Femme

Category: Slang & Language

Femme names a feminine gender expression claimed deliberately rather than simply assumed. It came out of lesbian communities, where it has a long history alongside butch, and it is used now by queer people of any gender: lesbians, bisexual and pansexual people, gay men, trans women and trans men, and nonbinary people.

It is not the same as being feminine. The word marks femininity worn on purpose, often at some cost, in a culture that reads feminine queer people as either straight or as not queer enough.