1. Anti-essentialism: The belief that identities such as gender and sexuality are not innate but are shaped by social constructs and cultural contexts.
2. Cisnormativity: The assumption that everyone's gender identity aligns with the sex assigned to them at birth, often leading to the marginalization of transgender individuals.
3. Heteronormativity: The societal expectation that heterosexuality is the norm, which reinforces binary notions of gender and sexuality and marginalizes non-heteronormative identities.
4. Intersectionality: A framework that examines how various social identities (like race, gender, sexuality) overlap and interact, influencing individuals' experiences and challenges.
5. LGBTQI: An acronym representing diverse sexual orientations and gender identities: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and Intersex.
6. Performativity: The concept that gender and sexuality are enacted through repeated behaviours and expressions rather than being fixed identities.
7. Queer: A term that challenges normative categories of sexuality and gender, embracing fluidity and non-conformity.
8. Queer theory: An interdisciplinary approach that critiques binary categories of gender and sexuality, highlighting fluidity, diversity, and social construction.
9. Social construction: The idea that societal norms and cultural practices shape our understanding of identities, rather than these identities being biologically determined.
10. Transgender: Refers to individuals whose gender identity differs from the sex assigned to them at birth, encompassing a wide range of identities and expressions.