gay
adjective · noun
Simple meaning
Possessing sexual and/or romantic attraction towards people one perceives to be the same sex or gender as oneself.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
gayIPA pronunciation (US)
ˈɡeɪ
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
adjective
of a person
Possessing sexual and/or romantic attraction towards people one perceives to be the same sex or gender as oneself.
of a romantic or sexual act or relationship
Between two or more persons perceived to be of the same sex or gender as each other.
strictly
Describing a homosexual man.
In accordance with stereotypes of homosexual people
of an animalby extension
Tending to partner or mate with other individuals of the same sex.
of an institution or group
Intended for gay people, especially gay men.
noun
A diminutive of the male given names Gaylord or Gabriel, and similar names
The letter —, which stands for the sound /ɡ/, in Pitman shorthand.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- A1 · Beginner (estimated)
- Frequency
- Very Common
- Typical Use
- Everyday English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: (of a person) Possessing sexual and/or romantic attraction towards people one perceives to be the same sex or gender as oneself.
Used this way, gay is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in relationships contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- No strong connotation
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Where it naturally appears
- Relationships
Nearby words
- homophile , rarer, so it draws attention
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
The movement aimed at liberating homosexuals from legal or social or economic oppression.
The movement aimed at liberating homosexuals from legal or social or economic oppression.
A female homosexual.
Any of various North American plants of the genus Liatris having racemes or panicles of small discoid flower heads.
The density of an ideal gas at constant pressure varies inversely with the temperature.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
- homosexualitynoun
- homosexualnoun
- heterosexualnoun
- bisexualnoun
- transgenderadjective
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.