Emerson College provides its students and staff with a resource to teach them what the terms skoliosexual, heteroflexible, panromantic, queerplatonic, and sapiosexual mean, among others.
The school’s Intercultural Student Affairs department created what it calls a “Glossary of LGBTQIA+ terms” that it wants its students and staff to use, avoid, and better understand.
For example, the glossary tells people that skoliosexual means “An attraction to non-binary identified individuals.” It adds that “This does not generally describe an attraction to specific genitalia or birth assignments but rather is an inclusive term.”
Meanwhile, it says that heteroflexible refers to “A person who is predominantly heterosexual, but not exclusively so.”
Also, the college defines panromantic as “A person whose romantic attractions are not influenced by sex or gender identity.”
This differs from pansexual, according to the school, which defines the latter as “A person who is emotionally, romantically, sexually, affectionately, or relationally attracted to people regardless of their gender identity or biological sex.”
Here is how it defines queerplatonic:
A type of non-romantic relationship where there is a strong emotional bond and commitment amongst everyone involved that goes beyond what is traditionally thought of as friendship. A-romantic people may or may not experience these types of relationships (among other kinds).
And the college says that sapiosexual means “A person who is emotionally, romantically, sexually, affectionately, or relationally attracted to intelligence and its use.”
Additionally, the college tells people to avoid using certain phrases.
While some are sexual-orientation vulgarities like f– and f——, others are not.
The school advises people against using the phrase “no homo.”
“An offensive phrase often used after someone has inadvertently said something that others may consider gay,” the glossary says.
“Femme” can also be offensive, the school says.
“Generally used to describe a person who expresses and/or presents culturally/stereotypically feminine characteristics,” the glossary says. “This term is also used to describe a specific lesbian identity (ie. butch/femme). Use the term with caution since in some contexts it can be perceived as offensive.”
And Emerson prefers that people not use the terms sex change and sex reassignment surgery, either.
“Outdated, oftentimes found to be offensive,” the glossary says. “See gender confirmation surgery.”
For reference, here is how the school defines “gender confirmation surgery”:
Permanent surgical body modification that seeks to attain congruence between one’s body and one’s gender identity.
A spokesman for the Emerson College Intercultural Student Affairs department could not be reached for comment on Wednesday or Thursday.
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