Is "butch" a gender identity?

They can be gender identities or labels for gender expression. If you are butch as in a masculine presenting lesbian (etc.), then you can be cisgender female. But at the same time, some people feel that their masculine side transcends mere clothing, and is an integral part of their identity. So, in a word, yes.

 

Firstly, never apologize for wanting to understand something. It's fine, no worries.

"Stud" and "butch" are terms used frequently to define physical presentation, or the way someone wants to appear. They're usually women that have more masculine features in the way they look, the way they dress, whatever.
Androgyny is that way too, for both women and men. It's a physical presentation between the genders, so they have both masculine or feminine features.

It can get confusing, however, because Androgyny is also considered a gender under the genderqueer umbrella. It's a person that identifies with some parts of one gender and some parts of the other. This is different from bi-gender in that bi-gender people identify as two whole genders.

I'm going to let you know, right now, that sexuality doesn't have anything to do with gender. I know, we're grouped in with sexuality with the LGBTQ moniker. But that's okay, as long as people know one isn't contingent on another. There could be lesbians out there who are dissatisfied as female. But I'm sure that just because one prefers to come across as more masculine doesn't mean they want to be men.

 

The distinction to make here is that androgyny and being androgynous are not genders, while androgyne is. Sevan's totally got the definition right though.


I 100% agree with Hazel. I would say it's usually used to refer to gender expression, but some people feel it goes beyond clothing for them and use it as more of a gender identity.

 

Butch is a gender expression term. It's normally used by cisgender women who present in a masculine manner, but are still proud of their female identity. Trans men would never use it, since It's linked with being a lesbian.

A lot of lesbian terms such as femme, butch, soft butch, lipstick/chapstick etc have to do with your clothing/attitude and how masculine or feminine you prefer to be. It's important to remember that one can be as masculine as can be and can still be a real woman.

 

Butch, femme, androgynous, etc. are all descriptors of different kinds of gender expression. Gender expression is crazy varied, and people of any gender can choose to express themselves in various ways! A person's gender expression isn't necessarily an indicator of how "male" or "female" (in a traditional sense) they feel - I've known butch lesbians that have more feminine demeanors, and lipstick lesbians that are into rough and tumble, athletic activities.

Because phrases like butch and femme tend to describe an expression, they aren't generally used as stand-alone descriptors of gender identity. But they are often used hand-in-hand with identity, if the individual feels that their expression is integral to their identity! For example, you wouldn't generally say "I'm a butch" because butch is an adjective. A butch what? A butch woman? A butch genderqueer individual?

Androgynous is a term used to describe a form of gender expression, however, androgyne is a gender identity. Some androgynes have a highly androgynous gender expression, but others lean more towards one form of expression over another, or look more masculine or feminine by nature.

 

In brief: it can be. Some people use it as such, to describe their own gender identity.

I know that's not very helpful, sorry! Basically it varies from person to person. Butch can be empowering or derogatory. Butch can be a label society applies to a person, or it can be a label someone chooses for themselves. Some butches take great pride in being a masculine female, while other butches transition to male (conversely not all FtMs are butch-identified or presenting). Butch generally refers to lesbians, but not always.

Because "butch" is so diverse, it's almost become viewed as an old-fashioned term for a masculine person who was assigned female at birth; nowadays the group of "masculine AFAB" has split into (possibly) butch, soft butch, boi, tomboy, tomboi, androgyne, genderqueer, FtM... or any number of these intersecting categories; and as far as sexuality goes, gay, straight, lesbian, queer, bisexual, pansexual, asexual... etc. You get the point.

So to answer your question: sometimes.

---------- Post added 20th May 2015 at 02:26 PM ----------

And yes some people who begin identifying as "lesbian" later go on to question their gender and identify as non-female; some of these people also prefer "gay" to "lesbian" because it's more gender-neutral.

So yes you can be a non-female-identified lesbian.

Also, this list is nowhere near complete in covering all possible permutations of personal identity, once you leave the land of non-cis-heteronormativity.

For an excellent discussion of butch identities and how complex they are, I'd recommend "stone butch blues" by Leslie Feinberg. The book is a quick read and it does a good job of describing how so many disparate identities would fall under the "butch" umbrella.