of an identity. Consider gender for instance. If you did a quick internet search of “gender identity spectrum,” you would likely find hundreds of linear models with “man” and “woman” endpoints. This is because our society sees gender through a binary33 lens and seldom recognizes identities beyond man or woman.
Society is missing out though! An abundance of genders exist that have nothing to do with being either a man or a woman, so it’s easy to see how plotting an identity like that on a linear spectrum would be inaccurate. After all, placing a person between “man” and “woman” endpoints when they feel like their identity has zero relationship with either of those genders wouldn’t make much sense.
An alternative to the linear spectrum model is a color wheel. Different sections of this visual represent different identities, and the merging of colors is where these identities blend. An example of just a few genders plotted on this diagram, might look like this:34
If a single point doesn’t feel right, a person can instead mark multiple points, highlight whole areas, draw arrows, or do whatever they feel best represents them. For example, if someone feels they move between genders, or that they have connections to multiple genders, their color wheel might look like the following:
Another amazing spectrum the Trans Student Educational Resources kindly gave me permission to include in this book is the Gender Unicorn. It looks like this:
To give you an idea of how a person might utilize a spectrum like this, I’ve plotted my identity on the Gender Unicorn on the next page.
Explanation:
My gender is fluid. Sometimes I feel partially like a woman sometimes I feel partially agender, and sometimes I feel like a simultaneous combination of both these genders.
I express femininely, masculinely, and androgynously in that order for least to greatest.
I was assigned female at birth.
I am physically attracted to many genders. However, I typically find woman attractive most often, followed by non-binary people, followed by men.
I am most often emotionally attracted to woman and non-binary people. Although it does not occur as often, I am capable of being emotionally attracted to men.
What’s so cool about this spectrum is it allows you to plot multiple aspects of your identity on one visual. These different identity aspects include gender identity, gender expression, sex, who you’re physically attracted to, and who you’re emotionally attracted to. Some other concepts spectrums can model are:
The conditions required for you to feel attraction
The intensity which you experience certain identities
The intensity you experience certain attractions. These attractions might include, but are not limited to: sexual, romantic, sensual, platonic, aesthetic, and alterous attractions.35
Polyamory
And much more!
If neither a line, wheel, nor unicorn are your jam though, don’t fret! You can always make your own spectral diagram that perfectly represents your sexual, romantic, gender, and any other identity in a totally custom way! Tons of people out there take this route, and some get fabulously creative. I’ve seen identity representations in the form of 3D spheres, planets, scatter plots, bar graphs,36 Venn diagrams, treasure maps, and my friend, Charlie, even drew their gender as a galaxy! Check it out on the next pages.37
Charlie’s gender galaxy explanation
I never felt like my gender fit into the strict male or female binary that society had shown me growing up. After doing some research, I found that many people described gender as existing beyond the binary. They described it as a linear spectrum where you can be male, female, or anywhere in between. This felt like this was getting closer to the way I was feeling, but I still didn’t feel like a mix of male and female, I felt like an entirely different gender.
Then I saw a visual representation of the gender spectrum being shown as a planet. There were uncharted lands, mountains, islands and more places than just the space between male and female. This was getting closer but still felt too finite.
To me, gender is an infinite universe. Every single person experiences gender differently. Sometimes a person has no gender, like a black hole or cluster of stars in deep space. Sometimes gender feels like a bursting colorful galaxy. Some people may stick to a strictly female planet their whole life, or jump fluidly between several. I have never been able to find a more specific label than “non-binary” that describes how I feel about my own gender, but creating the gender universe makes me feel okay about that. We all have our own unique place in the infinite gender universe.
Unless you craft your own custom diagram that is impeccably tailored to illustrate the intricacies of your identity, no spectrum model will be perfect. Many aren’t able to capture the specifics, subtleties, and conditions of some identities. Novosexuality,38 for example, is a sexual orientation we’ll unpack more later that has several contingencies and circumstances built into it. Therefore, accurately capturing it with just a few points on a spectrum is essentially impossible without some pretty lengthy footnotes.39 It could look something like this:
As we’ve learned, visual spectrums find their flaws in their tendency to oversimplify identities. However, while these models are imperfect, their existence still valuably impacts the way we view identities. To show you what I mean:
Spectrums are dope because they:
Challenge binaries (Example: “Don’t need gender neutral bathrooms? Everyone is either a man or woman you say? Psh, there are SO many other genders, just look at this spectrum!”)
Acknowledge that identities can exist in varying degrees of intensity (I’m genderflux, and I play with colors on my spectrum to show this. On days when I feel intensely like a girl, my dot is dark purple. On days when I feel kinda like a girl, it’s medium purple. On days when I feel barely like a girl, it’s light purple.)
Allow for change and fluidity (Example: “My identity changes so often, instead of a dot, I often draw a bracket on my spectrum!”)
Embrace middle
