G&STC Director Jesse Kahn Talks to Gabrielle Kassel at Healthline about What it Means to be Cisgender
Check out G&STC’s Director Jesse Kahn talking with Gabrielle Kassel at Healthline about what it means to be cisgender.
What’s the short answer?
Good old Merriam Webster defines someone cisgender as a person whose gender identity corresponds with the sex the person had or was identified as having at birth. And that’s spot on, according to Jesse Kahn, LCSW, CST, director and sex therapist at The Gender & Sexuality Therapy Center in New York City.
Cisgender and transgender
The prefix ‘cis’ means on the same side. So, someone who is cisgender has a gender that is on the same side as the sex they were assigned at birth.
The prefix ‘trans’ means on the other side. So, someone who is transgender has a gender that is on a different side from the sex they were assigned at birth.
Or as Kahn explains, “While a cisgender person is someone whose gender identity is the same as their gender assumed at birth, a transgender person is someone whose gender identity or expression differs from their gender assigned/assumed at birth.”
Typically, cisgender and transgender are considered binary categories. There’s often an assumption that someone must be either one or the other. But not all people feel affirmed by either term.
Cisgender and nonbinary
“A nonbinary person is someone whose gender doesn’t fit within the binary of ‘man’ and ‘woman’,” says Kahn.
Some nonbinary people see their gender as existing between the two binary genders, while other nonbinary people see their gender as existing totally outside of the binary genders.
Most people who are nonbinary, however, do not identify with the term “cisgender.” But that doesn’t necessarily mean nonbinary people are transgender.
“Some people who are nonbinary are also trans, and some people who are trans are nonbinary, but some people who are nonbinary don’t use the word transgender, and so on,” Kahn says.
More from G&STC Director Jesse Kahn on this topic:
Gender identity is what we call ourselves with regards to our gender identity. Gender expression is the ways we communicate and convey that gender including things like the clothing we choose to wear, how we style our hair, and so on. Ultimately, it’s important to remember that gender expression is how you express your gender and is not dependent on already existing definitions or norms of what is masculine, adrogynous, feminine, etc.
Your gender is up to you - you can use the words that already exist or exist outside of already existing words.
[With regard to nonbinary people] Ultimately, it’s important to not assume. A nonbinary person is someone whose gender does not fit within the binary of “man” and “woman.”