Defining Gender, Sexuality & Identity : Agender/bigender

Introduction

According to the Ecology Global Network there are approximately 360,000 births per day in this world. When someone is born in a hospital one of the first things the doctors do is assign the child a sex based off of the biological parts present. From there the rest of the world takes over in making assumptions about the child’s gender based off of the assigned sex. As Sam Killerman said in The Social Justice Advocate’s Handbook: A Guide to Gender, “Gender identity is our internal response to a social construction that attempts to make a connection between a person’s biological makeup and their eventual role in society.” Gender is a socially constructed idea and often in this society it is assumed that one’s gender matches their assigned sex, or it is assumed that both of the previous match up with the individual’s gender expression. From there people also assume that one’s sexual or romantic orientations fit into neat normative boxes that coincide with gender expression and identity, and sex. In actuality though, these assumptions just are not reliable. With 360,000 births a day there will be some babies that are not born just male or female, there will be some babies that don’t identify as men or women, and there will be some babies that are not attracted to the opposite sex. The goal of this blog is to define and discuss a few of the many identities and orientations that people possess and to show that as a society we simplify topics we should not. There is beauty in diversity, so let’s shine a light upon it.

http://www.ecology.com/birth-death-rates/

Monday, April 13, 2015

Agender/bigender

Gender is a person’s sense of being a man or a woman, and their private understanding of their gender is their gender identity. Non-binary and transgendered are two umbrella terms which cover a large continuum of gender identities. Someone who is bigender can exist exclusively and simultaneously at two distinct points on the spectrum. They experience two genders in one body and may move between the two genders. Someone that is bigender may identify with being a boy and/or a girl, they may identify with being a boy and/or gender neutral, or they may identify with two of the many genders along the spectrum.

Bigender pride flag

Somewhat in the opposite direction are people that identify as agender (gender-blank/genderfree/genderless/non-gendered). Some agendered people feel as though they have no gender identity, while others feel that they simply have a neutral gender identity and that agender is an identity within itself.