With the launch of the Iowa State Daily’s new Voices website here are some diverse terms defined:

African American: an American of African descent

American Indian (Native American): a person who identifies and/or has origin in any of the tribes in North America who continue to have tribal affiliation or recognition

Asian American: an American with origins in a country in Asia

Androgynous: someone who neither identifies or appears as female or male, presents themselves in a gender neutral way

Asexual: someone who typically does not show attraction to any other person regardless of their gender

Bisexual: someone who is attracted romantically and/or sexually to people of more than one gender

Ethnic Group: social group that shares the same identity based on culture, language and sometimes religion

Gay/Homosexual: someone generally is attracted to another person of their same gender

Gender identity: a person’s sense of identity of being man, women both, or neither

Gender expression: the way a person expresses masculinity or femininity

Hispanic: a person who has origins in a Spanish-speaking country

Heterosexual: someone generally is attracted to another person of the opposite gender

Intersex: when a person is born with the reproductive or sexual anatomy that doesn’t seem to fit traditional anatomy of females or males

Latino: a person who is native or has origins from Latin American countries

Lesbian: a woman who is typically attracted to other women

Non-binary: a person who is not strictly male or female.

People of color: people who self-identify as anything other than White

Pansexual:  someone who is generally attracted to another regardless of their identity or gender.

Queer: an “umbrella term” used to refer to all who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual and/or transgender

Racial Identity: an individual’s sense of identity of belonging to a certain racial or ethnic group who share certain physical traits

Sexual Identity: a characteristic based on the sex of those one tends to be attracted whether it be emotionally, physically, romantically and/or sexually

Transgender: someone whose gender identity or expression is different from their assigned sex at birth

Definitions used were gathered from the Iowa State Campus Climate Survey, the Merriam Webster online dictionary and the The University of California at Davis LGBTQIA Resource Center Glossary.