marginality.

1. A position at the edge of a social, cultural or institutional system, with limited participation or recognized standing.

2. The condition of being slight, narrowly sufficient or of limited significance.

3. Relation to an additional unit or incremental change in an economic quantity.

Use it for

Words that belong together

• social marginality
• cultural marginality

On the page

Social marginality limited access to the networks through which positions were normally filled.

The essay examined cultural marginality without assuming that the group lacked its own valued institutions.

Usage notes

Primary category: economics / business / social science. Forms: Usually uncountable. Legacy lexical fields mirror sense 1 only. Use numbered sense fields for all meanings. Established modern English lexical item. No separate regional spelling or grammatical inflection entry. Writing functions: economic explanation, resource analysis, incentive analysis, comparison. Disciplines: economics, business, social science. Commonness: uncommon.