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US /baɪˈsɛk.ʃ(əw).əl/ UK /baɪˈsɛk.ʃʊ.əl/
Freq #19677

Meanings

  1. 1

Thesaurus

Word family
Derived forms antibisexualbi-dykebisexualitybisexuallybisexualnessbisexybugbytesexuallesbigaylesbigaytransnonbisexualpseudobisexual
Related forms anti-bisexualbi-curiousbiromanticbisexualismbisexualistbisexualizationbisexualizeheterosexualhomosexualmetrosexual

Appears in

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".

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