Meleg

Meleg is a term appearing in Turkish and Hungarian with distinct meanings. In Turkish, meleg primarily means warm or hot and is used in everyday speech to describe weather, objects, or sensations. It does not function as a standard term for sexual orientation in Turkish; when discussing sexuality, Turkish speakers usually use other words or borrow terms from other languages, and the sexual-orientation sense of meleg, if it occurs, is highly context dependent.

In Hungarian, meleg means both warm and, in everyday usage, is also used to refer to homosexual people. As an adjective it describes warmth; as a noun or noun-phrase it can denote a gay person or the LGBTQ community. In contemporary Hungarian, meleg as a self-identifier is common in some communities, while in others it may be used pejoratively depending on tone and intent. In media and public discourse, context and sensitivity to audience are important, and many people prefer neutral terms or self-chosen labels.

The word’s exact connotations depend on language and culture, so awareness of local norms is important when using it in cross-language settings. Meleg can appear in Turkish contexts related to warmth or temperature, and in Hungarian contexts related to LGBTQ topics.