It, as many words can, can be used for more than that. From the top of my head alone: - a member of the Homo sapiens species. - a member of the Homo genus -

It, as many words can, can be used for more than that. From the top of my head alone: - a member of the Homo sapiens species. - a member of the Homo genus - a male member of any of the two above - a male adult member of any of the two above - a brave member of any of the two above - a soldier - a commoner - any vaguely humanoidly shaped being The word is certainly not special in that regard; I could give a similar list of “Russia” or “chess” for instance — but seemingly this word sometimes faces objection when the meaning the objector desires not be the one used, and I find that it is invariably a difference of gender lines in meaning if that be the case, and that it is rooted in gender politics. I have never seen such wilfull denial of descriptive usage of the word “chess” and objections when it is used to, for instance, mean the entire family of games that descend from a common ancestor, or when it is used by metaphor for any exercise in great tactical planning. The original meaning of the word “man” was the first I gave, all others arose by narrowing or widening it by analogy, much as what happened with “chess”.