subaltern

comparative more subaltern · superlative most subaltern

1. Of a lower rank or position; inferior or secondary; especially (military) ranking as a junior officer, below the rank of captain.

   a subaltern officer

   2 more examples

   Two weeks after giving birth[…] she [Rachida Dati] was removed and offered no consolation prize other than the subaltern position of No 2 on the UMP's list for the next European elections.

   2009 January 27, Agnes Poirier, “The fall of Rachida Dati reflects badly on the French president”, in The Guardian

   Celebrating the subversive practices of subaltern groups

   2013, Isher-Paul Sahni, “More than Horseplay”, in Studies in Popular Culture, volume 35, page 81

   Synonyms: subordinate

2. human sciencesAsserting only a part of what is asserted in a related proposition.

plural subalterns

1. A subordinate.
2. UKgovernmentA commissioned officer having a rank below that of captain; a lieutenant or second lieutenant.

   As a subaltern of 24, Neave was captured in the defence of Calais in May 1940.

   2003 February 20, Ciar Byrne, “Colditz: remade with love”, in The Guardian

   1 more example

   She was an extraordinarily beautiful girl, Margaret Devereux ; and made all the men frantic by running away with a penniless young fellow ; a mere nobody sir a subaltern in a foot regiment, or something of that kind.

   1891, Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray, London; New York, N.Y.: Ward Lock & Co., →OCLC

3. human sciencesA subaltern proposition; a proposition implied by a universal proposition.

   Antonyms: superaltern

4. literary theoryhuman sciencesA member of a group that is socially, politically and geographically outside of the hegemonic power structure of the colony and of the colonial homeland.

   In Ghosh's novel, a canonical western scientist is pitted against a counterscientific group of native folk-medicine practitioners led by Mangala, a subaltern in every conceivable meaning of the term.

   2012, Aparajita De, Amrita Ghosh, Ujjwal Jana, Subaltern Vision: A Study in Postcolonial Indian English Text, page 109

   1 more example

   Young refers sardonically to the existence of reams of postcolonial "theory", and promises to give us "postcolonialism from below, which is what and where it should rightly be, given that it elaborates a politics of ‘the subaltern’, that is, subordinated classes and peoples".

   2003 August 9, Steven Poole, “Postcolonialism and all that jazz”, in The Guardian