berdache

[ ber-dash ]

noun

1. Older Use: Sometimes Offensive. two-spirit ( def 1 ).

Word History and Origins

Origin of berdache¹

First recorded in 1800–10; from North American French; French bardache “catamite,” from South Italian bardassa, bardascia “boy, young man,” posssibly from Arabic bardaj “captive,” from Persian bardah, wardag

Example Sentences

Updating the figure of the “berdache,” a transsexual figure traditional in Indigenous cultures, and channeling Cher in her “Half Breed” phase, Miss Chief is an avatar of a global future that will see humankind moving beyond the wars of identity — racial, sexual, political — in which it is now perilously immersed.

From New York Times

They were mainly referring to “berdache” marriages, in which a man would marry another man who performed domestic duties or a woman would marry a woman who worked outside the home.

From Washington Post

But in the next 20 years, undisputed evidence of woman marriages, berdache marriages and other same-sex unions across dozens of cultures upended that definition.

From Washington Post

The Navajo have a category of person they call a berdache.

From Literature

What a berdache is, basically, is someone who adopts a gender other than their biological one.

From Literature