“The Event That Was Nothing”: Miscarriage as a Liminal Event

Abstract

How is it possible that an event is, and is not? How can any event, properly called, be nothing? And yet Susan Stewart’s fine words capture something important about the nature of miscarriage in American society. It both is and is not. It is both a source of acknowledged pain and suffering, and one swept easily away with “you can always try again” or “it could be worse.” I argue here that miscarriage is a liminal event. It is perhaps for this reason that it has been both poorly addressed in our society—it occurs in about 25 percent of pregnancies and yet 55 percent of Americans believe it is rare 2 — and enrolled in larger debates over women’s reproduction. We see laws governing the behavior of pregnant women used to minimize maternal autonomy, justified by preventing fetal harm, including miscarriage. We see laws that require women to prove pregnancy loss is a miscarriage rather than an abortion. Were miscarriage better theorized, perhaps it would not so easily be enrolled in these other debates. Its very liminality and the fact that it is enrolled in these debates sheds light on the complicated network of concepts within which miscarriage lies, an event that is nothing, that is neither abortion nor pregnancy. I shall begin by discussing relevant features of miscarriage and our poor understanding thereof. This poor understanding is, itself, to be expected from a liminal event. I then clarify what I mean by “liminal” even as I establish the liminality of miscarriage. We shall see that miscarriage is liminal along four distinct but related, and perhaps inextricable, dimensions: parenthood, procreation, death, and abortion. Finally, I show how miscarriage is thus enrolled in social and moral debates which are not really about miscarriage at all but rather about