subordinated

[ suh-bawr-dn-ey-tid ]

adjective

1. made secondary or subservient:

   Most college programs are geared to those aged 18 to 24, leaving others in a subordinated position in the system.

   She refused to settle for a subordinated life as an “office lady,” making copies and coffee for male coworkers and superiors.

2. Finance. being or relating to a debt whose holder is ranked below secured and general creditors with respect to priority of payment:

   Typically, in liquidation, subordinated debentures come after short-term debt.

Other Words From

• un·sub·or·di·nat·ed adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of subordinated¹

First recorded in 1640–50 subordinated fordef 1; 1920–25 subordinated fordef 2; subordinate ( def ) + -ed ²( def )

Example Sentences

In the age of aristocrats everything was subordinated to family bloodlines.

From The Daily Beast

The Palestine Partition plan failed because it took ethnic isolationism as a value and subordinated justice to it.

From The Daily Beast

Artifice is always strictly subordinated, and the poet seems to sing spontaneously.

From Project Gutenberg

Subordinated as it is here rewritten, it does not half express the spiteful independence she assumed to teach Coppy a lesson.

From Project Gutenberg

People will always think of it first when they think of us; all our work and aims will be warped by it and subordinated to it.

From Project Gutenberg

How does this subordination affect the reciprocal relation of the persons thus subordinated in common?

From Project Gutenberg

They really believed that the vast populations of eastern Asia could be permanently subordinated to such a Europe.

From Project Gutenberg