A person may be considered to be a transgender person if their gender identity is inconsistent or not culturally associated with the sex they were assigned at birth and consequently also with the gender role and social status that is typically associated with that sex. They may have, or may intend to establish, a new gender status that accords with their gender identity. Transsexual is generally considered a subset of transgender, but some transsexual people reject being labelled transgender.
Gender dysphoria (GD) is the distress a person feels due to a mismatch between their gender identity and their sex assigned at birth. People with gender dysphoria are typically transgender. The diagnostic label gender identity disorder (GID) was used until 2013 with the release of the DSM-5. The condition was renamed to remove the stigma associated with the term disorder.
Transphobia encompasses a range of negative attitudes, feelings or actions toward transgender people or transness in general. Transphobia can include fear, aversion, hatred, violence, anger, or discomfort felt or expressed towards people who do not conform to social gender expectations. It is often expressed alongside homophobic views and hence is often considered an aspect of homophobia. Transphobia is a type of prejudice and discrimination, similar to racism and sexism, and transgender people of color are often subjected to all three forms of discrimination at once.
Sex reassignment surgery (SRS), also known as gender reassignment surgery (GRS) and several other names, is a surgical procedure by which a transgender person's physical appearance and function of their existing sexual characteristics are altered to resemble those socially associated with their identified gender. It is part of a treatment for gender dysphoria in transgender people.
Gender identity is the personal sense of one's own gender. Gender identity can correlate with a person's assigned sex at birth or can differ from it. Gender expression typically reflects a person's gender identity, but this is not always the case. While a person may express behaviors, attitudes, and appearances consistent with a particular gender role, such expression may not necessarily reflect their gender identity. The term gender identity was originally coined by Robert J. Stoller in 1964.
Sex reassignment therapy is the medical aspect of gender transitioning, that is, modifying one's characteristics to better suit one's gender identity. It can consist of hormone therapy to modify secondary sex characteristics, sex reassignment surgery to alter primary sex characteristics, and other procedures altering appearance, including permanent hair removal for trans women.
A trans man is a man who was assigned female at birth. The label of transgender man is not always interchangeable with that of transsexual man, although the two labels are often used in this way. Transgender is an umbrella term that includes different types of gender variant people. Many trans men choose to undergo surgical or hormonal transition, or both, to alter their appearance in a way that aligns with their gender identity or alleviates gender dysphoria.
Transitioning is the process of changing one's gender presentation and/or sex characteristics to accord with one's internal sense of gender identity – the idea of what it means to be a man or a woman, or to be non-binary or genderqueer. For transgender and transsexual people, this process commonly involves reassignment therapy, with their gender identity being opposite that of their birth-assigned sex and gender. Transitioning might involve medical treatment, but it does not always involve it. Cross-dressers, drag queens, and drag kings tend not to transition, since their variant gender presentations are (usually) only adopted temporarily.
Blanchard's transsexualism typology is a psychological typology of gender dysphoria, transsexualism, and fetishistic transvestism, created by Ray Blanchard through the 1980s and 1990s, building on the work of prior researchers, including his colleague Kurt Freund. Blanchard categorized trans women into two groups: homosexual transsexuals who are attracted exclusively to men, and who seek sex reassignment surgery because they are feminine in both behavior and appearance; and autogynephilic transsexuals who are sexually aroused at the idea of having a female body. Blanchard's typology broke from earlier ones in that neither group was considered falsely transsexual; both autogynephilic and homosexual transsexuals were shown to benefit from transition. Before Blanchard, the idea that some types were not transsexual at all was a recurring theme in scholarly literature.
Historically, studies assumed that transgender sexuality might be distinct from traditional human sexuality. For much of the 20th century, what was described as "transsexualism" was believed to be sexual in nature, and so was defined along these terms.
In some cultures, most particularly in South America, travesti is a gender identity describing people assigned male at birth who take on a feminine gender role and gender expression, especially through the use of feminizing body modifications such as hormone replacement therapy, breast implants, and silicone injections. Travestis are sometimes described as transgender or as male crossdressers, and while they are considered distinct from trans women, their actual identity can be hard to define without over-generalizing.
Transgender people have a gender identity or gender expression that differs from their sex assigned at birth. Some transgender people who desire medical assistance to transition from one sex to another identify as transsexual. Transgender, often shortened as trans, is also an umbrella term. In addition to including people whose gender identity is the opposite of their assigned sex, it may include people who are not exclusively masculine or feminine. Other definitions of transgender also include people who belong to a third gender, or else conceptualize transgender people as a third gender. The term transgender may be defined very broadly to include cross-dressers.
Transsexual people experience a gender identity that is inconsistent with their assigned sex and desire to permanently transition to the sex or gender with which they identify, usually seeking medical assistance to help them align their body with their identified sex or gender.
A trans woman is a woman who was assigned male at birth. Trans women may experience gender dysphoria and may transition; this process commonly includes hormone replacement therapy and sometimes sex reassignment surgery, which can bring relief and resolve feelings of gender dysphoria. Trans women may be heterosexual, bisexual, homosexual, asexual, or identify with other terms.
Transgender hormone therapy, also sometimes called cross-sex hormone therapy, is a form of hormone therapy in which sex hormones and other hormonal medications are administered to transgender or gender nonconforming individuals for the purpose of more closely aligning their secondary sexual characteristics with their gender identity. This form of hormone therapy is given as one of two types, based on whether the goal of treatment is feminization or masculinization:
Transgender health care is how medical institutions, communities and individuals approach the care of transgender people. It includes the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of physical and mental health conditions, as well as sex reassignment therapies. This article covers gender variance, sex reassignment therapy, health risks, access to healthcare for trans people in different countries around the world, and specific information about transgender youth and transgender older adults.
The following outline offers an overview and guide to LGBT topics.
Transgender rights in Australia enjoy legal recognition and protection under federal and state/territory laws, but the requirements for gender recognition vary depending on the jurisdiction. For example, birth certificates and driver licences are regulated by the states and territories, while Medicare and passports are matters for the Commonwealth.
Transgender rights in Argentina have been lauded by many as some of the world's most progressive. The country "has one of the world's most comprehensive transgender rights laws": its Gender Identity Law, passed in 2012, made Argentina the "only country that allows people to change their gender identities without facing barriers such as hormone therapy, surgery or psychiatric diagnosis that labels them as having an abnormality". In 2015, the World Health Organization cited Argentina as an exemplary country for providing transgender rights. Leading transgender activists include Lohana Berkins, Diana Sacayán, Mariela Muñoz, María Belén Correa, Marlene Wayar, Claudia Pía Baudracco, Susy Shock and Lara Bertolini.
The issue of transgender people and military service in South Korea is a complex topic, regarding gender identity and bodily autonomy.
