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Although liminal theory explains transitional periods in consumers' lives – such as preadolescence – the impact of these transitions on emotionally connected actors and the transformations that the latter endure have been largely overlooked. Through a qualitative study of the mothers of preteen girls, we show that liminality spills over and that mothers transform from fully needed to authoritative-friendly moms. During this process, these mothers engage in spilled-over liminal consumption (SOLC), which comprehends concomitantly loosely and creatively crafted rituals and new and re-signified routines. However, amid the process of assuming a new mother's role and helping their daughters' transformation, these mothers unreflectively reinforce traditional gender norms. Based on our findings, we discuss the process of SOLC and how it ends in reproducing gender and class-based stereotypes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper advances knowledge around the intersection of death, loss, and leisure travel. Our phenomenological study revealed the lived experiences of seven senior travelers who had traveled internationally following the death of a loved one(s). We employed the 'MeBox' method to help uncover new layers of meaning that are not always easy to put into words. The findings of our study provide new insights into notions of leisure by identifying overseas leisure travel within a liminal space in which feelings of loss and acceptance, and the creation of new perspectives, are experienced following the death of a loved one(s). Our findings challenge the destructive nature of human loss following death of a loved one(s). Instead, the experience of international travel appeared to influence the social, material, and existential life of senior travelers after the death of a loved one(s), transforming leisure into a personally meaningful experience for them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Settlers of colour occupy a liminal space in the settler colony of Australia, and this liminality was exacerbated during the COVID‐19 pandemic. Through the literature on digital activism, technological immersion, and placemaking, this paper explores Radical Placemaking as a route for culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) people based in Brisbane to stake their right to the city through alternative digitised modalities. Three projects using situated digital stories were created: (i) the Chatty Bench Project; (ii) the TransHuman Saunter Project; and (iii) Chatty Bench Festival Community Media Visual Projections. We analysed the experiences of study participants creating the digital stories and eventual user experiences of the stories for their ability to provoke self‐reflection, immersiveness, and belonging through evocation and representation of lived experiences. The paper suggests that radical placemaking offers CALD communities subversive tactics of occupying space through emerging technologies without engaging in erasure of existing histories of place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2016, the UK voted to leave the European Union (EU). This outcome was not only unexpected but also had clear geographical and age‐bound divisions. While people over the age of 65 tended to vote to leave, younger voters were more likely to vote to remain a part of the EU. Reflecting on 7 years of journalism, this paper explores the ways in which young people have been represented by the news media with regards to the issue of Brexit. It analyses a database of 700 news media articles published from 2016 to 2022 across the UK, equating to 100 articles per calendar year and ranging from regional sources to those with an international reach. The paper showcases how young people occupy liminal spaces within the news media through an analysis of the language used to describe their political participation, and a focus on their role within political activism. As it is this media that dominates hegemonic narratives within traditional political spheres, the retelling and representation of young people's engagement serves, we argue, to reinforce their liminality as citizens apart. Reflecting on 7 years of journalism and analysing 700 news media articles related to Brexit and young people, this paper showcases how these media reinforce the liminal spaces occupied by this demographic in political discourse. As it is this media that dominates hegemonic narratives within traditional political spheres, the retelling and representation of young people's engagement serves, we argue, to reinforce their liminality as citizens apart. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

von Fircks' (Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science 1-20, 2003) essay on the experience of meditation is rich in stimuli and insights. This paper aims at extrapolating and developing a germinal element from it: Semiotic mediation constitutes the core of the religious nature of the human psyche. It represents both the drive for transformation in the transcendence of the relational process and the search for stability and fixedness in the immanence of the experience of the present moment. The religiosity of the mind can be considered the expression of a transcendent function of semiosis in the very act of looking at an elsewhere in the present moment. The semiotic mediation of the religious psyche seeks meaning in the very act of creating it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the connection between the late Victorian lost world novel and the fraudulent or flawed maps that frequently punctuate its narratives. Drawing on sociological risk theory, it argues that the model of adventure structuring these texts is one of liminality and 'experiential tension,' and that their fraudulent geographies are a spatial counterpart to this liminal model. They promote an adventure characterized by perpetual potential and possibility, one we might more accurately term 'meta-adventure.' This model was central to both the imperialist enterprise during the late nineteenth century and to the discourse of 'hypothetical masculinity' that helped bolster and uphold it. The problematic geographies of these texts illuminate the ways in which fiction, masculinity, and adventure were mutually productive processes during the fin de siècle, and the ways in which this interrelationship was facilitated, at least in part, by the 'unmapping' of adventurous space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports on the experiences of a mid-career teacher educator who spent a full semester supervising student teachers in schools. Adopting a self-study methodology, she and a critical friend collected and analyzed data, often in the form of reflection, on her experiences of third space and liminality. The time that she spent on the project helped her to develop more nuanced understandings of the complex daily realities faced by elementary teachers, which led to changes in her instruction with the preservice teachers with whom she worked. Importantly, the experience helped her to rediscover a sense of passion for her work. Her approach led to deeper insights on the importance of spending time in schools and of emotions and relationships in the work of teacher education. The experience points toward interesting professional development possibilities for teacher educators at mid-career. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aesthetic experiences can serve as powerful catalysts for emotional, psychological, and spiritual transformation. More recently, video games have drawn attention as an artistic medium in their own right, capable of inspiring profound transformation in ways similar to conventional art forms. Video games, like other artistic media, can be seen as thresholds to transformative aesthetic experiences, rendering them especially suitable for analysis through the lens of Victor Turner's work on liminality and the liminoid. This article employs these concepts as a framework to assess video games as liminoid structures in which players can engage with simulated liminal experiences and undergo transformative aesthetic experiences through ritual-like, interactive play. In particular, it integrates concepts from games studies to explore how video games have uniquely liminoid characteristics that distinguish them from other liminoid entities, including art and leisure activities. As a case study, this article also explores manifestations of liminality and the liminoid in the setting, narrative, and gameplay of indie video game Before Your Eyes. It examines how these elements act synergistically to provide a nuanced, intimate depiction of terminal illness, coming of age, and existential judgment in the afterlife, encouraging players to surrender themselves to the emotional world portrayed within the game and become transformed in the process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transformative Service Research (TSR) highlights the fundamental importance of resource integration for consumer well-being. However, recent research suggests that resource integration can be problematic and imperfect, particularly for vulnerable consumers with complex and ongoing resource requirements. Such vulnerable consumers may face transition challenges and end up in an uncertain "in-between" experience of liminality, where the linkage to resource integration remains under-researched. In response to recent service prioritization challenges, we explore how vulnerable actors experience liminality and resource integration in service systems. The vulnerable actors highlighted in this study are parents in families of children with life-long conditions (e.g., autism spectrum disorder/ASD and Down syndrome). We reveal a new form of liminality as a persistent, relational phenomenon that interdependent vulnerable actors with ongoing complex resource needs collectively experienced within service systems. Further, we identify the dynamics of persistent liminality as Precipitating, Subsisting, and Resisting. Finally, in line with TSR, we shed light on the resource constraints that decrease the well-being of vulnerable consumers. We also identify implications for theory, practice, and future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Clinician-healers bear witness to suffering and accompany patients and families through the liminal spaces of an illness experience. Bearing witness to a patient's suffering is a form of attunement toward the ill or hospitalized person. Non-action, or wu wei, becomes illustrative of the empathy that develops as clinicians bear witness to the suffering of patients and families. This empathic response highlights the clinician's moral obligation to accompany their patients. Accompaniment is a form of "co-action" which orients the clinician to a mutual relationship with patients and families. Co-action incites new meaning-making within the liminal spaces and holds the potential to change the clinician's identity as practitioner and healer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The social impact of cultural tourism remains controversial even though tourism development seeks a socially and economically balanced outcome. This article explores the potential of liminality as a means of explaining how cultural tourism development affects social cohesion at the neighbourhood level, particularly through open spaces. A quantitative survey of 349 respondents from two national-level tourism districts in Shanghai, Yuyuan and Xinhua, was conducted using the structural equation modeling technique. Three attributes of cultural tourism destinations (CTDs) that affect social cohesion – cultural expressions, spatial features, and management – as measured by 12 items were identified and validated in the study. The results emphasized that CTDs' cultural expressions, such as the form and appearance of buildings, had a strong positive impact on social cohesion. However, the connotation of social cohesion in CTDs is more about latent cohesion than manifest cohesion, which means people share place attachment and a sense of belonging without necessarily having closer interactions. The findings also indicate that liminality, which provides a sense of reviving and freedom, mediates CTDs' contribution to social cohesion. The study provides a reference for tourism planning and management to enhance social cohesion and further achieve consolidated tourism development by facilitating liminality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the application of liminality in Abha Dawesar's novel Babyji, focusing on the protagonist Anamika's journey through adolescence, sexuality, and societal expectations in 1990s Delhi. Liminality, a concept rooted in anthropology and later adopted in literary studies, describes the disorienting ambiguity and fluidity experienced by individuals in transitional states or thresholds. Babyji serves as a fertile ground for examining liminality, as Anamika navigates the thresholds between childhood and adulthood, traditional and modern values, and heteronormative and queer identities. Through a close reading of the novel, we analyze how Dawesar employs liminality not only as a narrative device but also as a means of critiquing rigid societal structures. Anamika's interactions with her lovers, her intellectual pursuits, and her struggle with her identity are marked by a constant state of in-betweenness, challenging conventional narratives of coming-of-age and identity formation. The novel's setting in a rapidly changing India further amplifies these themes, positioning Anamika's journey against the backdrop of a nation in transition. I argue that Anamika's liminal experiences reflect broader questions of power, agency, and resistance in a society grappling with the tensions between tradition and modernity. By situating the protagonist in various liminal spaces- be it in her relationships, her academic ambitions, or her socio-political context- Dawesar highlights the potential for transformation and self-discovery that liminality offers. Ultimately, Babyji presents a nuanced portrayal of adolescence as a liminal phase, inviting readers to reconsider the complexities of identity and belonging in a rapidly changing world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article delves into the pivotal role that police encounters play in shaping the experiences of 18- to 25-year-olds who come into contact with the criminal justice system. The study is anchored in an analysis of in-depth narrative interviews with young adults, predominantly young men, in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Their accounts unveil the latent risks of police approaches that may pivot on the 'age and/or lack of maturity' of young adults. Introducing the concept of 'sheriff syndrome', the research sheds light on the detrimental effects of entrenched, antecedent expectations regarding the behaviours, attitudes and (in)capacity for change of those over the age of 18 years. Participants' accounts underscore the need for interactions that recognise and protect subjective elements of maturity, while cultivating opportunities for open, respectful and bidirectional communication between suspect populations of young adults and the police. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper, based on my doctoral ethnographic research amongst the Miya community in one of the chars of Western Assam, shows how a particular category of identity documents shape their subjectivities, experiences, and aspirations. I focus on the identity documents which have errors, like mistakes in names, dates of birth or addresses, and badly angled photos. I refer to them as thin documents. Because of the thin documents, the Miyas find it difficult to assert formal citizenship rights, which they could normally assert based on accurate documentation. For the thin documents to help prove the Miyas’ citizenship, they must be further supported by an additional set of documents. The process questions the Miya’s formal citizenship rights. I present narratives of the Miya people living with thin documents to illustrate how the materiality of the identity document binds the Miya people to a state of liminal citizenship. I ask: what do these errors in the identity document or thin documents tell us about citizenship, particularly liminal citizenship with reference to the Miya community of Assam? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the role of affect in the credibility assessment process in queer asylum claims. Through 27 semistructured interviews with caseworkers, it explores how sexual truth, in the Greek asylum apparatus, is effectively produced and analyses how access to asylum is intermediated by effective control of who is considered the “good” sexual citizen. According to the research material, the process focuses on applicants' emotions, while caseworkers tend to assess the “authenticity” of applicants' feelings through their senses and intuition. Additionally, apart from the exclusionary politics of emotions in homonationalist border regimes, it discusses affect's transformative possibilities in legal decision-making. Reflecting on queerness as an affect, through those failed, unspeakable queer performances that have been rendered non-credible by the affective rules of spoken sexual truth, it aims to challenge white-centred definitions of “genuine” queerness and the binaries of compliance and resistance in slow-death apparatuses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A foundational assumption of social theory is that things change: structures, institutions, organisations, groups, cultures, and selves all are contingent and subject to transformation. Herein, this malleable foundation is termed transformativity, drawing attention to a specific conceptualisation of change, which predominates and displaces other accounts of change, elaborated via a typology of change that positions transformation between reconfiguration and metamorphosis. Transformativity posits society as contingent, open to reconstruction, but assuming that change acts upon a substrate, which is continuous; altered, yet retaining identity through time. Transformativity is situated culturally by tracing historical conceptions of change from ancient to modern. Next, Turner's liminality, Foucault's power relations, and Butler's performativity are analysed in depth as influential contemporary models of transformativity. Furthermore, transformativist thinking animates governmentality, neo-liberal capitalism, technological thinking, and cultures of self-work. In particular, transformativity intersects with contemporary ideas of 'experience', incorporating notions of contingency and change into modern experimentalism. While transformativity facilitates critique and social change, this implies a gradualist model of slow purification and refinement, which may be inadequate to deal with contemporary challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban human-cat relations depend on complex and contingent systems of overlapping policies, ordinances, and laws. Cats defy anthropocentric binaries and boundaries. In response to the problematic use of the term 'feral', a term rife with negative associations, many government agencies, including those in Miami-Dade and Broward Counties in Florida, have rebranded this population as 'community' cats. This investigation explores the transspecies liminality experienced by both free-roaming, or 'community', cats and their urban caretakers. While government-run animal shelters boast the successes of trap-neuter-return (TNR) programs and the concomitant increase in 'live-releases' from the shelters, the experiences of cats who live in perilous urban spaces, facing vehicular injury, animal cruelty, and even death, subverts these politically-driven narratives. The uneven acceptance and treatment of these cats results in the development of informally organized networks of cat caretakers whose experiences share the challenging, contentious, and often dangerous experiences of the cats for whom they care. Sociolegal constructions and rituals produce the experience of liminality for more than just human or animal individuals. The result is a transspecies liminality of shared experiences, struggles, and relations beyond the targeted population or species, which has implications for how researchers approach the implementation of nonhuman governance policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article applies a three-level framework based on the logic of ontological security to the case of party interactions between Hong Kong and Taiwan in the post-handover years. Rather than through domestication and subversion, as the literature suggests, this article argues that liminal actors enhance their ontological security through interacting with like-minded partners. Establishing the case of liminality for Hong Kong and Taiwan, this article also finds that both conventional and movement parties in the two political units interacted to strengthen their stable sense of self. However, their practices differed based on their political positions within the political systems and their available resources. This article provides the first empirical mapping of the conventional party interactions between Hong Kong and Taiwan. It seeks to contribute a theoretical framework explaining the close links between political units and their movements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Starting from the concept of death in contemporary Serbian culture (in the context of thanatological and anthropological studies), the author focuses on the analysis of communication with the deceased in dreams, which is still perceived as an important form of contact with the otherworldly. The analysis of material collected during field research at various locations in Serbia and in Serbian communities in Romania (from 2017 to 2024), supplemented by dream narratives from the internet, has shown that based on the main messages conveyed by the deceased to the living, dreams can be divided into: (1) dreams about "the unappeased deceased" (who lack something in the otherworld, usually due to an omission by the living related to funerary rituals); (2) dreams in which the deceased show the otherworld and provide verbal assessments of it; (3) dreams in which the deceased inform of their departure or final passing into the world of the dead; (4) dreams in which the deceased demonstrate their presence in the world of the living, i.e., providing information pertaining to the sphere of the dreamer's social reality; (5) dreams in which the deceased convey their messages, advice or warnings to the living; and (6) dreams interpreted as the deceased person's call to the dreamer to join them in the otherworld. Basic element analysis of the spatial world image, projected via the dream, highlights the importance of the locus perceived as a border space. Dreams about the deceased seem to be ambivalent in this respect, given that, on the one hand, they are perceived as an important means of communication between this world and the otherworld, and on the other hand, through the ideas on which they are founded and that they further transmit, they are also part of the narrative strategies of the boundary between this concept of two worlds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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This study analyzes liminal characters in the selected two novels by focusing on the Uncanny and liminality and its impact on the characters. The selected novels for the current study are, "When the Moon is Low" by Nadia Hashimi and "Exit West" by Mohsin Hamid. The present research work explores the elements of uncanny liminality in the selected novels by using Victor Turner's theory of liminality (1969) and Sigmund Freud's concept of "Uncanniness" (2003) as theoretical framework. It also looks into the impact of uncanny liminality on the personality of characters because characters have undergone a serious change and transition which ultimately lead to severe changes in the life and personality of characters. Furthermore it evaluates the relationship between liminality and uncanny and the impact of its interplay on character's migrant experience and their journey. The study uses textual analysis and close reading techniques for collecting and processing data. The key findings of the study reveal that Fereiba Waziri in "When the Moon is Low" and Nadia and Saeed in "Exit West" are liminal characters as they leave their native lands in search of a peaceful and stable life. These characters undergo the process of migration and experience grave outcomes because it is a transitional process that involves significant mental, physical and spiritual transformation in the personalities of the migrants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

South Africa has a complex history of racialized (im)mobilities. During the social engineering of apartheid, the city became a racialized white space that was dependent on black migrant workers who were forced to live in the marginal spaces on the edge of the city. This daily commute was enabled through the construction of public transportation systems and commuter railways. This mundane and banal form of mobility became a key site of both repression and resistance during the apartheid era. The present article explores how these racialized railway mobilities were represented during the 'Drum decade' of the 1950s in South Africa. It explores how the short story, as a liminal genre positioned within local and transnational literary cultures, is mobilized to narrate railway mobilities during this transitional decade. Texts analyzed include the news reports and short stories by Can Themba, Es'kia Mphahlele, and Nat Nakasa. This article explores how the mobile public spaces of the railways and the mobile figures of railway passengers were mobilized in the Anglophone South African short story as a form of resistance to the repression of the apartheid era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Penned in 2004 by Louis de Bernières and articulated through the viewpoints of diverse characters, Birds Without Wings illuminates the harrowing scenes of war and their impact on local inhabitants and migrants during the formative years of the new Turkish Republic. Examining the reverberations of the national struggle in the international context, this paper specifically investigates the repercussions of the population exchange between Greece and the emerging Turkish state in 1923, focusing on a South-West Anatolian village (Eskibahçe) in a tumultuous historical era, which is the central issue in Birds Without Wings. Employing polyphony, that is, a muti-voiced narrative style with Bakhtin’s terminology about the novels with a variety of perspectives and narrators, the novel explores themes such as war, love, forced migration, and identity. The plot unfolds against the backdrop of a multicultural late Ottoman Empire, where Turkish-speaking Christian villagers and Greek Orthodox migrants initially coexist harmoniously but later face social isolation and loneliness after being exiled to Greece. Therefore, this paper aims to underscore individual and social isolation resulting from the devastating impact of wars on the idyllic lives of villagers in Birds Without Wings, drawing on Homi K. Bhabha’s third space theory. Another objective of this study is to demonstrate that Birds Without Wings celebrates hybridity and ethnic diversity by reevaluating the forced migration between Greece and Turkey, prompting reflection on the villagers’ attempts to redefine their identities after the Turkish Republic’s establishment and an analysis of its long-term implications.

The presence of war refugee camps around the world and their development into places of political resistance for identity formation, alternate governance systems and lives has been part of academic studies for quite some time now. Less attention has been paid to frame refugee camp spaces for studying the complexity of the concepts of resistance and indifference for reclamation of human identity. Despite attention to the mass movement of refugeesasylum seekers, there is a huge gap in scholarship to understand the center-controlled and marginalized refugee existence in camps because refugees are often silenced, insignificant obscure figures in the grand war discourse of reports and case studies—lives not worth saving. Furthermore, refugees’ resistance against the center’s anti-humanity beliefs, ideologies and practices calls for a reengagement with the camp space because it has become a source of material and knowledge production for the center to profile and subject all types of refugees to any physical, mental and psychological testing-experimentation whenever it develops a new weapon, therapy, theory or technology. This paper intends to cover these gaps and build its analysis of a refugee camp, through the text Red Birds (2018).

Abstract De-migranticization is becoming a core strategy for overcoming the fetishization of migrants in migration studies. However, this shift in perspectives raises questions about what categories to use instead. This paper contributes to these debates by considering the potential of studying immobility as a tool for de-migranticization. It looks at immobility through the lens of liminality: as a transitory phase, as a transformative stage and as one which enables epistemological subversion. In doing so, it goes beyond other border spanning terms to offer methodological insights into using immobility and liminality to de-migranticize. The paper suggests that these qualities of reading immobility through theories of liminality has implications for when, where and how to study migration. The empirical case draws on 165 semi-structured interviews with distance education students from Zimbabwe, Namibia and Nigeria studying at the University of South Africa (UNISA).

The conflict between the Perso‐Shiite state and its opposition, especially Kurdish political organizations in Iran/Eastern Kurdistan, and their subsequent suppression, has led to the migration of many Kurds since the early 1980s. This exodus has affected their political identification. Here, changes toward nationality and citizenship in the attitude of the first‐generation Kurdish immigrants with a leftist political background living in Germany, The Netherlands, Sweden and France will be analyzed. From the perspective of the relationship between individual and political organization, state and society/community, it seeks to uncover that how these migrants think about different collective political identities, how their views have changed, and which collective social identity has had most impact on shaping their political view. Following a qualitative approach, data were collected through in‐depth semi‐structured and focus group interviews. The findings show that the interviewees within the extra‐organizational Kurdish convergence in Europe have tried to reidentify themselves politically by moving away from the political climate of Iran, while Kurdishness shapes their view on nationality and citizenship. Although the European states officially recognize them as Iranian nationals, they themselves see this as an imposed citizenship. In their current situation, many of them, while emphasizing their Kurdish nationality and wishing for Kurdistani citizenship, prefer to be recognized only as citizens of European countries and not be attributed to Iran. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Seichi Junrei (聖地巡礼) is an emerging form of tourism in which visitors pilgrimage to locations depicted in cultural works. It has been popularized by visitors through creative representations on social media. This article conducts a netnography of Seichi Junrei experiences on Douban, a Chinese social media platform related to popular culture, to examine the application of liminoid in tourism in a media-saturated era. Findings show that Seichi Junrei is liminoid in that pilgrims sanctify ordinary locations and perform distinct practices from the mundane. The characteristics of anti-structure become ambiguous as Seichi Junrei is reproduced in a structured condition constructed by pilgrimage manners. However, the combinations of pilgrims' subjectivity, communal admiration for cultural works, and platform vernaculars and affordances of Douban support expressions of Seichi Junrei as an engagement of aura that transcends the norms. The article contributes to studies of the intersection of tourist experiences, liminality, and social media by exploring how social media perpetuates and reconceptualizes liminoid in Seichi Junrei. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Academic writing for publication is a challenging process for which academics are often ill-prepared. Being consistently successfully published in peer-reviewed publications is one measure of academic worth and scholarliness. Becoming a scholar is a rite of passage, an iterative process with liminal spaces, thresholds, transitions and transformations, which cannot be achieved without support, guidance and mentorship. We used collaborative autoethnography to describe the types of liminality we encountered as managers, facilitators, critical readers and editors of academic writing for publication capacity development events. We identified three facilitation features: that facilitators act as agents of disruption, that they provide a generative and safe holding space, and that balance and mutuality are foundational elements. Application of these three features by facilitators, supervisors or managers could contribute to providing transformational writing spaces and support at various university levels during the iterative process and journey of scholarship development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective Background Method Results Conclusion Implications This research delved into the experiences of couples and therapists in online couples therapy with an emphasis on therapeutic boundaries.Although 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.A 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.The 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.The 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.To 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. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we identify when and why migrant gig workers experience liminality in the socio-spatial context of food delivery in the Swedish gig economy. We analyse qualitative interviews and informal conversations with food delivery workers in Stockholm through the lens of the territory-place-scale-network (TPSN) framework as developed by Bob Jessop, Neil Brenner and Martin Jones. We find that workers are challenged to deal with triple liminality regarding their work identities, workplaces and work organisation through platforms. Focusing on liminality as a central aspect of gig work, we further find that despite having little worker agency, some of the study participants engage in what we call liminal agency, that is actively pursuing possibilities for progress in uncertain states of in-betweenness. By unpacking the liminal dynamics that especially migrant food delivery riders are confronted with in their daily working lives, this study contributes to the debate on the migrant gig economy, the spatial turn in organisation studies and efforts from human geography to understand agency in precarious gig work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines a body of engaged "ritual magic practitioners" to understand their methods and techniques for facilitating putative parapsychological outcomes in everyday life, as well as outcomes on a computerized test of putative psi. We hypothesized that the combination of meditation, visualization, and related mental exercises at the core of magical practice relates to both invoked anomalous phenomena and spontaneouslyoccurring anomalous phenomena, and further that the perceptual-personality variable of transliminality (i.e., loose mental boundary functioning) is integral to this process. Likewise, we also anticipated that these associations would enable ritual magicians to score significantly above-chance on the psi test. A split-sample analysis found a positive and statistically significant series of relationships between transliminality and the majority of measured variables within the sample, and notably those involving questionnaire measures of subjective and objective anomalies as well as daily mental exercises. The ritual magicians also performed significantly below-chance (p < .01 for several conditions) on the psi test, as a function of open testing of ESP or using ritual to influence the test. We discuss these results in terms of significant predictions of trait and practice variables on ESP scoring, as well as the evidence that magical practice may represent techniques in which a transliminal dis-ease model might be better remediated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article studies the life-stories and identity narratives of Turks of Western Thrace (Greece) focusing on the role of the Turkish–Greek border and its changing permeability. It suggests that people who have strong attachments to both sides of a national border experience spatial liminality and the border is a place of passage between not only territories, but also lived identities. For young Turks of Western Thrace, travelling to Turkey to work or study is an established strategy that is intertwined with major life events. Drawing on ride-along interviews and focusing on five participants, who travelled to Turkey during the Cyprus crisis, the article identifies the disciplinary power of bordering on identities and life-stories. By examining how different individuals dealt with this power, and how their circumstances affected the outcomes, it explores the tensions between agency and structure, state power and resistance, and categorisation and liminality during life-planning and identity construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the experiences of academic developers engaged in creating a cross-institutional community, the Academic Development Collective (ADC). The ADC was formed to address inequities in resources for educational development across institutions in one U.S. state. Semi-structured interviews with 7 participants were used in a case study approach to examining how the ADC emerged from reacting to crises into a more proactive role addressing inequities in academic development. Findings revealed that participation in the ADC provided members with empathetic support and critical friends, and that cross-institutional collaboration enabled collective action. Members described how distributing expertise through initiatives drove systemic change, particularly in increasing equitable access to faculty development opportunities through resource-sharing. Engagement with the ADC enabled members to expand their capacities, share resources, and provide enhanced development opportunities for local faculty/staff. Recommendations include prioritizing diverse strengths, fostering collaborations beyond resource-sharing, balancing ameliorative and transformative strategies, and institutional investment in leadership and facilitation of collectives. This research illuminates how academic developers can build supportive professional communities to mitigate institutional inequities and transform existing structures through collective action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Academic development is a mammoth undertaking that requires collective effort from all stakeholders, extending beyond academic developers alone. As early career academics, we explore our experiences of academic development within our community of practice. Through a collaborative self-study, we reveal how our community of practice has bolstered our academic progress. Utilizing a metaphoric drawing, we visually represent the rigorous and fulfilling practices within our community of practice. Our illustration underscores the advantages of establishing communities of practice in liminality. Moreover, we advocate for liminal spaces as potent hubs for collaborative initiatives to expedite the academic growth of early career academics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Penned in 2004 by Louis de Bernières and articulated through the viewpoints of diverse characters, Birds Without Wings illuminates the harrowing scenes of war and their impact on local inhabitants and migrants during the formative years of the new Turkish Republic. Examining the reverberations of the national struggle in the international context, this paper specifically investigates the repercussions of the population exchange between Greece and the emerging Turkish state in 1923, focusing on a South-West Anatolian village (Eskibahçe) in a tumultuous historical era, which is the central issue in Birds Without Wings. Employing polyphony, that is, a muti-voiced narrative style with Bakhtin’s terminology about the novels with a variety of perspectives and narrators, the novel explores themes such as war, love, forced migration, and identity. The plot unfolds against the backdrop of a multicultural late Ottoman Empire, where Turkish-speaking Christian villagers and Greek Orthodox migrants initially coexist harmoniously but later face social isolation and loneliness after being exiled to Greece. Therefore, this paper aims to underscore individual and social isolation resulting from the devastating impact of wars on the idyllic lives of villagers in Birds Without Wings, drawing on Homi K. Bhabha’s third space theory. Another objective of this study is to demonstrate that Birds Without Wings celebrates hybridity and ethnic diversity by reevaluating the forced migration between Greece and Turkey, prompting reflection on the villagers’ attempts to redefine their identities after the Turkish Republic’s establishment and an analysis of its long-term implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: The Covid‐19 pandemic dramatically altered the way cancer care services were accessed and delivered, including for colorectal cancer (CRC). In the United Kingdom, patients were discouraged from presenting in primary care, many consultations took place remotely, investigative procedures and screening programmes were temporarily suspended, and fewer operations and treatments were delivered. People had to face the practical consequences of having cancer during a pandemic and navigate never before seen pathways, often alone. We examined the experience of being diagnosed and treated for CRC during the pandemic, and the implications of this on people's cancer journeys. Methods: Semi‐structured interviews were undertaken with people diagnosed with CRC during the Covid‐19 pandemic (January 2020–May 2021), in the North East of England. An iterative topic guide was used during interviews, which took place remotely (telephone or Zoom), were audio recorded, pseudo‐anonymised and transcribed. Initial transcripts were independently coded by two researchers, and a code 'bank' developed for application across transcripts. Development of themes and overarching analytical constructs was undertaken collaboratively by the research team. Results: Interviews were conducted with 19 participants, analysed and four key themes identified: (1) The relative threats of Covid‐19 and Cancer were not comparable, with cancer seen as posing a far greater risk than Covid‐19; (2) Remote consultations were problematic, affecting patients' abilities to build rapport and trust with clinicians, assess nonverbal communication, and feel able to disclose, comprehend and retain information; (3) Stoma follow‐up care was seen to be lacking, with long wait times for stoma reversal experienced by some; Finally, (4) Being alone during consultations negatively impacted some peoples' abilities to absorb information, and left them without the support of loved ones at an emotionally vulnerable time. However, some participants preferred being alone at certain points in their pathways, including receiving a diagnosis, and most frequently when receiving in‐patient treatment. Conclusion: Being alone brought unexpected benefits, absolving people from undertaking emotions work for others, and instead focus on their recovery, however, remote consultations negatively impacted patients' experiences. This study highlights the complex benefits and burdens of pandemic‐located cancer journeys, including how these shifted at different points across cancer pathways. Patient or Public Contribution: Lorraine Angell, a cancer survivor, has been central to this study from idea conception, contributing to: development of study focus and design; securing funding; production of patient‐facing materials; development of interview topic guides; analysis and interpretation of data; and drafting of key findings and manuscripts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of the article is to look at the formation of identities, as their cultural forms and practices grew with multiple and diverse tendencies. This led to the occurrence of different trends of thought that were seen to bring together different traditions. These came with their own string of tensions and accommodations. This becomes important as we understand a region's history and culture. These multiple cultural tendencies and communities can be looked at in terms of cultural categories and, therefore, the concept of a 'cultural fault line' between the two religious communities. These could also be looked at as processes of 'exchange' 'sharing' 'borrowing' or processes connected to liminality and 'liminal' traditions, as has been noted by scholars. One such community is the Jasnathi Sampraday, which belonged to the remote region of the Thar Desert. Guru Jasnath, the founder of the Jasnath Sampraday, belonged to the peasant community of the Jat cultivators. The article looks at the hagiography, the devotional literature, the teachings that emphasised environmental concerns and the practice of Ratri Jagran (night vigil), whereby the Jasnathi Siddhs explain the Jasnath banis to their followers of the Jasnathi Sampraday. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study addresses the lack of research into social processes of competition in organizations and explores women leaders self-positioning in relation to the discourses of gendered competition and neoliberal competition. The discourses carry contradictory obligations for women. While the gendered competition discourse socially punishes competitive women, the neoliberal competition discourse expects competition. Through a feminist approach and critical discourse analysis of narratives from 52 women leaders we make two central contributions. First, we outline how the two discourses jostle together, fighting for attention and contradicting each other, provoking social ambiguity. We demonstrate how the women leaders adopt paradoxical self-positioning as 'competitive–not competitive' using four interconnected strategies of 'denying', 'masking and reframing', 'moving on' from and 'diverting' competition. Second, we extend studies of liminality and theorize how the discourses create liminality for women leaders. We elucidate how the women take up and disrupt the discourses by continually oscillating between paradoxical positions of being competitive, perceived as competitive, not competitive, no longer competitive, and competitive for organizations. Competition is identified as a toxic, gendered process, which is both harmful and aspirational, and both a liminal challenge and an opportunity for women leaders. We extend understandings of those who experience liminality in organizations, to women leaders and demonstrate how their paradoxical self-positioning affords them opportunities to discursively present as competitive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Community health workers (CHWs) occupy a liminal position in two senses: they are situated between the communities they come from and serve, and the health and social service professionals with whom they connect patients; and also between two forms of knowledge. In interacting with health and social service institutions, they draw on the 'technical knowledge' that dominates these settings. However, they must also draw on 'communicative knowledge', which is the situated and embodied knowledge needed to gain the trust of their community peers and to carry their voice, but which is often relegated to a secondary position. In this US-based study, we analyze interviews with CHWs, their supervisors, and advocates of their work, to better understand how CHWs mobilize discursive resources to combine these two forms of knowledge and, in doing so, constitute their liminal position as an essential asset. Our findings support valuing CHWs' incorporation within healthcare teams, so that health and social service professionals can directly interact with CHWs' situated and embodied knowledge of patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Postcolonial "writing back" and resistance concur on their common goal to question, subvert and critique imperialist and hegemonic discursive practices. Former postcolonial writing attempted to provide agency to the subject from within the binaries of the colonized Self and the colonizing Other. However, the conceptual categories of hybridity, liminality and contrapuntal reading, as explicated by postcolonial theorists such as Homi Bhabha and Edward Said respectively, provide better discursive strategies which enable voicing the hitherto silenced voices, which also enable breaking away from the limiting framework of binaries. Through an analysis of P Sachidanandan's The Book of Destruction (2005; translated in 2012) and Tabish Khair's The Thing About Thugs (2012), which pivot the Indian secretive cult of thugs and the practice of thugee, this paper argues that the discussion of thugee and the narratives of violence in the novels do not just validate the need to understand and accept "deviant" cultures, but also provide the context to discuss postcolonial issues of marginalization, identity and the creation of alternative narratives which subvert/resist the macro narratives created by imperialism and the nation-state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

AbstractThe COVID-19 pandemic compelled many consumers to adapt their grocery shopping, food preferences, and consumption behaviors. Based on 18 in-depth interviews with adults in the United States, this study uses a liminality framework to explore how the pandemic altered these behaviors. It also seeks to assess whether individuals have reverted to pre-pandemic consumption behaviors. Results show the mode of grocery shopping shifted; the frequency of grocery shopping declined; and the quantity of food increased in the initial stages of the pandemic with more people remaining home. By summer 2022, more individuals had shifted to online grocery shopping from shopping in-person, a departure from their pre-pandemic behavior. Findings also indicate the frequency of shopping largely mirrors pre-pandemic levels, though the quantity of groceries purchased has declined. Finally, the decline in food purchases is accompanied by increased spending on groceries in all phases of the pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]