Word of the Week: Gray-A

By Emilia Marcyk

Sexuality is not black and white; some people identify in the gray area between asexual and sexual. People who identify as gray-A can include, but are not limited to those who:

• do not normally experience sexual attraction, but do experience it sometimes
• experience sexual attraction, but a low sex drive
• experience sexual attraction and drive, but not strongly enough to want to act on them
• people who can enjoy and desire sex, but only under very limited and specific circumstances

– AVENwiki

History

The term Gray-A, or gray asexual, came into general use in the early 21st century, and was likely coined in a post to the Asexual Visibility and Education (AVEN) Network. It, and other terms like demisexual or semisexual, acknowledge that, like other aspects of identity, sexuality (meaning desire to engage in sexual activity) exists on a continuum. Identifying as Gray-A means different things to different individuals, and has taken on a diversity of meanings that reflect the diversity of human sexual experience.

Perspectives

• Coyote. “‘Experiences attraction infrequently’ doesn’t cut it.”
• Hezekiah. “The development of gray asexuality and demisexuality as identity terms.“
• Historicallyace. “Somewhere In Between: A History of Demi and Grey Terminology.”
• Siggy. “Many ways to be between.”
• White, Rachel. “What it means to be “gray-sexual.”
• AVEN Network: http://www.asexuality.org/