So I work to make my stories more diverse (different races, genders, sexualities, disabilities, etc) and I wanted to include more multigender labels. Do you have any suggestions for lesser known labels that could use some representation?
Hey anon! So happy to see this ask. I myself am a storyteller, an artist and a writer at my core, so I tend to also include various different identities with my characters.
So, I do want to say, it's awesome to start with a certain label or give a character a label that just feels like it could be them, but I usually like to analyze a character's experience and relationship with their gender. That's also just because I loveee to go in depth in my characters' psychology, and I like to imagine how it feels for them. For example, Ill show here some rambly notes I wrote for a character of mine, Pandora, a genderfluid boygirl.
Pandora feels a little like a boy. Thats a pretty much constant, partially, she's a boy. Now rhe rest of her gender, rhats harder to describe and fluctuates more often. Its feminine, partially connected to girl and its a bigger feeling than boy, usually bigger and more intense, but partially it's nothing. This feeling very much changes, fluctuating between intense girl feeling and then nothingness, which we would describe as agender. The agender part is small, partially always there, and that part of her gender, girl/agender is hard to define. She doesn't properly feel like “a girl” wholly at a time. She doenst usually feel completely like a girl, there's always an undefined part of jt, liks it trails off into nothingness. When the girl feeling subsides a lot, the agender one taking over, her average (bfvskdbskdjsk) gender falls somewhere in between neutral and boy, and she likes to dress more masculine then. Being called dude or other type of adjectives like rhat I think fills her with a huge euphoria, though she rarely uses he/him pronouns, she's a she/her kind of boy. She likes the idea of that very much, she understands her gender is inherently queer, loopsided and out of boxes and she likes that part of herself, its not smth she'll hide, I think probably her family taught her a lot abr self acceptance here. But anywya, she enjoys the thought of mixing up the pronouns and presentation. Pronouns dont matter all that much to her. People who are close to her tend towards she/her, most and mostly rumouers tend to use they/them, a few use he/him but thats when they get confused. I think the euphoria comes from that masculine part of her gender being recognised. I think she lights up in a way she doesn't with anything else and she:s ecstatic and giggling about it for days.
I dont do this kind of analysis with all my characters, but in this case, where I knew I wanted to make a queer character whose relationship with gender was not immediate to describe, writing it down helped a lot.
In any case, the point is, giving labels just for the sake of it is fine, but if you're interested in creating a character that's got more depth to them, try and think how they experience things, beyond the simple just the definition of the label. Basically try and see from their perspective, even without any access to labels, what would they describe their gender as? What would make them happy and what would cause them distaste? Do all people see them the same way or does the perception of their gender change based on who's looking? Explore their specific and unique experience! Itll give you a far greater understanding of the character.
As far as multigender experiences go, there is a ton of variety in the way multiple genders can be seen as belonging to the person from birth or changing over time. Multigender as a label includes the possibility of the genders shifting over time too.
Anyway, you asked specifically about labels so I shall respond with what I find! As I dont know every single label but I often find myself doing research on them. Without further ado:
Multigender: having multiple gender identities, either at the same time or moving between different gender identities at different times. It's an umbrella term, but may also be used as a specific gender identity.
Bigender: two specific gender identities, at the same time or different times, although important to note that bi historically often meant 'more than one' and so may be used synonymously with multigender.
Trigender: experiencing three gender identities, either fluidly or at the same time.
Polygender: poly meaning 'many' and therefore indicating someone who experiences several genders but not all of them.
Pangender/Omnigender: pan and omni mean 'all', these labels indicate experiences an uncountable amount of gender identities, a vast spectrum, or their gender identity simply a one all encompassing identity. This definition only excludes any gender identities that are culturally specific or specific to certain groups (like intergender/intersex exclusive gender identities, identities influenced by neurodivergency) that the person using the label is not part of.
Ambigender: experiencing two genders but without any fluidity or variation in intensity.
Genderfluid: commonly put under the multigender label since it indicates fluidity between multiple gender identities, regardless of how often or between how many.
Genderflux: the term indicates a gender identity whose intensity varies over time.
Fluidflux: a mix of the previous two experiences, where both gender identity and the intensity of said gender changes.
Multiflux: specifically describes someone who experiences multiple genders at the same time, which vary in intensity. But the actual gender identities dont change.
Demigender: the term indicates a partial connection with a certain gender. Can be considered multigender or not, depends on who you ask.
Demiflux: indicates someone who experiences a gender or part of gender that is static, while another changes in intensity.
Demifluid: indicates someone who experiences a gender or part of gender that is static, while another part is fluid.
Ill end this here, but there are tons of more specific labels, like genderfaun and genderfae and genderflor, who indicate fluidity between certain genders, but excludes others of certain alignments (respectively, woman aligned, man aligned and binary aligned), and labels like pangirl/panboy/panenby, indicating a stronger attachment to certain gender identities over others, and similarly so paragirl, paraboy and paraenby, where there's a lack of gender identity but feeling really close to a certain gender.
Also labels like fem/masc/fluid/flux/pan/etc can be tacked onto various identities to create specific sub-labels. Hope this gave you some inspiration anon!
