Gender (verb)

Definition

To gender is to assign someone else a gender. This is, for most people, an almost automatic action, so it is often not noticed as being an active process by the person assigning the gender (“perceiving someone as a certain gender”).

Gendering someone is done based on behavioural cues and body presentation (secondary sex characteristics). It is distinct from sexing (see: sexing (verb)). 

The act of gendering someone incorrectly is known as misgendering. Misgendering is also the term used when someone intentionally uses the wrong pronouns for someone. 

As gendering is such an immediate, pervasive, but often (consciously) unaware act of speculation often, when someone is misgendered, the person who did the misgendering feels misled or deceived, even though the person who was misgendered was not (actively) part of the gendering process. 

Usage

If you look like a supermodel, you can act as butch as you want to, but other people will inevitably gender you as female. And if you like like a linebacker, you can act as femme as you want, but others will still gender you as male. While the way we “do” gender may influence whether people perceive us as queer or straight, and may tip the scales for those whose appearance is somewhat gender-ambiguous to begin with, the vast majority of us are gendered primarily on our physical bodies rather than our behaviors. (Julia Serano in Whipping Girl, p. 193)

See Also

Gender (noun), sex (noun), sex (verb), Pass (verb)