CLH Words

Let’s talk about words and what they can show us about society as a whole. Language and words are kinda my thing. I have a degree in English, read and write a ton, and just generally think about/study how we communicate with each other. Now despite larger misconceptions, language by and large is made by people for people. There is no ‘wrong’ why to talk or use a word; if it conveys something, it’s a word (this is an oversimplification of course but eh, good enough). While there is no ‘correct’ or ‘true’ unified language, there are general rules that it follows. Because of this, we can see the larger trends of how language is being used and changing and come to conclusions about societal norms, trends, and opinions (again super over simplified but bear with me). Now let’s examine how people online talk about trans people.

               There is an increasing usage of the words transwoman and transwomen (and transman/men but I see that less often). While this is technically a word (people use it and others know what it means) it shows a shift in the conversation. There should be a space there. Trans woman, trans women, trans men, trans people. Trans is an adjective, a word used to modify another word. You do not say tallwomen, brokenlamp, or anything else. Hell, it’s even coffee table not coffeetable—two words that often go together. Sometimes words become compound words. That is part of language. When a word and its adjective become so linked they become one. That’s great. But that is not what is happening here.

               People do not see trans women as a kind of women. They see us as something other, less than. When I first came out, I knew this by the way people treated me. Some straight up told me it of course, but I am not talking about overt transphobic bigots. I mean the everyday cis people in liberal spaces that have pronouns in their bio (if even that). They treated me as a man who they had to refer to using she/her pronouns. In discussions of women’s issues, we were left out. Excluded and mistreated because we were seen as less than. Of course, nothing overt. Our mistreatment was prettied up by acceptable social politeness, a thin paint over the over hostility.

               Transmisogyny compounded this. I note the irony in saying transmisogyny, not trans misogyny, but that is because the transphobia is intertwined with the misogyny, not merely modifying it. I am a woman. Yet, my acts of femininity were seen as fake, lesser than the same acts of cis women, or even trans men. My acts of masculinity, both the ones I chose and the ones I could not control, were taken as proof of my womanhood being fake. No matter what, I was not a woman, but a different, lower thing, a transwoman. Of course it is impolite to point this out directly, so attitudes had to be conveyed through other means.

               This othering of trans women has become so common that it has changed our language, upturned our linguistic rules, and created a new word. Transwomen is, unfortunately, a word. But it should not be. Its use shows that we are not seen as women, not allowed to claim that sacred word. Yet, trans women are women. Trans is just another kind of women, as natural and real as any other. We must understand this. Trans women are not just people you have to refer to as women but are in fact women. So please, mind the space.