (talk) 16:02, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for catching that. The template Wiktionary uses for adjectives adds comparative and superlative forms automatically, and they have to be suppressed in cases where they are not used. Someone may also have noticed that one of the citations (the 1992 one) below sense 2 actually uses the word gradably; that seems to be the only instance where the word is used gradably, however. I've changed it to incomparable/ungradable. - -sche (discuss) 17:15, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

Transgender as a noun

It's an adjective, not a noun. Adjectives don't have plural forms. Ever. Please remove the noun listing, as it was never a noun. The proper way to use transgender to indicate more than one transgender person: Transgender Men, Transgender Women, Transgender People, or Transgender Persons. Transgenders has never been acceptable or accurate. — This unsigned comment was added by 104.36.203.222 (talk).

• You can quite clearly see from the citation evidence that it has been used as a noun and in the plural. Whether it is ‘acceptable’ is beyond the scope of a dictionary, but you will see that it already has a usage label to that effect. Ƿidsiþ 16:42, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

The fact that was was used improperly by people who did not know any better does not make it proper, if you want to be a reputable dictionary then you do not list improper uses of a word.

Here is the defintion from a reputable dictionary used here as fair use:

transgender adjective trans·gen·der \-ˈjen-dər\ Definition of transgender

of, relating to, or being a person (as a transsexual or transvestite) who identifies with or expresses a gender identity that differs from the one which corresponds to the person's sex at birth

transgenderism \-ˌi-zəm\ noun

Transgenderism has been used as a noun but transgender hasn't, and transgenders has never been grammatically acceptable as a plural.

104.36.203.222 16:52, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

We document usage. That's all. Maybe you should go back in time and tell the people who used the word this way that they were wrong. DTLHS (talk) 16:57, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

Your job is to document the correct usage, that's the purpose of a dictionary. 104.36.203.222 16:59, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

You are misinformed as to the purpose of a dictionary. However perhaps you can direct some of your criticisms to other ‘disreputable’ dictionaries that include this definition, like the OED. Ƿidsiþ 17:04, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

Here's another 2 reputable dictionaries... Again used as fair use.

transgender adjective uk /trænzˈdʒen.dər/ us /trænzˈdʒen.dɚ/ also trans, uk /trænz/ us › used to describe someone who feels that they are not the same gender (= sex) as the physical body they were born with, or who does not fit easily into being either a male or a female: a transgender woman/man trans people Society has become more understanding of people who are transgender. (Definition of transgender from the Cambridge Advanced Learners Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge University Press)

transgender Pronunciation: /transˈjendər/ /tranzˈjendər/ (also transgendered) adjective Denoting or relating to a person whose sense of personal identity and gender does not correspond with their birth sex. Compare with cisgender. a transgender activist and author the series will chronicle a group of Chicago women united by the shared experience of being transgender

Your use is incorrect and you have been told it is incorrect. I have given 3 reputable sources to back up my statement. Merriam-Webster, Cambridge University Dictionary, and the Oxford University Dictionary. Your cited references are not reputable sources.

The Allison Stone reference for transgender as a noun is actually used an adjective not a noun.

Correct the record. 104.36.203.222 17:07, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

You are doing nothing but quoting definitions of the adjective, which we already have. As explained, we base our definitions on citation evidence, and there is plenty of it for the noun. The noun sense is also found in the OED, which has the following citations:

1988 Stage 4 Aug. 12/1 Theatrical transgenders now have their own magazine which, it is hoped..will..be a means through which drag artists can find jobs in the theatre.

1995 Times 15 Nov. (Interface section) 6/3 This assistant professor..started off life as a gifted but socially inadequate young man, became a woman and is now a ‘transgender’, occupying the middle ground between the sexes.

1999 Time Out N.Y. 10 June 31/1 The airy Chelsea outpost of this West Coast chainlet offers advice on the gamut of social, religious, emotional and economic issues for gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgenders.

Ƿidsiþ 17:12, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

Pronunciation

There is discussion of how the word is pronounced and which syllable(s) can be stressed at Wiktionary:Information desk/2018/March#English_transgender. - -sche (discuss) 05:36, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

usage by opponents contrary to "usual" usage

Transgender men are not women.

Add a definition or usage note? —Suzukaze-c◇◇ 03:35, 24 November 2019 (UTC)

I've seen that usage, and it is awkward, but I think the word being "disagreed on" is men, not transgender. AFAICT "opponents" agree the people they're talking about are trans, in the usual sense of that word ("having a gender [identity] different from one's assigned sex"), they just feel that one "can't change gender" or whatever, and so say people like Nicole Maines or Laverne Cox are "men" (who are trans) instead of "women" (who are trans). - -sche (discuss) 10:02, 26 November 2019 (UTC)

Isn't it an alienans? Anyway, I think it makes more sense here to see the phrase "transgender men" as a unit. The person isn't constructing an original phrase to describe a subset of men; they have heard "transgender men" somewhere and are talking about its referent. Equinox ◑ 18:46, 20 June 2020 (UTC)

RFV discussion: March–April 2023

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transgender

In diff I Rfv-sense "(very strictly, often offensive, proscribed) Having a gender (identity) which is opposite from the sex one was assigned at birth: being assigned male at birth but having a female gender, or vice versa; or, pertaining to such people." I personally would like to see some examples of this usage but this is not my area of expertise and I don't know what to look for. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 20:11, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

The only difference between this and the first sense is the use of "opposite" rather than "different", which seems to indicate that this is a nonbinary-exclusive definition. Only problem is, I'm not sure if that is a separate sense, or just a matter of context. To me, this would be like having a separate sense for LGBT+ defined as "(very strictly, often offensive, proscribed) same as sense 1, but excluding asexual people". Binarystep (talk) 23:11, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

This must be intended to cover uses like google books:"transgender or non-binary" (etc) where transgender, non-binary (and cisgender) are treated as categories on the same level, rather than non-binary being a subtype of transgender... but whether this is best handled with three(!) senses or just a usage note, I'm not sure. Senses 1 and 3 also seem not-that-distinct. Perhaps we could get by with tweaking sense 1 like Having a gender (identity) which is different from the sex one was assigned at birth: for example, being assigned male at birth but having a female or non-binary gender or vice versa; or, pertaining to such people. (Compare transsexual.) so it doesn't take a stance on non-binary people either way (just saying "for example" instead of trying to list possibilities exhaustively), then having a short usage note about how transgender is used as an umbrella term, rarely even including e.g. crossdressers (see cites under sense 3), but crossdressers are usually considered separate and sometimes non-binary people are considered a separate category on the same level, too. (?) - -sche (discuss) 23:57, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

UPDATE: I just now happened to find a discussion that seems to come close to sense 2: [3] @0:25 to 1:00 talks about transgender "in a binary sense, transition from one of two genders". I will try to see if anything in the conversation comes close to an example of sense 2, but I am not an expert and I totally see the concerns raised in the above two comments. I recommend other editors listening to the conversation to see if sense 2 or the other senses are used in this conversation. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 12:07, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

Brave dude. Equinox ◑ 13:12, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

@Binarystep, Equinox, -sche After reading your comments and listening to the above material, I decided to try to find some cites for sense 2 and found some material that definitiely seemed similar to sense 2 (though I'm not 100% sure). The sense may be cited(?). I would appreciate it if you all would check this out and move things or change things as you see fit. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 19:28, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

I agree the citations are using that sense; thanks for finding them. :) IMO the question (perhaps this is more an RFC / TR question) is, is it best to have a different definition-line for every slightly different scope someone uses the term with? I'm not sure; I don't know. As Binarystep says, it seems similar to how LGBT can be attested with a bunch of slightly different scopes (include asexuals or no? do bi people in "straight-passing" relationships count? etc). Or like how different jurisdictions and eras have different definitions of how much dairy is required for something to be ice cream, but is this best handled by a zillion definitions, or is ice cream basically one thing different times and places have slightly different definitions/standards of? (Some other ways of using transgender I could probably attest with effort are: very-broad use that even includes crossdressers, and conversely the way some people, including some trans people, historically used it only for pre-op folks, taking the view that once they had SRS they were no longer trans="on the other side of" anything since they'd now aligned their sex and gender (compare: if an object from beyond Jupiter is brought to reside permanently on this side of Jupiter, where the cisjovian objects are, is it still a transjovian object? in some contexts yes, but in others no). - -sche (discuss) 20:37, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

I emphasize that I'm a non-expert in this, but I have learned a lot trying to cite these words. I have made senses 1 and 2 subsenses of a strict sense. The wording of this strict sense parallels Merriam Webster's definition. And Merriam-Webster's 'especially' subsense uses 'opposite' in its definition. See: [4]. The broad sense three (now sense two) remains as is. To me, sense three (two) is outside the gender identity categories concepts. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 17:05, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

@Geographyinitiative would you consider the sense to be cited? Ioaxxere (talk) 17:36, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

@Ioaxxere Yes. I now think (95% chance) that the sense meets Wiktionary:Attestation and that the sense is a bona fide independent sense similar to the Merriam-Webster's "especially" subsense at [5]. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 17:58, 15 April 2023 (UTC) (Modified)

In that case RFV Passed Ioaxxere (talk) 18:01, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

Confusion with Intersex

While I have looked for cites of transgender related to the 'strict sense', I have seen material where transgender is (seemingly) defined like intersex: "Several years ago, Saitama University made news by announcing that they would specialize in treating people with transgender problems. Strictly speaking, transgendered people are those whose sexual attributes at birth are ambiguous. Sometimes these people are raised as one sex while feeling decidedly like the opposite." [6]. I have also seen people say 'don't confuse transgender and intersex' as here: "People sometimes confuse being transgender and being intersex. Intersex people have reproductive anatomy or genes that don’t fit typical definitions of male or female, which is often discovered at birth. Being transgender, meanwhile, has to do with your internal knowledge of your gender identity." [7]. I speculate that it may be possible that there is a proscribed sense of transgender as a synonym with intersex. I'm not sure of the line between 'common mistake' and 'proscribed sense', nor am I clear how common this usage is, but it's common enough that I've seen it a few times. I will leave this comment here to see if anyone picks up on this and for general reference if I or someone else sees more of this later. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 11:31, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Whether transitioning is required

@Geographyinitiative when you were looking for quotes, did you ever find quotes drawing a distinction between

1. Someone who identifies as a different/opposite gender.
2. Someone who transitions to a different/opposite gender.

It seems like the first quote on sense 1.1 could attest that. Ioaxxere (talk) 16:19, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

@Ioaxxere It was difficult for me to pin down the 1.1 sense, so to add this extra analysis of 'transition versus identify' would be another leap. What I would recommend is creating a group using the existing cites on Citations:transgender that you think would fall into a potential 'transition' sense or senses. If you can get a few like that, then it will be easier for me to understand what you are looking for and help. (For instance, I've got a 'broad sense' on the Citations page that is not yet clear enough to really make into a good subsense.) --Geographyinitiative (talk) 16:26, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

Mutliple Independent Origins

My guess on the origin of 'transgender' and its senses and the related words like transgenderal, transgendered, and transgenderist is that between 1960 and 1980, there were different authors thinking about different or similar issues who independently created the words, and that transgender occupied a space like the word crossgender. In daily life, I can make up a word with the prefix trans- or cross- or similar and be easily understood by others, and I assume that's whats happening here, until it bubbles up in the 1980s into several solidified senses. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 15:09, 19 July 2023 (UTC)