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To a first approximation, they describe the match or mismatch between a person's gender identity and their assigned gender at birth.
"Cis" = "my gender identity matches my assigned gender at birth"
"Trans" = "my gender identity does not match my assigned gender at birth"
I like the way you express this. "Cis / Trans" isn't about your gender, it's about whether your gender has CHANGED. (Although it may not be your GENDER that changed, but what people THOUGHT your gender was.)
In a similar way, I (a cis male) usually call myself "straight", but that's not really accurate. I don't feel like I'm attracted to whatever gender is different from mine (which happens to be women); I feel like I am attracted to women (which happens to be the gender that's different from mine).
Putting it differently, if some magical spell were to transform me into a woman, I don't imagine that I would then be attracted to men, I imagine that I would be attracted to women. So instead of calling myself "straight", I should probably be saying that I am "gynosexual" (attracted to women).
Finally a "down to earth" explanation I can fully understand, thank you!
I appreciate the use of formal logic here, I don't see this enough!!!
I think the confusion is coming from the fact that cis and trans really only have context of an expectation. In this case, it would be the expectation of society.
You are correct that if you identify as a woman or a man, you are a woman or man. If you have a penis, or a vagina, or some mix or lack of those, then those are just parts of your body and that isn't really up to interpretation.
In broad strokes, society expects your body parts (penis, vagina) to correspond to how you identify (man, woman). Humans are kind of just built this way. Our brains take a lot of shortcuts and categorize the world around us. It is statistically likely that if you have a penis, you identify as a man.
As we've evolved as a society, we have come to understand and recognize that these statistically likely correlations not always hold up (it's just likely, not a guarantee, after all). So cis and trans are descriptors of whether or not the correlation between your gender identity and your physical characteristics match (cis) or don't match (trans) society's expectations.
Cis and trans are terms that came before their application to gender identity. I learned themin organic chemistry in reference to chemical isomers.
Wikipedia: The prefixes "cis" and "trans" are from Latin: "this side of" and "the other side of", respectively.
As applied to gender, "this side of" you are the gender of the sex you were born as. "The other side of" means you have switched your gender to the other side of the sex from which you were born.
Edit: to answer your question more directly, your gender is cis or trans of the sex you were born as. The question you ask for is: "is your gender cis or trans of your sex?"
This is the correct answer to the question that was asked by OP.
Well said.
Please note I’m typing this as a trans man. Being “cis” or “trans” stems from someone’s gender.
Basically, do you identify as your birth gender (not sex, gender and sex are different)? If the answer is yes, you are “cis”. If the answer is no, like I my case, I was born female, I identify as a male, then you are are trans.
I hope this answers your question.
I understand what they are, I'm asking if there is a name for the category of characteristic that they both belong to.
I'm not entirely sure there is a word for it. If not, maybe there should be.
I understand what they are, I'm asking if there is a name for the category of characteristic that they both belong to.
You're not getting an answer to your question because the question, as stated, is incomprehensible. You're asking for a "category of characteristic" that a pair of antonym adjectives "belong to"? That doesn't make sense. They apply to a whole host of characteristics, because they're not describing a specific characteristic, but how a characteristic relates to the whole. Just like "homo" and "hetero"; homozygous, heterogenous, homocystine, and heterophony are all words that use the "homo" or "hetero" prefix to describe how those words relate to other concepts in their category. It's the same with "cis" and "trans". The prefixes don't "belong" to a category of characteristics, they explicitly exist outside of the characteristics of the words their modifying.
That's the best I can do with the way you've chosen to phrase your question, and I admit it's a reach, but your question is gibberish.
Male, female or nonbinary are a person's gender.
White, black, asian (nonexclusively) are a person's race.
Right, left are a person's handedness.
Gay, straight, bi are a person's sexual orientation.
Cis, trans are a person's ________.
We could call it "gender metadata" ;p
I'm not actually sure if there's a real term for this. If nothing else, "trans status" works but there should be a better term I think ^.^
Maybe "genderdivergence"?
"gender identity" might fit. "Identity" taken literally, to mean if the birth sex/gender and the actual expressed gender are identical.
Edit: or "gender divergence" if you want to focus on the difference instead of the sameness.
I think it's an alignment, like parallel vs. perpendicular.
If you identify with your sex at birth, whatever it is, your identity is aligned with your biological sex at birth, that is called Cisgender. Parallel.
If your gender identity is not aligned with your biological sex at birth, it is at an angle to it, perhaps perpendicular (you were a boy baby but are a woman) perhaps a different angle (perhaps were born a girl and are non-binary). Anything other than that parallel alignment is thrown into the Trans bucket, but particularly the perpendicular arrangements.
Cisgender means the person has a gender identity that matches the sex they were assigned at birth.
If you are a man and you were assigned male at birth, you are cis.
gender chirality . gender isomerism. gender topology
My topology is a tube with appendages. Ultimately, humans (like all chordates) are convoluted toroids.
Gender congruence.
I think I've seen "gender modality" used before.
You might call the category lived experience. Does your gender identity match your lived experience and upbringing, or does it not? Sometimes you see trans people use the phrase 'man of trans experience' or 'woman of trans experience' to highlight that the word trans applies to history and experience. So the question might be, "what is your gender experience?" or "what is the nature of your gender socialization?"
I'm trying to think of questions that have a similar vibe. these may be way off (I'm not trans) so take with a grain of salt -
a religious person meets someone in their congregation and asks if they are a convert or were born in.
a person on a date asks their date, a single person, if they are divorced or never married.
I think I would struggle to define the category being asked about in these questions too. It's something about history and expectations.
If the answer is "I am cis" or "I am trans", what is the question?
The question would, to be blunt, be "are you cis or trans?", because "cis" and "trans" are just shorthand for "cisgender" and "transgender".
It's a question of very limited scope -- even if you were to reword it -- because in modern society, the exact detail of if someone is cis or trans isn't really practically important. If someone is a man, say, society cares a lot more about them being a man rather than being a cisgender man or a transgender man. (I'd say the same about women, but there's obviously a subset of society that is in the process of demonising trans women, so...)
I think the core issue you've found is that cis/trans-ness is something that only makes sense in the context of something else, the gender identity of the person in question.
Gender alignment? Gender alignment vs biological/birth sex?
CIS is simply opposite of TRANS - they simply describe someone's identity in terms of their physiology.
Confusion rises, somewhat, when you factor in masculinity/femininity to the equation - but basically 'trans' means that having a dick doesn't mean you're a man... 'cis' means that being a man means you have a penis.
They're adjectives. Just like "tall" or "smart" or "young".
The question would just be "are you cis or trans?", there's not a specific word or term that you'd use.
Tall or short would be a person's height.
Smart or dumb would be a person's intelligence.
Young or old would be a person's age.