Marginalization, a fluid concept, challenges status quo understandings and representations of individuals throughout the world. Considered to reference individuals who have been excluded from the mainstream dialogue, marginalization has developed into a term that evokes an examination of the master narrative, also known as the metanarrative. In a world where the master narrative predominates, individuals are systematically excluded based on a characteristic or characteristics they possess that disrupt a specified system of cultural norms. In relation to the global media, marginalized voices represent groups that have self-contained cultural norms and rules that differ from mainstream norms and rules. While marginalized groups may share some norms, rules, and values with the mainstream culture, they possess differences that can be viewed as transgressive, existing outside the mainstream norms, rules, and values. Media representations of groups that are globally marginalized, and sometimes stigmatized, include but are not limited to race, ethnicity, sexuality, gender, class, ableism, and religion. A study of these marginalized groups reveals an implied system of privilege that reifies the status quo and supports the master narrative. Media invisibility results from marginalization, and when marginalized groups are represented, often those representations are through a marketable, stereotypical lens. As a result of the dearth of images, and a system of privilege, few studies examine marginalized groups in countries throughout the world. By creating a global dialogue about marginalized voices, images, and self-representations, advocacy for difference and understanding allows these voices, images, and self-representations to become expressive renderings of specific transgressive cultural norms.
