transgender

The story

1. Proto-Indo-European*terh₂-
2. Proto-Indo-European*térh₂t
3. Proto-Indo-European*tr̥h₂ónts
4. Proto-Indo-European*tr̥h₂n̥ts
5. Proto-Italic*trāns
6. Proto-Italic*trāns-
7. Latintrans-
8. Englishtrans-
9. Proto-Indo-European*ǵenh₁-
10. Proto-Indo-European*ǵénh₁os
11. Proto-Italic*genos
12. Latingenus
13. Old Frenchgendre
14. Middle Englishgendre
15. Englishgender
16. English todaytransgender

The adjective sense is derived from trans- (“extending across, through, or over”) + gender, modelled after transsexual (adjective) and probably modified from transgenderism which was coined by the American psychiatrist John F. Oliven (1915–1975) in 1965; the terms transgender, transgenderal, transgendered, transgenderist, and similar terms arose in the decades after this. By the 1990s, the word transgender had acquired its current senses, and had also largely displaced the earlier term transsexual: see the usage notes. The noun and verb senses are derived from the adjective. Regarding noun sense 2 (“synonym of transgenderism”), compare transsex (noun).

First known use, by meaning

• from 1974 Of a person: having a gender (identity) which is different from one's assigned sex; that is, the identity of a trans man, trans woman, or someone non-binary, for example, agender, bigender, or third-gender.
• from 1974 Of a person: having a gender (identity) which is opposite from the sex one was assigned at birth: being assigned male but having a female gender, or vice versa (that is, not including a non-binary identity).
• from mid 20th c. Synonym of crossgender (“across multiple genders”).