Other forms: borderlines
A borderline is the dividing point where one condition shades into another. A borderline case, borderline pass, borderline acceptable.
As an adjective it means barely on one side or the other, and it is the honest word for a judgement that could have gone either way. In medicine borderline personality disorder is a specific diagnosis, and the name is a historical accident rather than a description.
1nounborderlineThe point at which one condition shades into another.
“His test score was right on the borderline between a pass and a fail.”
borderline is a dividing point.
Border plus line, from the nineteenth century, first of an actual frontier.
From border + line.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA