1. Home
2. Idioms
3. gender

gender

---

---

gender bender

1. One who dresses and/or behaves in the manner or style of the opposite sex. Tom works as an accountant during the week, but he has a performance routine as a gender bender on the weekend.

2. One who challenges, denies, or explores the borders or limitations of gender identity, typically through means such as activism, transvestitism, academic discourse, etc., or a combination thereof. Some of the leading academic gender benders are gathering this week for a summit on transgender rights.

See also: bender, gender

gender bending

1. modifier (hyphenated and used before a noun) Literally, causing a change in the sexual assignment of a person or animal. Scientists are developing a gender-bending chemical procedure to induce artificial hermaphroditism in insects.

2. modifier (hyphenated and used before a noun) Assuming the roles, appearance, or manner of the opposite sex. This novel features a gender-bending protagonist who, at various stages in the story, moves between gender identities.

3. noun The discourse or practice of challenging, denying, or exploring the borders or limitations of gender identity, typically through means such as activism, transvestitism, academic discourse, etc., or a combination thereof. Some of the leading academics in gender bending are gathering this week for a summit on transgender rights.

See also: bend, gender

play the gender card

To dismiss or discredit an opinion, argument, position, action, decision, etc., as being the product of prejudice against one's gender. The candidate played the gender card as an explanation for why her polls were much lower recently, claiming that the media has been giving her less visibility than her male opponents simply because she is a woman. I hate it when casual misogynists try to brush off legitimate criticism by claiming that you're just "playing the gender card."

See also: card, gender, play

gender gap

A broad difference between men and women, as in There is still an enormous gender gap in the wages of unskilled labor. This expression at first referred to the difference between men and women in voting preferences. It has since been extended to other areas. [1970s]

See also: gap, gender

gender-bender

1. n. a device that changes electrical plugs or sockets to the opposite gender—male to female, female to male. You need what’s called a gender-bender to match those plugs.

2. mod. having to do?with something that obscures male/female distinctions. Those gender-bender hairstyles can be confusing.