Nonbinary Wiki

History of nonbinary gender: Difference between revisions

No edit summary
(restructuring and rewriting the beginning of the article to make it more appropriate to the wiki)
Tag: 2017 source edit
 
(143 intermediate revisions by 25 users not shown)
Line 1: Line 1:
This article on the '''history of nonbinary gender''' should focus on events directly or indirectly concerning people with [[nonbinary]] [[gender identity|gender identities]]. It should not be about [[LGBT]] history in general. However, this history will likely need to give dates for a few events about things other than nonbinary gender, such as major events that made more visibility of [[transgender]] people in general, [[gender variant]] people from early history who may or may not have been what we think of
{{Content warning|<translate><!--T:1--> some troubling events that could be traumatic for some readers. Some historical quotes use language that is now seen as offensive</translate>}}
<translate><!--T:2-->
Gender variance has a long history [[gender-variant identities worldwide|all around the world]], from the first known records of written language to modern day. What gender variance means and how it's viewed in society has changed throughout history, and the words used to describe it has changed as well; while the word "nonbinary" itself is a relatively new term, the concept itself has existed since ancient times. This page summarizes the history of gender that doesn't fit the [[gender binary|binary]], irrespective of how it's called.


==Tips==
==Antiquity== <!--T:10-->
* In Mesopotamian mythology, among the earliest written records of humanity, there are references to types of people who are neither male nor female. Sumerian and Akkadian tablets from the 2nd millennium BCE and 1700 BCE describe how the gods created these people, their roles in society, and words for different kinds of them. These included eunuchs, women who couldn't or weren't allowed to have children, men who live as women, intersex people, gay people, and others.<ref>Murray, Stephen O., and Roscoe, Will (1997). ''Islamic Homosexualities: Culture, History, and Literature.'' New York: New York University Press.</ref><ref>Nissinen, Martti (1998). ''Homoeroticism in the Biblical World'', Translated by Kirsi Stjedna. Fortress Press (November 1998) p. 30. ISBN|0-8006-2985-X<br>See also: Maul, S. M. (1992). ''Kurgarrû und assinnu und ihr Stand in der babylonischen Gesellschaft.'' Pp. 159–71 in Aussenseiter und Randgruppen. Konstanze Althistorische Vorträge und Forschungern 32. Edited by V. Haas. Konstanz: Universitätsverlag.</ref><ref>Leick, Gwendolyn (1994). ''Sex and Eroticism in Mesopotamian Literature''. Routledge. New York.</ref></translate>
[[File:Sekhet hieroglyphs.jpg|thumb|<translate><!--T:11--> The word "sekhet" in ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs.</translate><ref name="Brustman">Mark Brustman. "The Third Gender in Ancient Egypt." ''"Born Eunuchs" Home Page and Library.'' 1999. https://people.well.com/user/aquarius/egypt.htm [https://web.archive.org/web/20230510151854/https://people.well.com/user/aquarius/egypt.htm Archived] on 17 July 2023</ref>]]
<translate>
<!--T:12-->
* {{#if:1|{{#section:Gender variance in spirituality|SekhetDefinition}}}}


Here are some tips for writing respectfully about historical gender variant people whose actual preferred names, pronouns, and gender identities might not be known.
<!--T:13-->
* Many cultures and ethnic groups have concepts of [[gender-variant identities worldwide|traditional gender-variant roles]], with a history of them going back to antiquity. These gender identities and roles are often analogous to nonbinary identity, as they don't fit into the Western idea of the [[gender binary]] roles. The [[Hijra]] of South Asian countries including India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh date back to 400 BCE or 300 CE, where they were mentioned in the ''Kama Sutra.'' The Hijra are feminine eunuchs who consider themselves neither male nor female. The Scythians, who were Eurasian nomadic horseriders, were well-known to other civilizations for honoring gender-variant people as priests and warriors. The Scythians invented the world's earliest known hormone therapy as far back as the 7th century BCE, using licorice root as an antiandrogen,<ref name="enarees kaldera">Raven Kaldera. "Ergi: The Way of the Third." ''Northern-Tradition Shamanism.'' https://web.archive.org/web/20130501152328/http://www.northernshamanism.org/shamanic-techniques/gender-sexuality/ergi-the-way-of-the-third.html</ref> and mare's urine as an oestrogen, much as is used in the modern oestrogen medication, Premarin.<ref name="enarees savage 74">Helen Savage. (2006) "Changing sex? : transsexuality and Christian theology." Doctoral thesis, Durham University. http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/3364/ [https://web.archive.org/web/20230415224247/http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/3364/ Archived] on 17 July 2023</ref> Hundreds of pre-colonial Native American cultures recognized various kinds of gender roles (today called by the umbrella term [[Two-Spirit]]) who did not fit into the Western gender binary. The [[māhū]] of Hawaii and Tahiti were also pre-colonial genders outside male and female. As far back as six centuries ago, the Bugis people of Indonesia have recognized five genders, one of which, called [[Bissu]], is a combination of all the genders, even if they are not physically intersex.<ref name=ABC>{{cite news|publisher=Australian Broadcasting Corporation News|first=Farid M|last=Ibrahim|url=https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-27/indonesia-fifth-gender-might-soon-disappear/10846570|accessdate=27 February 2019|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190227045350/https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-27/indonesia-fifth-gender-might-soon-disappear/10846570|archive-date=27 February 2019|title=Homophobia and rising Islamic intolerance push Indonesia's intersex bissu priests to the brink|date=27 February 2019}}</ref> As far back as the 1st century CE, classical Judaism has recognized six genders/sexes, with distinct prohibitions for each.<ref>Robbie Medwed. "More Than Just Male and Female: The Six Genders in Classical Judaism." ''Sojourn'' (blog). June 01, 2015. Retrieved July 14, 2015. https://web.archive.org/web/20150714011440/http://www.sojourngsd.org/blog/sixgenders</ref>


* '''Dead names.''' It is disrespectful to call a transgender person by their former name ("dead name") rather than the name that they chose for themself. Some consider their dead name a secret that shouldn't be put in public at all. For living transgender people in particular, this history should show only their chosen names, not their dead names. In this history, some deceased historical transgender persons may have their birth names shown in addition to their chosen names, in cases where it is not known which name they preferred, or where it is otherwise impossible to find information about that person, if one wants to research their history. This should be written in the form of "Chosen Name (née Birth Name)." If history isn't sure which name that person earnestly preferred, write it in the form of "Name, or Other Name."
==Eleventh century== <!--T:14-->
* '''Pronouns.''' It is disrespectful to call a person by pronouns other than those that they ask for. Some historical persons whose preferred pronouns aren't known should be called here by [[Pronouns#No pronouns|no pronouns]]. If this isn't possible, [[Pronouns#They|they]] pronouns.
* '''Words for a person's gender, assigned and otherwise.''' It is disrespectful to label a person's gender otherwise than they ask for, but it's not always possible to do so. In the case of some historical people, history has recorded how they lived, and what [[gender assigned at birth|gender they were assigned at birth]], but not how they preferred to label their gender identity. For example, it's not known whether certain historical people who were assigned female at birth ([[AFAB]]) lived as men because they identified as men (were [[transgender men]]), or because it was the only way to have a career in that time and place (and were gender non-conforming [[cisgender women]]). This should be mentioned in the more respectful form of, for example, "assigned male at birth ([[AMAB]]), lived as a woman," rather than "really a man, passed as a woman." For another example, writing "a military doctor discovered Smith was AFAB" is more respectful than saying "a military doctor discovered Smith was really a woman." For people who lived before the word "transgender" was created, it may be more suitable to call them "gender variant" rather than "transgender." On the other hand, if we have enough information about such a person, we may do best by such people by describing them with the terminology that they most likely would have used for their gender identity if they lived in the present day, with our language.


==Wanted events in this time-line==
<!--T:15-->
* The Anglo-Saxon word ''wæpen-wifestre'', or ''wæpned-wifestre'' (Anglo-Saxon, ''wæpen'' "sword," "penis," "male" (or ''wæpned'' "weaponed," "with a penis," "male") + ''wif'' woman, + ''estre'' feminine suffix, thus "woman with a weapon," "woman with a penis," or "man woman") was defined in an eleventh-century glossary (Antwerp Plantin-Moretus 32) as meaning "hermaphrodite." The counterpart of this word, ''wæpned-mann,'' simply meant "a person armed with a sword" or "male person."<ref>Dana Oswald, ''Monsters, Gender and Sexuality in Medieval English Literature.'' Rochester, NY: D.S. Brewer, 2010. p. 93.</ref><ref name="ClarkMedieval">David Clark. ''Between medieval men: Male friendship and desire in early medieval English literature.'' Oxford University Press, 2009. P. 63-65.</ref> ''Wæpen-wifestre'' is known to be a synonym for "scrat" (intersex).<ref>''Catholicon Anglicum: An English-Latin Word-book, dated 1483, volume 30.'' Accessed via Google Books: https://books.google.com/books?id=I7wKAAAAYAAJ&dq=%22W%C3%A6pen-wifestre%22&pg=PA325#v=onepage&q=%22W%C3%A6pen-wifestre%22&f=false [https://web.archive.org/web/20221213084019/https://books.google.com/books?id=I7wKAAAAYAAJ&dq=%22W%C3%A6pen-wifestre%22&pg=PA325 Archived] on 17 July 2023</ref> Another synonym given for ''wæpen-wifestre'' is ''bæddel,'' an which also means intersex, but also feminine men, from which the word "bad" is thought to be derived, due to its use as a slur.<ref>"bad (adj.)" ''Online Etymology Dictionary.'' https://www.etymonline.com/word/bad [https://web.archive.org/web/20230320040139/https://www.etymonline.com/word/bad Archived] on 17 July 2023</ref> The related word ''bæddling'' was used in eleventh-century laws for men who had sex with men in a receptive role.<ref name="ClarkMedieval" /> Additional meanings of ''wæpen-wifestre'' are possible. When ''wæpen-wifestre'' is read as "woman with a penis," it could describe a feminine man, a man who has sex with men, or a transgender woman. When read as "woman with a sword," it could refer to a warrior woman. When read as "man woman," it could mean not only an intersex person, but also people who transgressed the gender binary that seems to have been the rule in Anglo-Saxon England, as far as is known from limited literature from that era. From this range of meanings that the word potentially covers, it's possible that ''wæpen-wifestre'' may have been a general category for intersex, queer, and gender-variant people in Britain, during the time that was contemporary to Beowulf.


Please help fill out this time-line if you can add information of these kinds:
==Seventeenth century== <!--T:16-->
* Events in the movement for keeping the genders of babies undisclosed.
* Events concerning [[nonbinary celebrities]], and historical persons who clearly stated they were neither female nor male, or both, or androgynes, etc.
* Skim nonbinary blogs looking for past and current historical events.
* Events that show that transgender and especially nonbinary gender identities existed long before the twentieth century.
* Changes in the use of gendered versus gender-neutral language.


<!--T:17-->
* A blog post by the Merriam Webster dictionary editors says, "In the 17th century, English laws concerning inheritance sometimes referred to people who didn’t fit a gender binary using the pronoun ''it'', which, while dehumanizing, was conceived of as being the most grammatically fit answer to gendered pronouns around then."<ref>“Words We’re Watching: Singular 'They:' Though singular 'they' is old, 'they' as a nonbinary pronoun is new—and useful.” ''Merriam Webster.'' https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/singular-nonbinary-they Captured November 2017. [https://web.archive.org/web/20230618001603/https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/singular-nonbinary-they Archived] on 17 July 2023</ref> This is an example of people being considered legally outside of male and female. ''Editors at this wiki would appreciate more information and sources about the laws in question, their dates, and what categories of people they referred to. (Unborn children? Intersex people? People who didn't conform to gender norms?)''


==Antiquity==
<!--T:18-->
* In Mesopotamian mythology, among the earliest written records of humanity, there are references to types of people who are neither male nor female. Sumerian and Akkadian tablets from the 2nd millennium BCE and 1700 BCE describe how the gods created these people, their roles in society, and words for different kinds of them. These included eunuchs, women who couldn't or weren't allowed to have children, men who live as women, intersex people, gay people, and others.<ref>Murray, Stephen O., and Roscoe, Will (1997). ''Islamic Homosexualities: Culture, History, and Literature.'' New York: New York University Press.</ref><ref>Nissinen, Martti (1998). ''Homoeroticism in the Biblical World'', Translated by Kirsi Stjedna. Fortress Press (November 1998) p. 30. ISBN|0-8006-2985-X<br>See also: Maul, S. M. (1992). ''Kurgarrû und assinnu und ihr Stand in der babylonischen Gesellschaft.'' Pp. 159–71 in Aussenseiter und Randgruppen. Konstanze Althistorische Vorträge und Forschungern 32. Edited by V. Haas. Konstanz: Universitätsverlag.</ref><ref>Leick, Gwendolyn (1994). ''Sex and Eroticism in Mesopotamian Literature''. Routledge. New York.</ref>
* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas(ine)_Hall Thomas Hall, who apparently had an equal preference for the birth-name Thomasine] (c.1603 – after 1629), was an English servant in colonial Virginia. Hall was raised as a girl, and then presented as a man in order to enter the military.<ref>Norton, Mary Beth, "Communal Definitions of Gendered Identity in Colonial America", Ronald Hoffman, Mechal Sobel, Fredrika J. Teute (eds) ''Through a Glass Darkly: Reflections on Personal Identity in Early America'' (University of North Carolina Press, 1997), pp. 40ff. </ref> After leaving the military, Hall freely alternated between feminine and masculine attire from one day to the next, until Hall was accused of having sex with both men and women. Whether someone was legally a man or a woman would result in different punishments for that. Several physical examinations disagreed on the details of Hall's sex, and concluded that