Transsexuality

A transsexual (sometimes transexual) person establishes a permanent identity with the opposite gender to their assigned (usually at birth) sex. Transsexual men and women make or desire to make a transition from their birth sex to that of the opposite sex, with some type of medical alteration (gender reassignment therapy) to their body. The stereotypical explanation is of a "woman trapped in a man's body" or vice versa, although many in the transsexual community reject this formulation.

Terminology

Gender terms used to describe transsexual people always relate to the target. For example, a transsexual man is someone who was identified as female at birth owing to his genitals, but identifies as a man and who is transitioning, or has transitioned, to a male social gender role and a male-identified body (an alternative term is female-to-male transsexual or transman; compare also transwoman).

Related Topics:
Genitals - Transman - Transwoman

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One common abbreviation used to clarify involves versions of "assigned-to-target", i.e. female-to-male, or male-to-female. This helps avoid confusion caused by outdated medical terminology. These terms are abbreviated with several variants, so female-to-male might be expressed as F to M, FtM, F2M, F-M, F>M, etc.

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Those researching the topic should be aware that older medical texts often referred to the person's original sex; in other words, referring to a M2F transsexual as a "transsexual male." This usage is now sharply deprecated and little-used.

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Among the transsexual community, the short form trans is more commonly used, e.g. trans guy, trans dyke, trans folk. Some also use the somewhat more controversial term tranny, e.g. tranny boy. Both abbreviated forms are also used by non-transsexual transgendered people, although "tranny" is often considered offensive if used by those outside the community.

Related Topics:
Tranny - Transgender

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Some people prefer to spell transexual with one s, in an attempt to divorce the word from the realm of psychiatry and medicine and place it in the realm of identity, but this trend is most common in the United States and, for example, is almost never used in the United Kingdom.

Related Topics:
United States - United Kingdom

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Some people prefer the term transsexed over transsexual, as they believe the term sexual found in transsexual is misleading. Another justification made for this preference is that they feel it is more in line with the term intersex, as more transsexual groups are welcoming them because they feel both groups have much in common. It is by some definitions also possible to be both intersexed and transsexed. Other attempts to avoid the misleading -sexual have been the increasing acceptance of transgender or trans* and in some areas, transidentity.

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