Gender is often described as having three dimensions. First is the phsycal or biological dimension, which refers to a person's anatomy and assigned sex at birth. Second is a person's identity, which refers to their own internal sense of gender. Finally, is gender expression, or how a person outwardly presents themselves and how that presentation represents and interacts with societal and cultural stereotypes about gender.

Gender expression is how you choose to express your gender identity through your name, pronouns, clothing, hair style, behaviour, voice, or body features. While many people express themselves in ways that are aligned with social stereotypes related to sex and gender, other people may choose expressions that are different from what people may expect of their gender identity.

Society often thinks of these cues as being male/masculine and female/feminine. But what‘s thought to be masculine and feminine changes over time and within different cultures. In many cultures, social expectations and stereotypes for how people are expected to behave, dress, and express themselves based on their assigned sex are still quite rigid. People who express their gender in ways that do not conform to social or cultural expectations about gender may be subjected to bullying, discrimination, and harassment.