Subaltern

A subaltern is a military term for a junior officer. Literally meaning "subordinate", subaltern is used to describe commissioned officers below the rank of captain and generally comprises the various grades of lieutenant. In the British Army the senior subaltern rank was captain-lieutenant, obsolete since the 18th century.

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Prior to reform of the British Army in 1871, the ranks of cornet and ensign were the junior subaltern ranks in the cavalry and infantry respectively.

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The term is used in postcolonial theory to refer to the lower classes; this sense of the word was coined by Antonio Gramsci. In current philosophical and critical usage, the term specifically describes a person rendered without agency by her or his social status, a sense that owes its influence to Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's essay "Can the Subaltern Speak?"

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Military: A military or military force (n., from Latin militarius, miles "soldier") has seen many different incarnations throughout time. Early armies may have been just men with sharpened sticks and rocks, through time they have included advancements such as men mounted on horses, men wielding swords and ot...

Officer: Any holder of an office or of a post may bear the title officer. Generally, the word officer implies a rank, and degree of decision-making responsibility, higher rather than lower in a chain of command and reporting....

Subordinate: REDIRECT Hierarchy...

Subaltern related Images and Photos (experimental)

The Young Subaltern