Liminality of betwixt and between

Living as an Imaginal Bridge between Worlds (Part #5)

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Liminal personae: The theme is otherwise explored in relation to liminality by Bob Trubshaw (The Metaphors and Rituals of Place and Time: an introduction to liminality or Why Christopher Robin wouldn't walk on the cracks. At the Edge, 1996). In discussing Hermes as the "god of the gaps", Richard E. Palmer (The Liminality of Hermes and the Meaning of Hermeneutics, 2001) refers to the articulation of liminality by Victor Turner (Passages, Margins, Poverty, 1974) following Arnold Van Gennep (The Rites of Passage, 1972).

Turner highlights the sense in which during the liminal stage of transformation, the between stage, one's status becomes ambiguous; one is "neither here nor there," one is "betwixt and between all fixed points of classification," and thus the form and rules of both an earlier state and a state-to-come are suspended. For the moment, one is an outsider; one is on the margins, in an indeterminate state -- a liminal person betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention, and ceremonial. For Turner:

The attributes of…liminal personae are necessarily ambiguous, since this condition and these persons elude or slip through the network of classification that normally locate states and positions in cultural space. Liminal entities are neither here nor there; they are betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention and ceremonial. As such their ambiguous and indeterminate attributes are expressed by a rich variety of symbols in the many societies that ritualize social and cultural transitions. Thus, liminality is frequently likened to death, to being in the womb, to invisibility, to darkness, to bisexuality, to the wilderness, and to an eclipse of the sun or the moon. (1969, p. 95)

Many cultures offer a mythical articulation of the "mysterious" nature of those able to live in such conditions -- to live "in between". The elves and other creatures of the land of faerie of western mythology offer an example. These are enchanting to children of all ages (as acknowledged in production of blockbuster movies), despite being variously deprecated by the conventions of science and faith that have proven to be so inadequate in the face of current global crises.

Movement between worlds: References in current literature to "betwixt and between" in contemporary preoccupation with such matters are relatively rare, although often surprising in their own right (Erebos, Betwixt and Between, South African Pagan Council, 23 November 2008). The phrase is of particular significance in Wicca -- being translated into Irish Gaelic, for example, by Idir Eatarthu (to mean "between worlds").In a discussion of shamanism, Claire Montanaro (Betwixt and Between Times, ezinearticles.com, 2008) indicates that:

An important part of this tradition is omen reading, which is a practice whereby a shamanic practitioner works in different realities, timeframes or cycles, using the "betwixt and between" time to get information and guidance about situations in the present or future... Humanity itself is experiencing its own betwixt and between time in a way that is profoundly important for us as individuals and as a race, and for the planet.

Similar references are to be found to the "cracks between worlds" and to movement between them. Such notions are cultivated in modern myth-making (as with the Stargate series) as well as figuring in shamanic training programmes in relation to sacred sites. They are also cultivated metaphorically in relation to the many "worlds" of which society is composed (for example: John Gray, Moving between Worlds, Resurgence; Vonda Plett Martens, Moving between Opposing Worlds: the moral experiences of white, anti-racism educators in Saskatchewan, 2007; Miranda Ward, Can You Move Between Worlds As A Perpetual Traveler? MatadorNetwork, 4th August 2008).

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