bisexual
/baɪˈsɛk.ʃ(əw).əl/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: 3.70 in modern English
17
Scrabble Score
8
Letters
4
Syllables
8
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Having two distinct sexes, male and female (as contrasted with unisexual or hermaphroditic).
Example Sentences
- "Skirt Club caters to bisexual or bicurious women. No men are allowed, but women with all levels of experience in same-sex sexuality, from bicurious to fully lesbian, are welcomed."
- "Pakistani transgender activist Hina Baloch has sparked a massive online debate after claiming in a viral video that 80% of Pakistan is gay and the remaining 20% are bisexual. Speaking in an interview with the Queer Global YouTube channel, Baloch described homosexuality in Pakistan as an open secret suppressed by religion, culture, and family honour. She argued that social pressure forces most Pakistanis to deny or conceal their true sexual orientation."
- "Midrash and Zohar present Adam as hermaphroditic or bisexual."
- "To say that Loki is bisexual means that he readily alternates between the male and female sexes, becoming female at will or as needed."
- "Among the arguments put forth for Ishtar's hermaphroditic or bisexual character is the practice of transvestism in religious rites associated with her (e.g. Harris 2000: 170; Groneberg 1986: 39)."
- "The bisexual name, such as Marion and Carol (and Evelyn and Vivian in England), is frequently a source of annoyance and embarrassment to the letter writer, who, if he does not know his ambiguously named correspondent personally […]"
Etymology
From bi- + -sexual, via the French bisexuel (bi-, sexuel). Attested since 1792 as a synonym in botany for "hermaphroditic" ("having male and female parts"). First used of sexuality in Richard von Krafft-Ebing's 1886 Psychopathia Sexualis (in German) and Charles Gilbert Chaddock's 1892 English translation thereof, due to the theory that people were naturally attracted to the opposite sex and so the brain or mind of a person attracted to "both" sexes (or to the same sex) must be partly of another sex and thus "hermaphroditic".
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /baɪˈsɛk.ʃ(əw).əl/
- British English: /baɪˈsɛk.ʃʊ.əl/