It is an umbrella term , originating in the United States , broadly referring to all sexualities , romantic orientations , sex characteristics , and gender identities that are not heterosexual , heteroromantic , cisgender , or endosex.
In the s, gay, lesbian, and bisexual activists adopted the initialism LGB. Terminology eventually shifted to LGBT , as transgender people gained recognition. Around that time, some activists began to reclaim the term queer , seeing it as a more radical and inclusive umbrella term, though others reject it, due to its history as a pejorative.
These labels are not universally agreed upon by everyone that they are intended to include. For example, some intersex people prefer to be included in this grouping, while others do not. The first widely used term, homosexual , now a term used primarily in scientific contexts, has at times carried negative connotations in the United States.
As lesbians forged more public identities, the phrase gay and lesbian became more common. Lesbian feminists eschewed gender role play that had been pervasive in bars as well as the perceived chauvinism of gay men ; many lesbian feminists refused to work with gay men or take up their causes. Lesbians who held the essentialist view that they had been born homosexual and used the descriptor lesbian to define sexual attraction often considered the separatist opinions of lesbian-feminists to be detrimental to the cause of gay rights.
In the late s and the early s, after the elation of change following group action in the Stonewall riots in New York City , some gays and lesbians became less accepting of bisexual or transgender people. Beginning in the s, the term queer was beginning to be adopted by the community to support gay-pride and reclaim the term from its earlier pejorative use as scholars have shown. The field of study of the LGBTQ community is called queer studies , in recognition of this reclamation and used as an umbrella term for the wider community as the academic response to the Stonewall riots.
