A Glossary of Terms

[Bionca]

Originally Posted by jolo

Thank you for your time to post this. Would I be correct in assuming that the terminology is not static and keeps changing and being added on to ?

Yes, language is a living thing and words and meaning change over time and location.

Originally Posted by jolo

I did read somewhere on some blog or site, where there was a post by a TS, who felt offended by the term shemale. I understand and respect that, however when searching I noticed it is used a lot on commercial sites and blogs use Shemale.

That's part of the point - it is largely used connected to porn. As a large portion of the trans woman population has no direct relationship to the sex industry, using a term that is so directly associated with porn is insulting. It also has a very negative past, as it's first use to describe trans women, was in a book by Dr Janice Raymond who's position was to "Morally mandate transsexuality out of existence". Jan was used to get the US government to stop covering trans-related health care among other directly harmful things to trans women.