Transgender

What is Transgender?

Gender Identity refers to a person's internal understanding of their own gender. For Transgender individuals, their gender identity conflicts with the sex they were assigned at birth. Many transgender individuals will go through social, legal, and medical processes in order to align their gender with their gender identity.

Cisgender refers to an individual whose gender identity aligns with their sex assigned at birth. Transgender refers to people whose gender identity conflicts with the sex they were assigned at birth. Many transgender people transition to align their gender expression with their gender identity.

What is Transphobia?

Transphobia is the feeling of hate or prejudice against a trans individual. It includes a range of negative attitudes, feelings, or actions towards transgender people, or the transgender community. Often, these feelings come from either misinformation or misguided notions about transgender individuals.

What is Transitioning?

Transitioning refers to the social, legal, and medical processes that may transgender individuals go through in order to better align their bodies and gender expression with their gender identity. 

Transgender individuals may change their pronouns and their name in order to better express their gender identity, this may involve even legally changing their name. It is best to always refer to them by their preferred pronouns, and never use an individual's "dead name". A dead name refers to the name used by a transgender individual before they transitioned.

Additional Resources

HRC - Transgender Resources