liminal
adjective
Deborah JowittJon Goss
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Get in Between Liminal
Liminal is a word for the in-between. It describes states, times, spaces, etc., that exist at a point of change—a metaphorical threshold—as in “the liminal zone between sleep and wakefulness.” The idea of a threshold is at the word’s root; it comes from Latin limen, meaning “threshold.” In technical use liminal means “barely perceptible” or “barely capable of eliciting a response,” and it has a familiar partner with a related meaning: subliminal can mean “inadequate to produce a sensation or a perception,” though it more often means “existing or functioning below the threshold of consciousness.” Limen has served as the basis for a number of other English words, including eliminate (“to cast out”), sublime (“lofty in conception or expression”), preliminary (“introductory”), and the woefully underused postliminary (“subsequent”).
Examples of liminal in a Sentence
David L. Ulin, The Atlantic, 21 Feb. 2025
Reese and Friedman have discarded the bulk of the paper’s old typesetting equipment, but the interior still has the cozy, liminal atmosphere of a place where people might drop in unannounced to lodge a complaint or tell their life story, both of which are routine occurrences at the Civic.
—Chelsea Edgar, The New Yorker, 31 Jan. 2025
That balance allows this movie to exist in the compellingly liminal space between concrete and imagined worlds.
—David Ehrlich, IndieWire, 14 Jan. 2025
Reality often feels suspended and liminal in late December, but this time, a certain urgency cut through that haziness, an ever-present awareness that things are about to drastically change.
—James Factora, Them, 8 Jan. 2025
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Cite this Entry
“Liminal.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/liminal. Accessed 13 Mar. 2025.
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liminal
adjective
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