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their employment of linguistic gender is still constrained by a tra-ditional and dichotomous notion of gender. While the hijra tends to make greater use of the masculine when signalling social dis-tance from the referent, whether it be respect for a superior or contempt for an inferior, she is morę likely to employ the feminine when expressing solidarity, particularly when addressing other hijras directly. Occupying an ambiguous position in a society that has marginalized them, hijras are morę attentive than their non-hijra peers to the cultural meanings evoked by feminine and masculine markings, enacting and contesting them in their everday projections of self.