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Moreover, one of the hijras’ favorite in-group insults is the term bhosri vald Vagina-owner’, an epithet so offensive to middle-class Hindi speakers that the Banaras resident who typed my transcripts refused to include this word, typing an ellipsis in its place. When used among nonhijras, the term is generally used be-tween men and implies that the referent, although małe, has somehow been de-masculinized. The epithet is used differently from the American insult cunt, then; for one, bhosri vala is itself grammatically masculine and its referent must be so as well (the feminine counterpart bhosri vali does not exist in contemporary usage²⁸). When used among hijras, the insult lies not in the accusation of demasculation, sińce the very definition of hijra depends on the notion of impotence, but in the