How to Use heteronormative in a Sentence

heteronormative

adjective
  • Swagger is a way of walking away from, or through, the tough conditions of a heteronormative world.
    — Josephine Livingstone, The New Republic, 16 May 2018
  • The narrative is very heteronormative (and to be honest, very bland).
    — Gigi Engle, Marie Claire, 28 May 2018
  • He’s only managed to maintain his heteronormative bonafides by lying through his shiny white teeth.
    — Ben Travers, IndieWire, 15 May 2025
  • The books that made sense to me at the time were those that questioned the primacy of the heteronormative family.
    — Emily Witt, The New Yorker, 1 Nov. 2019
  • These are things that need to be further introduced to the heteronormative mainstream.
    — Lauren Valenti, Vogue, 30 Oct. 2018
  • This is not the first time JoJo has taken a stand against the heteronormative media.
    — Carolyn Twersky, Seventeen, 27 Aug. 2021
  • By the way, most of these studies are still talking about cisgender and heteronormative couples.
    — Shayla Love, Scientific American, 20 Feb. 2023
  • There he was surrounded by people who didn’t fit a heteronormative mold—some his own age, some who had already come into great success.
    — Chris Weller, Newsweek, 1 May 2014
  • But Lizzo is far from heteronormative, or even mainstream in the traditional sense of that word.
    — Alex Blynn, Billboard, 13 Sep. 2019
  • Once upon a time, not so long ago, Valentine’s Day was a strictly heteronormative affair.
    — Lynn Yaeger, Vogue, 2 Feb. 2018
  • That is, dating is still heteronormative and extremely gendered.
    — Melanie Curry, refinery29.com, 11 Mar. 2025
  • In locker rooms, on fields and on courts, male athletes are taught to embrace heteronormative standards of masculinity.
    — New York Times, 22 June 2021
  • Whiteside has tried to carve out a space for himself as a gay man who is not heteronormative in an art form that has for centuries depicted men as princes courting women.
    — Avichai Scher, NBC News, 21 Sep. 2019
  • His confident swagger opened up new spaces for countless other men of color to present themselves in less heteronormative ways.
    — Angel E. Fraden, Teen Vogue, 23 June 2017
  • And even though there are still a plethora of heteronormative love triangles and television often still adheres to the status quo, nuance has crept in.
    — Lorena O’Neil, Los Angeles Times, 13 Apr. 2024
  • The same heteronormative forces that can lead us to suppress our queerness can also complicate making inroads with other women.
    — Katie Simon, Vogue, 17 Oct. 2024
  • Andrea flees back to Portland and vows to live free of heteronormative artifice, despite the personal costs.
    — Christine Sneed, New York Times, 11 Apr. 2018
  • The stress and discomfort that manifests in my body from its daily encounter with misogynoir and cis-heteronormative culture melts away.
    — Martine Thompson, Bon Appétit, 25 Feb. 2020
  • The singer reportedly insisted that the video's love triangle break the heteronormative mold.
    — Paris Close, Billboard, 13 Sep. 2017
  • But Waithe bucks the heteronormative tropes somewhat by keeping things in Denise’s perspective.
    — Cate Young, Vulture, 24 May 2021
  • So the person that we’re supposed to love the most is typically somebody that forms a heteronormative relationship with us that leads to children.
    — Shayla Love, Scientific American, 17 Feb. 2023
  • Rom-coms and sitcoms played off the same heteronormative ideal -- with single and/or fat women demonized as tragic and desperate.
    — Holly Thomas, CNN, 30 Aug. 2021
  • Fire Island is one of several films that attempted to upend the genre’s white, heteronormative, fatphobic tropes this year.
    — Amel Mukhtar, Vogue, 12 Dec. 2022
  • Will’s slap was a physical assault, a tearing down of another Black man to reclaim his heteronormative power in that very public realm.
    — Eisa Nefertari Ulen, The Hollywood Reporter, 29 Mar. 2022
  • Although Daedone had dated women in the past, OneTaste was more heteronormative than not.
    — Thessaly La Force, New Yorker, 29 Aug. 2025
  • Over the years, the series has faced criticism for its lack of diversity, particularly its all-white, heteronormative lead cast.
    — Harper's Bazaar Staff, Harper's BAZAAR, 29 May 2021
  • There’s no question the profile of voters and candidates who are either not white, not male or not heterosexual or heteronormative is rising.
    — Patricia Sullivan, Washington Post, 30 June 2019
  • There are other types of spaces which are more, say, heteronormative and Black, or commercial and Black, where maybe the values are different.
    — Julissa Jamesstaff Writer, Los Angeles Times, 16 June 2022
  • Because the world assumes that all people are heteronormative and cisgenger, kids can often be on the back foot when talking about their relationships and identity.
    — Taylor Grothe, Parents, 4 June 2026
  • For many years now, the heteronormative and gendered approach to fashion has been changing, with a more inclusive and fluid ideology emerging.
    — Kati Chitrakorn, CNN Money, 26 Jan. 2026

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'heteronormative.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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