Non-Binary Pride Flag

Non-Binary or nonbinary (sometimes shortened to NBY or N.B.) refers to someone whose gender does not fall strictly within the category of the binary genders (male or female) that are used in western society. Anyone who is not always, solely, 100% male or always, solely, 100% female can be considered non-binary. Some non-binary individuals may identify with one or both of the binary genders, at least in part, while others are completely unrelated to the binary genders. [1]

Non-binary can be a gender identity on its own, or it can be used as an umbrella term for anyone whose gender is something other than male or female. Some individuals may also use the term genderqueer interchangeably with non-binary or something else entirely. [1]

Non-binary individuals may call themselves enbies or borls (the equivalent of boys or girls) or enben (the equivalent of men or women). Non-binary individuals may also call themselves an enban, which is the equivalent of woman or man. Non-binary is included in the umbrella of transgender, although some non-binary individuals choose not to identify as transgender. [1]

One may identify as non-binary on its own or they may identify as a gender that falls in the category of non-binary. Any gender that is not strictly and completely male or strictly and completely female falls under the category of non-binary. Some common examples of non-binary identities include:

• Agender

• Androgyne

• Bigender

• Demigender

• Genderfluid

• Genderflux

• Libragender

• Maverique

• Neutrois

• Paragender [1]

Some non-binary can be partly connected to or aligned to one or both of the binary genders. For example, a male-aligned non-binary individual (solarian) may have an experience similar to binary male people or have some connection to boyhood/manhood, regardless of actual gender. Non-binary individuals are often connected to masculinity and/or femininity, but they do not necessarily have to be connected to manhood/boyhood or womanhood/girlhood. This kind of non-binary identities may be called viabinary, ideobinary, or aligned. Non-binary individuals who are somewhere in between or simultaneously experience masculinity and femininity, and/or maleness and femaleness can be called androgyne, androgynous, or mesobinary. [1]

Other non-binary genders are not connected to the binary genders at all. These genders are not connected to maleness, masculinity, femaleness, femininity, and they are not in between male and female or in between masculine and feminine. However, these genders are also not necessarily agender or otherwise genderless. This type of gender may be called as abinary, unaligned, neutral, stellarian (neutral-aligned), epicene, or exobinary. [1]

Non-binary individuals who are not female aligned, feminine aligned, male aligned, masculine aligned, or neutral aligned are called atrinary, or outherine. Some outherine genders are also xenogenders. [1]

Since there is no single "non-binary look" there is no "typical" non-binary transition, it depends on one's gender identity and their goals for gender presentation. Some non-binary individuals do not transition and present as the gender assigned to them at birth, others may attempt to look like the "opposite" of their assigned gender, as more masculine or feminine. Others will attempt to look as androgynous or gender neutral as possible. [1]