androgynous

comparative more androgynous · superlative most androgynous · alternative androgenous

1. Possessing the sex organs of both sexes.First known use the earlier 17th c.
2. Pertaining to a feature or characteristic that is not definitively of either sex.

   Nicknames like Pat, Sam, and Chris are androgynous, used by both men and women.

   3 more examples

   And I was taught that to be an actress, one should be fashionable, and to be fashionable is to be androgynous. And I am androgynous not less than David Bowie himself.

   1982, Slava Tsukerman, Anne Carlisle, Nina V. Kerova, Liquid Sky, spoken by Margaret (Anne Carlisle)

   My name is androgynous, in pronunciation at least – Lauren sounds like the more masculine Loren.

   1993, Octavia E. Butler, Parable of the Sower, HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP (2019), page 199

   All the men call me Kim. Suitably androgynous, I suppose. But all the sisters in Bugis St call me by my initials KC.

   2001 [1992], Russell Heng, Lest the Demons Get to Me, revised version January 2001, via National Library Board Singapore, Act 1, page 4

3. Possessing qualities of both sexes.

   The truth is, a great mind must be androgynous.

   1832 September 1, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “Great Minds Androgynous—Philosopher’s Ordinary Language”, in H[enry] N[elson] C[oleridge], editor, Specimens of the Table Talk of the Late Samuel Taylor Coleridge. […], volume II, London: John Murray, […], published 1835, →OCLC, page 96

   1 more example

   The androgynous creative deity was best supplicated or propitiated by offerings concerned with the pleasures of the flesh. In such circumstances, to the worshipper as to the god, licentiousness was not a sin: on the contrary, it was a duty.

   1941, George Ryley Scott, Phallic Worship: A History of Sex and Sex Rites in Relation to the Religions of All Races from Antiquity to the Present Day, London: T. Werner Laurie, page xi

4. computer hardwareOf a connector or docking port, able to connect to another connector or port of the same type, rather than being restricted to connecting to solely male or solely female connectors or ports.

   APAS is an androgynous docking system, so – in principle, at least – any APAS-equipped vehicle should be able to hook up with any other, without having to worry about matching male with female ports.