Department of Social & Policy Sciences, Centre for Death and Society, University of Bath, Bath, UK.
Omega (Westport). 2024 Feb;88(3):1068-1084. doi: 10.1177/00302228211054317. Epub 2021 Dec 8.
This paper discusses the case of missing persons in Israel, to show how the category of "missingness" is constructed by the people who have been left behind, and how this may threaten the life-death dichotomy assumption. The field of missing persons in Israel is characterized not only by high uncertainty, but also by the absence of relevant cultural scripts. Based on a narrative ethnography of missingness in Israel, I claim that a new and subversive social category of "missingness" can be constructed following the absence of cultural scripts. The left-behinds fluctuate not only between different assumptions about the missing person's fate; they also fluctuate between acceptance of the life-death dichotomy, thus yearning for a solution to a temporary in-between state, and blurring this dichotomy, and thus constructing "missingness" as a new stable and subversive ontological category. Under this category, new rites of passage are also negotiated and constructed.
这篇论文讨论了以色列失踪人口的案例，以展示“失踪”这一范畴是如何由被留下的人构建的，以及这可能如何威胁生死二分法的假设。以色列的失踪人口领域不仅具有高度的不确定性，而且缺乏相关的文化脚本。基于对以色列失踪人口的叙事民族志，我声称，在缺乏文化脚本的情况下，可以构建一种新的、颠覆性的“失踪”社会范畴。被留下的人不仅在失踪者命运的不同假设之间波动；他们也在接受生死二分法和对暂时中间状态的解决方案的渴望之间波动，以及模糊这种二分法，从而将“失踪”构建为一个新的稳定和颠覆性的本体论范畴。在这个范畴下，新的过渡仪式也在协商和构建。
