Additional Umbrella Terms

 

This article is part of Season 3 of LGBT by the Numbers, a series that examines the prevalence of LGBT identities in the United States and around the world.

Season 3 examines the results of the Gender Census, an annual global survey of people with a gender that isn’t strictly male or female.

I primarily focus on the results from 2015 to 2024, for reasons I explained in previous articles.

 

 

We have already examined how the five most common terms from the 2024 Gender Census performed over the past decade.

Today, we’ll examine the next three most popular identity terms: gender non-conforming, genderqueer, and enby.

The most common terms in the Gender Census, including these three, are umbrella terms that collectively describe many groups of people with more specific identities.

 

 

This graph shows the performance of Gender Census identity terms over the past 10 years. 

It includes the sixth through eleventh most popular terms from the 2024 Gender Census.

 

Note the Y-axis of the graph doesn’t begin at 0.

Many graphs in this series have a suppressed 0, so their lines can be more easily seen.

 

I created the graphs in this series using flourish, a website that allows users to create compelling visual aids.

 

  

 

Gender non-conforming

 

I believe “gender non-conforming” can be an unnecessarily confusing term. 

As a stand-alone phrase, “gender non-conforming” doesn’t signify what someone’s gender is, or to which gender they're not conforming.

Absent further clarifying information, I would presume someone using this phrase means they're gender non-conforming relative to their birth gender.

But that wouldn’t necessarily clarify whether they still identify with their birth gender, identify as nonbinary, or identify as binary transgender.

 

Alternatively, the phrase could indicate someone is non-conforming relative to either binary gender. 

But that doesn’t clarify whether they are non-conforming due to gender identity or expression.

 

 

Nevertheless, gender non-conforming is among the more common terms used by people with a gender outside the binary.  

 

 

Gender non-conforming was added as a checkbox option in 2019, when it received 26.2%.

It steadily increased in popularity, until it peaked at 38.5% in ‘23, before declining to 34.9% in ’24.

Gender non-conforming has a range of 12.3%.

 

Gender non-conforming was the sixth most popular option, in the Gender Census, from 2023-24.

 

 

 

 

Genderqueer

 

Genderqueer refers to someone whose gender identity or expression falls outside the boundaries of what is typically considered male or female. 

 

It’s common for nonbinary people to describe themselves as genderqueer, but some people with a binary gender identify as genderqueer as well.

Someone with a binary gender could refer to themselves as genderqueer if they engage in gender expression in a non-conforming way, like femboys and tomboys do.

 

 

Genderqueer was commonly used by nonbinary youth in online videos in 2015, when I first began to understand my gender.

While genderqueer is less commonly used today, I’m still quite fond of the term.

 

I have discussed genderqueer in several previous articles, including The Big Picture, Gender Identity and Biological Sex, Feedback on the Diagram, and Nonbinary Nomenclature. 

 

 

Genderqueer was chosen by 58.3% of respondents in the 2013 Gender Census. 

That year, genderqueer was the most popular term. 

I discussed genderqueer’s performance in the 2013 pilot survey in an earlier article.

 

Genderqueer never again reached the heights of its debut in the first Gender Census.

 

Genderqueer was chosen by 41.2% of respondents in 2015, and steadily declined until it bottomed out at 25.9% in 2020.

Genderqueer bounced back and steadily rose until it peaked at 35.0% in 2023, before declining to 32.6% in 2024.

From 2015-24, genderqueer has had a range of 15.3%.

 

 

From 2015-17, genderqueer was the second most popular identity term.

From 2023-24, genderqueer was the seventh most popular identity term.

 

 

 

Enby

 

Nonbinary can be shortened to NB. 

Once those letters are pronounced aloud, you get enby.

Enby is generally used as a noun, whereas nonbinary is generally used as an adjective.

 

Enby is a cutesy word, and not all nonbinary people use the term to describe themselves.

Twice as many people identified as nonbinary (60.4%) in the 2024 Gender Census, than identified as an Enby (29.4%).

 

 

It’s also worth bearing in mind that Enby might not be an appropriate word to use in all settings, even for those that identify with the term.

I would enjoy being called an enby by a romantic partner or close friend.

I’m glad we have a term for nonbinary people that conveys warmth and playful intimacy.

But it could seem strange in a work or professional setting, depending on the level of formality promoted in the workplace. 

 

 

Enby first appeared as a checkbox in 2016, when it received 15.6%.

Enby peaked in 2021, when it received 37.0%.

Enby received 29.4% in 2024.

Enby has a range of 21.4%.

 

Enby was the eighth most popular identity term, in the Gender Census, from 2023-24.

 

 

Enby has the largest range of any of the checkbox identities in the Gender Census, since 2015.

Over the past 10 years, the rise and partial fall of enby has been the largest change among the results for identity terms in the Gender Census.

 

 

That’s not the only reason Enby’s historical performance has been notable.

Enby is one of only two terms initially chosen by fewer than 20% of respondents, as a checkbox, that was able to subsequently cross that threshold.

The other is transmasculine, which we will discuss in the next article.

Since 2015, no term that received more than 20% in the Gender Census has subsequently fallen below that threshold.

 

 

 

At its peak in 2021, Enby was the third most popular identity term.

This can be seen in the graph below, which begins to push the limit of how many lines can be clearly shown on a single graph.

This graph shows the performance of the eight most popular terms from the 2024 Gender Census over the past decade. 

 

 

I discussed gender non-conforming, genderqueer, and enby in “Nonbinary Nomenclature,” which explored the results of the 2023 Gender Census.

 

 

In the next article, we’ll examine transmasculine and transfeminine, as we continue our tour of nonbinary identities from the Gender Census.