Drag performer

The term "drag" is used for any clothing carrying symbolic significance but usually referring to the clothing associated with one gender role when worn by a person of another gender. The origins of the word are debated, but "drag" has appeared in print as early as 1870. One suggested etymological root is 19th-century theatre slang, from the sensation of long skirts trailing on the floor.

"Drag queen" appeared in print at least as early as 1941. In the vernacular, the word as a noun is typically perceded by a verb: "do". A folk etymology whose acronym basis reveals the late-20th-century bias would make "drag" an abbreviation of "dressed as girl" in description of male transvestism. The opposite, "drab" for "dressed as boy," is unrecorded. Drag may be practiced by people of all sexual orientations and gender identities.

There is a long history of drag in the performing arts, spanning a wide range of cultural as well as artistic traditions.

Drag in the theatre arts manifests two kinds of phenomenon. One is cross-dressing in the performance, which is part of the social history of theatre. The other is cross-dressing within the theatrical fiction (i.e. the character is a cross-dresser), which is part of literary history.

Drag is often played for comic effect. Examples include the female characters (at times caricatures) played by male members of Monty Python, and Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon in Some Like It Hot. In other cases the comedy may be primarily in the material being performed, and not necessarily in the fact that the women characters are portrayed by men, such as in many Kids in the Hall sketches.

Baden-Powell, founder of the Scout Movement, was keen on amateur theatricals from Charterhouse public school where, among other roles, he played female operatic roles. In the army he made a speciality of female roles and would often make his own dresses. His stage speciality was what he called his skirt dance.

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