Concept Of Liminality Research Articles

Living in a liminal space: possibilities for pre-tenure faculty to refuse loveless neoliberalism

Neoliberalism occupies the walls of academia, seeping into the pulse and pace of faculty work and engendering precarity into academic life and the promotion and tenure process, particularly for Women of Color (WoC) scholars. Building on research on early-career faculty and Faculty of Color and informed by the theoretical concept of liminality, we use scholarly personal narratives to document ways neoliberalism has shaped our experiences as pre-tenure WoC scholars at research-intensive universities. Ultimately, recognizing our and other pre-tenure faculty members’ liminality within the loveless neoliberal academy, we offer possibilities for subversion and refusal toward forging a more equitable and just future.

The subaltern strikes back, or how Ukraine is claiming agency from Russia and the European Union

ABSTRACT Using the concept of liminality in combination with ontological security through an overarching postcolonial lens, this article shows how Ukraine as a liminar on the East–West spatial-ideological axis has successfully claimed agency from the European Union (EU) and Russia in the wake of Russia’s full-scale invasion. We argue that the latter has acted as a critical juncture for Ukraine, to the point that agency has emerged from a state of ontological anxiety. Provoking the need to fight for the survival of the Self, Russia’s invasion has strongly accelerated the transformation of Ukraine’s liminal identity, uniting the country around a new asserted Self. Russia’s aggression has pushed Ukraine to definitively reject the narrative of a common identity promoted by Russia and claim its rightful belonging to Europe, thereby unleashing unprecedented agency vis-à-vis its significant Others, i.e. Russia and the EU. From the EU’s side, Ukraine has finally been embraced within the European family by receiving candidate status. From Russia’s side, Ukraine’s successful application for EU candidate status has consolidated Ukraine’s departure from Russia’s perceived sphere of influence. Along with Ukraine’s nationwide resistance against the invasion, this destabilises Russia’s projected identity discourse around the Slavic brotherhood and the “Russian world”.

Liminality as a Principle of the Life of Christian Communities in the Reflections of Richard Rohr

This article analyzes Richard Rohr’s reflections on the anthropological and pastoral significance of the liminality. Although we do not find among Rohr’s publications a book in which he specifi-cally addresses the context of liminality or the pastoral care of Chris-tian communities, these contents are recognizable within his publica-tions. In this paper, we pay attention to the concepts or authors that Rohr relies on when reflecting on liminality and its meaning. Thus, it seeks to systematically deepen the ideas and concepts related to his understanding of the potential of liminality within the life of Christian communities. The main aim is to highlight the significant anthropologi-cal and pastoral potential of the concept of liminality, which Rohr most explicitly addressed in the book Adam’s Return. The secondary aim is to differentiate the character of liminality in the context of Christian communities, which could remain misunderstood.

Examining liminality in professional practice, relational identities, and career prospects in resource-constrained health systems: Findings from an empirical study of medical and nurse interns in Kenya

We examine new doctors' and nurses' experiences of transitioning from training to practising as health professionals, drawing on the concept of liminality. Liminality is a stage of ‘in-betweenness’, involving uncertainty and ambiguity as people leave one social context and reintegrate into a new one. Surprisingly little research has explored new health professionals' experiences of liminality during role and career transitions, particularly in precarious and resource-constrained settings. Drawing on 146 qualitative interviews and seven focus groups, involving 121 new graduate medical doctors and nurses transitioning through internship training in Kenya, we describe three aspects of liminality. First, liminal professional practice, where interns realise that best practices learned during medical and nursing schools are often impossible to implement in resource constrained health care settings; instead they learn workarounds and practical norms. Second, liminal relational identities, where interns leave behind being students and adopt the identities and responsibilities of qualified professionals within pre-existing professional hierarchies of status and expertise. We explain how these new doctors and graduate nurses negotiate their liminal status, including in relation to more experienced but less qualified professional colleagues. We also discuss how interns cope with liminality due to disappointing and inadequate supervision and role modelling from senior colleagues but then find peer support and their place within their own professions. Finally, we discuss how new doctors and nurses come to terms with the precarity of working in resource constrained health systems, abandon expectations of secure, permanent employment and careers, and accept the realities of liminal professional careers. We explain how all three forms of liminality influence professionals' developing practices, identities, and careers. We call for further studies with a specific liminality lens to explore this critical period in health workers' careers, to inform policy and practice responding to global transformations in healthcare professions and practice.

Using the lens of liminality to understand important steps in creating conditions for networked learning in work-integrated learning

In this paper university teachers' and professionals’ work in the BUFFL project, a networked work-integrated lifelong learning project with flexible online course modules. The project involved a meeting space between academia and industry bank organizations or insurance companies in Sweden. Previous research in the project reported that four important steps are important for a successful establishment of a networked community of practice and networked learning. In this paper, the concept of liminality, or a liminal space, is used to explore work-integrated learning. The short paper concludes that there is a balance to strike between the risks and possibilities of liminality in learning in practice. From the different perspectives of liminality, a balance is needed when academia and industry meet. While both academia and industry bring their formal spaces and structures, this meeting can be said to create a liminal space that provides a free and uncertain place of possibilities where learning and transformation take place.

Ethnic identity as a challenge to antidiscrimination law: protection, positionality and liminality

ABSTRACT Constitutions and antidiscrimination provisions tend to compartmentalise and operationalise ethnicity through religion, ethnic origin or country of origin, nationality, language and race. The growing focus on religion and race contributes to the entrenchment of ethnicity in religion and race, and this is not always fruitful. This article argues that antidiscrimination law should explicitly and robustly integrate ethnic identity as a protected (personal) characteristic in domestic law, independent of any other descriptors that may be recognised, and independent of existing group-based protections. Furthermore, this article argues that anti-discrimination infrastructure needs a provision of positionality and liminality. The concept of positionality facilitates the recognition of power dynamics present in the ascription of otherness, as well as the potential incongruences between identity ascription and actual self-identification. The concept of liminality enables the consideration of fluid and more flexible forms of self-identification across multiple public and private spaces.

Getting socialized but trying not to get stuck: early career professionals’ liminality in dual socialization processes

Abstract Early career professionals actively seek career advancement opportunities while undergoing socialization within their organizations. This study employs the concept of liminality to examine their experience of in-betweenness in dual socialization—simultaneous organizational socialization and vocational/organizational anticipatory socialization for the next career chapter. We conducted repeat interviews with 22 U.S. early career professionals (n = 65), employed full-time. This longitudinal study uncovers how participants construct liminality as either a planned or an emergent phase; factors contributing to their discursive tension in liminality over time; and how they communicatively manage the tension to move forward. We propose a refined model of socialization [Jablin, F. (2001). Organizational entry, assimilation, and exit. In F. Jablin & L. Putnam (Eds.), The new handbook of organizational communication (pp. 732–818). Sage], which integrates liminality as a phase in which individuals feel neither fully “in” nor “out” of their organization. This enhanced model theorizes dual socialization as dynamic and interconnected processes through permeable organizational boundaries, addressing the contemporary career landscape with an increasing number and types of employment options.

Liminal spaces and Hong Kong: Metaphors of crisis and identity

Periods of localised social unrest are increasing in frequency and are usually described in terms of crisis. Events that unfold during these periods are often recounted retrospectively once a sense of stability has emerged. In contrast, this article contributes an empirical analysis of identity work undertaken by a group of individuals amid an unfolding crisis by drawing on interview data collected in one Hong Kong University across December 2019 and January 2020. We frame our analysis with the concept of liminality which draws attention to the space or state of in-between-ness occupied by people as they navigate and work to transition from ‘before’ to ‘after’ a time of great change. We explore linguistic representations of liminality by analysing the use of metaphors in these interview narratives. Metaphors, in this context, are considered key markers of complex cognitive and psychological processing. Findings of this analysis indicate the dominance of (dis)orientation to time and uncertainty about the future which are associated with liminality and identity work.

Boundaries in online couples therapy: “Can anything exist without boundaries?”

AbstractObjectiveThis research delved into the experiences of couples and therapists in online couples therapy with an emphasis on therapeutic boundaries.BackgroundAlthough the popularity of online therapy has surged, limited understanding exists about the meanings and experiences tied to therapeutic boundaries in this context, underscoring the need for its examination to enhance online therapy's effectiveness.MethodA purposive sample of 51 participants, including 36 individuals (comprising 18 couples who underwent separate interviews), and 15 couple and family therapists were interviewed in four online focus groups. Constructivist grounded theory guided the data analysis to discern therapeutic boundary dimensions.ResultsThe analysis identified three dimensions of therapeutic boundaries: (a) boundaries between the therapist and couple, (b) boundaries between the couple and their family, and (c) boundaries between the therapists and their own families.ConclusionThe study offers insights into the nuanced concept of liminality within therapists' and couples' transition to online couples therapy, particularly emphasizing disruptions in conventional therapeutic paradigms.ImplicationsTo uphold the integrity and bolster the therapeutic alliance in online couples therapy, there is a compelling need for therapists to transition toward novel means of establishing boundaries, moving away from traditional constructs.

Pleasures of Liminality

Since the comprehensive theorization of liminality and its attributes by the Scottish anthropologist Victor Turner in the late 1960s and 1970s, the concept of liminality has been applied to more than the threshold experience of individuals. As liminality in general describes a state of transition, the concept has been expanded to include rather different spaces, genres, and conditions. In this article, I propose liminality as a threshold concept that might offer a new and different angle for looking at legal and literary fiction(s). Liminality might allow us to bridge the conceptual gaps between the disciplines with regard to the general use and function of fiction(s) and fictionality in law and in literature; it may thus prove to be valuable for interdisciplinary approaches in both fields. I will, however, not attempt to formulate a new theory of fiction, since in contrast to the numerous and not always successful attempts at defining fiction(s) and fictionality, I am not interested in locking down either phenomena in law and in literature, but rather in identifying and highlighting some common aspects. Liminality, I argue, lends itself profitably to the cross-disciplinary orientation of an approach which addresses both legal and literary perspectives. It appears to be particularly suited to bring out the functions of fictions and fictionality in both law and literature, which is ultimately to translate the merely imaginable into something conceivable.

Leaning Into the Liminal: A Guide for Counselors and Companions (2024). Edited by Timothy L. Carson. ⁠The Liminality Press. ISBN: ‏9798989164004

Liminality is a concept that straddles various domains of thought and practice. In the context of human suffering the concept has much to offer clinical practitioners who work with clients undergoing significant life changes. In Leaning Into the Liminal: A Guide for Counselors and Companions (2024a), editor Dr. Timothy L. Carson facilitates a range of voices exploring the meanings and uses of liminality. Carson is a pastor who completed his doctoral research on liminality and now heads the Liminality Project at the University of Missouri. The concept of liminality is treated in the text as a description of how people move through the disorientating passage from what is known, through unknowing, and into the new. Individuals traverse such passages when they experience key changes in life. Protocols for supporting this movement are a valuable part of the discussions in this book. The book is organised into sections dealing with liminality in clinical practice, recovery from war (including in Ukraine), spiritual direction, and dying. This exploration will be helpful to counsellors, psychotherapists, and practitioners who are unfamiliar with this liminal perspective on human experience. Some of the contributions to the book are tender and intimate in a way that supports a deepening engagement with these essential life transitions.

Feral ecologies of the human deep past: multispecies archaeology and palaeo‐synanthropy

AbstractThis article articulates recent advances in palaeo‐ecology with the goals and ambitions of multispecies archaeology. It centres the synanthropic nexus as a key context for the study of early human‐animal relationships and argues that its evolution yields important yet currently overlooked dynamics shaping the structure of the archaeological record. I first show how the dominant heuristic of wild versus domesticated nonhuman animals obfuscates the inherent variability and creativity of past animal agency. I then illustrate how such agency is caught up with human behaviour and ecosystem impacts from relatively early on in human history, navigating historically shifting configurations of autonomy and control. Drawing on deep‐historical examples of synanthropic niches co‐assembled by human foragers and nonhuman animals, I argue that such interspecies configurations require careful attention to concepts of liminality and ferality and challenge species‐level approaches. I finally highlight potential human behavioural, material, and cosmological consequences of the synanthropic nexus, including integrative foraging patterns and notions of the giving animal, which play an important role in many Indigenous and ethnographic forager societies and illustrate the value of attending to this nexus as a focus of comparative multispecies research.

Crossing the Threshold by/around Water: A Critical Reading of the Liminal Experiences of Adolescents and Young Adults in Feeding the Moonfish and Our Place

AbstractThis study seeks to examine water as a liminal symbol that reflects and symbolizes the liminal identities of adolescents and young adults in two selected plays for young adults: Feeding the Moonfish (2011) by Barbara Wiechmann and Our Place (2015) by Terry Gabbard. Feeding the Moonfish deals with the young adults Martin and Eden who suffer from traumatic experiences. They go to the dock by the lake to rediscover themselves, and, eventually, heal by the water. In a similar setting, Our Place comprises five stories that revolve around adolescents and young adults’ feelings of loss, fragmentation, frustration, love, and death. In both plays, the characters go through the three stages of liminality defined by Arnold van Gennep: the pre-liminal, the liminal, and the post-liminal and, finally, emerge as reborn/healed. Water is a complex liminal symbol that reflects the experiences of adolescence and young adults, and combines contradictory meanings which are essential, expressive, and, most importantly, complementary for the development of the characters and for their eventual recovery. Using the concept of liminality and adolescent psychology to read scenes in which liminal experiences (confusion, indecisiveness, and disorientation) are present, this study argues that the depiction of liminal experiences near water in these plays for young adults offers complex symbols for the study of young adulthood and for encountering and responding to traumas experienced in adolescence.

Navigating the boundaries between technology and social change—evaluating acceptance of visible tattoos in the workplace: the French exception?

This article examines how tattoos are challenging and renegotiating social norms in the French workplace—from hiring to everyday work life—and the role of social media technology. The workplace reflects the complex interplay of relational and social processes that form societal attitudes. France remains a highly conservative and centralized national context traditionally resistant, due to its republican values, to external markers of identity, such as, for example, religious artifacts. The motivation for the present article is an exploration of how the nuanced interplay between technology, social factors, and organizational attitudes, impact on the gradually changing perceptions and acceptance of visible tattoos in Gallic work contexts. Using theories of socio-technical systems and identity-driven consumption framed by the postmodern concepts of liminality and communitas, we employ a mixed-methods approach to examine tattoo consumption and acceptance across a range of workplaces in France. Findings suggest that social norms, interacting with social media peer pressure, continue to push cultural boundaries, with online consumer behavior frequently shaping offline consumer behavior and employee/employer attitudes. These processes are often informed by the pursuit of “self” and reflect several “tribalistic” aspects of society. Through analysis, we articulate and contribute six interpretations of how tattooing is partially accepted by recruiters in the workplace in France. We also contribute to the understanding of liminality and communitas as applied to socio-technical spaces. Overall, we reveal insights that can inform researchers, managers, and practitioners in anticipating future changes and preparing for the opportunities and challenges that lie ahead.

Ambivalence and the unsettling aftershocks: Postcolonial perspectives on Vellem’s spirituality

Addressing a myriad of complex social, economic and political issues in the South African context requires that we draw from a variety of voices. This postcolonial reflection draws on the work of Vuyani Vellem’s African spirituality to highlight how it can help Africans conceptualise race epistemologically. The contribution emerged out of an article presented at a conference themed ‘unthinking West. The article employed the concepts of liminality and threshold to discuss the ambivalence encountered by Vuyani Vellem and highlights how his theological convictions still present unsettling ideological aftershocks within the unjust structures of society.Contribution: This contribution is a black liberation theological reflection, which laments how Vellem did not live to witness the full realisation of his dreams regarding the liberation of the black masses. The article identifies racial discrimination and misconceptions on African spirituality as some examples of the ‘unsettling aftershocks’ regarding challenges, which Vellem confronted within the unjust structures of South African society.

The Liminality of Subcultural Spaces: Tokyo’s Gaming Arcades as Boundary Between Social Isolation and Integration

This article explores the concept of liminal spaces in Tokyo, specifically focusing on gaming arcades as transitional spaces between social isolation and integration. The decline of the once-popular arcades since the 1990s raises questions about their usage, accessibility, and affordability in contemporary Tokyo. After clarifying the concept of liminality and urban borderlands, the article examines various case studies in central Tokyo, argues that arcades serve diverse purposes and highlights the importance of reintegration of such liminal spaces to bring people from different backgrounds together, providing entertainment, competition, and ritualized encounters. Employing ethnographic fieldwork, including participant observation, interviews, and secondary data analysis, this study recognizes the gaming arcade not only as a physical but also as a mental and social space. The arcades embody the hopes, fears, and aspirations of their users, blur boundaries, offer immersive experiences, and foster a sense of community, comfort, and nostalgia. Such insights allow us to understand how identities are constructed and negotiated in these spaces. In conclusion, the article advocates for a nuanced approach to urban planning that recognizes the value of subcultural spaces like gaming arcades and emphasizes the need to preserve and integrate these spaces into the broader urban fabric. By doing so it can be understood how these liminal spaces can contribute to a diversity of social interactions, community-building, and a better understanding and revitalization of urban borderlands if integrated and managed in the right way.

Liminality in academic middle management

Abstract This article explores the complex academic-administrative role of the associate dean in US higher education administration. Previous research in Australia, UK and USA indicates that these academic middle managers experience significant conflict and ambiguity due to their roles and responsibilities as faculty members and administrators. Victor Turner's concept of liminality provides insight into the challenges of academic middle management at this administrative level. Analysing qualitative data collected through semi-structured interviews with associate deans at US research-intensive universities, I find that associate deans experience changes in perspective and relationships that foreground contradictions of meaning and highlight their paradoxical social status. I argue that, as part of a process of transition from faculty to administrator, the associate deanship is essential to the social construction of the university.

Incredible Contradiction between Liminality and Communitas in Nehru’s An Autobiography

This paper examines An Autobiography of Jawaharlal Nehru focusing on the performativity of his liminality at Harrow and Cambridge in England from 1905 to 1912. Being separated from his family and nation, he got a higher education there. The concepts of liminality and communitas by Turner and the idea of the ‘rites of passage’ by van Gennep are used as theoretical bases for analyzing the autobiographical narrative. The analysis of the textual evidence responds to how Nehru, the icon of Indian political and economic modernity, performs in a liminal space of a foreign land and explores how and why the organicity between liminality and communitas as theoretically claimed does not work in the cases of his life-writing. The discussion then finally identifies the distinct economic status, multiple references to politics, diverse family legacy, and lack of ‘we feeling’ among the group members responsible for breaking the organic union between liminality and communitas and promoting an incredible contradiction. Fundamentally, this study supports perceiving the notions regarding the performance of the person in a liminal space. At the same time, it also assists in spotting the obstructive aspects behind the organic relation between the generally inseparable concepts of liminality and communitas in the customary rites of passage.

Tourists at Work: Outstation Leisure Behavior of Airline Cabin Crew

During airline cabin crew members’ time abroad, although they are on duty and relevant laws and regulations regulate their behaviors, they still have free time for leisure. This circumstance gives them the characteristics of being tourists at work. The present study applied the border theory and the concept of liminality to explore the tourists at work phenomenon among airline cabin crews. We adopted qualitative research methods and interviewed 40 flight attendants with experience in long-haul trans-oceanic flights. Six significant types of leisure behaviors were identified: serious leisure, spontaneous leisure, self-guided, group, spontaneous work and leisure, and nightlife and gaming leisure. Additionally, this study discussed the changes in airline cabin crews’ travel behaviors and their contribution to tourist destinations.

Tensions and change in liminal spaces – Young people in Swedish out-of-home care

The objective of this paper is to further the understanding of young people’s experiences of out-of-home care (OHC). The focus will be on the tension between negative and positive experiences of OHC, refracted through the concept of liminality. The study is based on semi-structured interviews with 10 young people aged 15–22 (7 women, 3 men) with long-term contact with social services and psychiatric care. OHC can be experienced as a liminal space in both a negative and a positive sense. It is negative when perceived as containment rather than meaningful treatment. It can also be a negative experience when connected to fear, a lack of influence, and uncertainty in terms of being in between the social services and psychiatric care. It is positive when it is perceived as a turning point that enables positive change. It is then connected to feelings of meaningfulness, being respected, hope, and empowerment. The young people participating in the study also connect their experiences of OHC to a context of greater austerity in the welfare state. They reflect upon the benfits of OHC in terms of costs for society, but also the costs for the young person if the OHC is not perceived as meaningful support leading towards positive change. The participants have complex, interrelated needs and problems, and they also experience institutional gaps between psychiatric care and social services. It is important to overcome these gaps, so that young people are not located in ‘in-between spaces’ in terms of service provision.