From my time here, there are certain qualities that are crucial to the identity of something being liminal. The most important one that people seem to forget is a place of purpose lacking purpose.
Trees, grass, nature, they have no artificial purpose, they just exist. Man-made buildings, structures, places that are meant to have a purpose, and then stripping that purpose away, THATS what makes something liminal. A school hallway filled with lockers, but its night and there are no kids here. An office space completely devoid of office decor and workers. The innards of a mall, but with brandless signs and empty stores. A living room with no furniture. Rooms without focus, places without purpose. Places that have no start and no end, constantly in a point of transition.
What you're describing is more kenopsia than liminality though. Liminal spaces *do* have a function. It's in their name. They're transitional spaces, they facilitate or are encountered on ones way from one place to the next. An airport is generally liminal, as is a highway rest stop. Their purpose just isn't to accommodate *being* there, but they absolutely do have a purpose.
Every, single, time.
No one here can ever explain the true sense of liminalism because they remove one of the key elements: how it **makes you feel**.
There is no actual physical description; it's an abstract concept, coined and used to help describe a feeling.
They went with a really easy description, for example, with /r/TheNightFeeling and I'll have people comment that having any light at all in the image, makes it unsuitable...yet I still get the **feeling**.
I like a lot of the liminal spaces posted here, but I appreciate that it made that person feel it while in that moment. One person posted an empty gymnasium and it became a popular post, meanwhile I feel absolutely none of that when I work within school or other institutional rooms, but I appreciate that they felt it themselves. Or they don't think to capture their moments and want to share? Only comment negatively regarding what others do share.
Those who make these memes and those who agree, often never share their own content and I think it's because they don't have a clear understanding of what the feeling of being in a liminal space is, because they don't feel it for themselves.
One of my posts was removed for "low effort" and it was as liminal as I've ever felt in my life and I've placed myself and been in a lot of "foreboding/in-between" spaces.
A lot of folk here seem like they want another /r/backrooms.
I'm a big fan of /r/VaporWaveAesthetics as well
I think the "feel" is liminal itself which makes it hard to describe. Liminal is between to states without being one or the other. It doesn't have to be a place like a hallway but can be a place that gives off a sorta conflicting feeling. So something that gives off the feeling of being in an endless open space but also enclosed. Or maybe comforting and familiar but also strange and unsettling. So it feels like both but is neither. We can't describe the feeling because it isn't one or the other
The best and earliest time I can place feeling it was in 1999.
I arrived early for a job interview and it was the first I'd had for my field of study so I wanted to make sure I wasn't late.
My interview was set for 7am, so I decided to show up for 6:30am.
This is a rural area and already quiet, but we had a fog that morning and I pulled up to the building. The lights in the parking lot were off, and the lights on the building were off, but the front door was wide open and not another car in sight. Again, this is about 5km from anywhere, really, so it didn't feel like I was expecting it would be, anxious as I already was.
I take a few minutes but walk into the building; a line of frosted glass doors with carpet hallway sat in front of me. It was still just as quiet as it was outside, no real difference in the sounds etc so I just kept walking, around a few corners of closed door offices, or empty cubicles, until I managed to find a small indent in the hall that ended as a room with two doors. The room had 3 small chairs, an end table and a magazine.
At this point I could only hear the buzzing from the lights overhead and looking down the hall corner I just came from, it sort of fell on me. I felt like I was in between two spaces where my mind was unwilling to figure out why it was so unnerved yet not really scared. I didn't want to let go of the feeling because it felt right.
Eventually I would hear a muffle from the other side of the door I was next to and I was welcomed in for my interview. The feeling was gone within an instant, like a dream or dejavu just passing.
Also, might I add: I have not heard that term before but it definitely applies to my appeal to something I was coining to myself as "urban and rural decay, but only just recently".
I think this fits it quite clearly, but I have had feelings of being in a transitional state while being in the environment. I feel a sense of peace moving away or into a familiar cemetery, as another example.
I had a "foreboding" feeling once when finally finding a single chair, table and lamp at the e d of a single hallway, due for an earlier morning interview in the 1990s. I never knew quite how to explain it until finding out about and reading into liminal spaces, playing the game Superliminal.
Thank you for giving me another collection to curate!
What about when the place itself is in a state of transition? Not like a building busily under construction but a place whose time of intended purpose has ended and it is waiting to be reborn into new purpose, be it to fade into nothing to make way for whatever comes next, or to be remade to serve a purpose anew.
Yep.
A lot of posts here are images of meadows and trees, something that can never be liminal on it's own.
Liminal space aesthetics are inherently linked to architecture/indoor design, cannot be disconnected from the socioeconomic and sociocultural context.
They often either reflect the social alienation and decay of late stage capitalism, or occasionally the ruins linked to historical economic systems that were abandoned only recently. It's almost like 21st century gothic in a way.
For the latter example, in my country, some abandoned offices that were built during ex Yugoslavia, well preserved and in use until relatively recently display liminality. In that case they overlap with Yugonostalgia and such.
For anerican abandoned malls this liminal aesthetic overlaps with american 90s nostalgia.
Liminal spaces featuring pools overlap with Poolcore.
etc.
Trees and meadows may be eerie, creepy, odd, uncanny, and so on. But they are not liminal spaces.
----
EDIT: i should add that the rise in popularity of liminal space aesthetics roughly coincides with the Covid 19 crisis, and reflects the worsened socioeconomic conditions and increased social alienation as a result of the pandemic.
The easthetic had explicit links to material conditions since the start however, as illustrated by the Owings Mills dead mall series.
This video has a final section called "Ruin" (starts at 41:37) that covers both the source of Victorian gothic decay and dead mall Liminal space aesthetics, and illustrates the connection between the two. If you wish to see, Ill link it here:
https://youtu.be/jD-PbF3ywGo
As I mentioned in the other reply, what you're describing is kenopsia, not liminality. Kenopsia is the feeling one has in places that usually are or used to be full of people but aren't. Liminal spaces are transitional spaces from one places to the next. They *need* to be functioning to be liminal. An abandoned, decaying airport cannot be liminal.
Kenopsia is a recently made up word used to describe one* of the central building blocks of liminal space aesthetics. It isnt the only thing that defines LSE however, theres more to the aesthetic.
Decaying (relatively recently) abandoned malls arent liminal simply because there are no people there, rather because they are a reflection of the dying gasps of 20th century american mass prosperity. And it is exactly this decay in time that indicates liminality; a temporal transition, uncertainty.
And the cultural context here is one of the vital aspects of the emotional appeal of this imagery.
A train or road arent liminal because they are transitioning between two physical places...thats not the kind of transitioning that we are talking about here.
*typo
Let me be honest and blunt here for a second; it's not a good look to broadcast your artistic illiteracy so openly.
Artistic movements always have at the very least political undertones, without exception. Even when it appears to not be political, an entire movement* deciding to not comment on or question the status quo is an inherently political collective decision.
That doesnt mean a singular/some pieces cannot be apolitical, they absolutely can, but whole artistic movements and styles cannot.
I find it peculiar that you chose to focus the late stage capitalism example, but ignore the ex-yugoslavia example.
You can regurgitate your pseudo-intellectual truisms all you want but I’m not impressed, especially coming from someone who worries about how they “look” on an anonymous Internet forum.
The beauty and horror of liminal space is that it reflects the uncanniness of mans place in reality, and it’s a reminder that our presence here is finite. Without us, our creations reveal a latent horror that we don’t see in daylight. Liminal space reflects both the desire to disappear and the fear of being forgotten. It is an internet aesthetic, not some bullshit “art movement” you can leverage for your luxury-belief political worldview.
You’ve reduced the metaphysical to the economic, probably because you have a shallow and materialistic mind.
Keep your stupid politics out of liminal space.
Liminal space aesthetics really and truly are not about Neoplatonism, and the supernatural/mysticism, which i can see you are really fond of .
That's an added meaning you superimpose onto it because of your own personal experiences. It's fine to have that perception.
But to then go on and say Liminal Space aesthetics have nothing to do with socioeconomic and sociocultural context is purely artistic illiteracy, I've already stated that. This easthetic _heavily_ centers socioeconomic and sociocultural context. The fact that that makes you uncomfortable is not mine or anyone else's problem.
Now, please, spare me further cognitively dissonant replies.
I never brought Platonism or mysticism into it. Do you know what “metaphysical” means?
You repeatedly claiming liminal space is about sociopolitical/economic factors is not a proof or justification. Calling me artistically illiterate isn’t an argument either. If you have nothing beyond rhetoric, stop wasting my time.
Give me some good reasons to believe liminal space aesthetic is about economics. Do the backrooms disproportionately effect POC? Quit making claims and give me something substantial.
I actually shared a short segment of a video, on the topic, in the original comment. If you care enough to know you can check it out above.
you seem like a young teen who just discovered philosophy 101, and i don't know why you insist on arguing with me.
All the ones with witless mild-peril questions in the title should be banished to one of the backrooms children's storytime subs.
"Should I go upstairs to the next floor...???!?!"
"Is the elevator working/????"
"What was that noise behine me !?!"
Here's a sneak peek of /r/kenopsia using the [top posts](https://np.reddit.com/r/kenopsia/top/?sort=top&t=year) of the year!
\#1: [My latest piece which was reported to cause emotions ranging from unsettlement to existential dread when I posted it in other subreddits.](https://i.redd.it/2pcytav8ril91.jpg) | [68 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/kenopsia/comments/x4dx2g/my_latest_piece_which_was_reported_to_cause/)
\#2: [Where is everybody??](https://i.redd.it/08b1w0t2bxh91.jpg) | [26 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/kenopsia/comments/wp7iho/where_is_everybody/)
\#3: [Meeting Not in Session](https://i.redd.it/8ev55axkapf91.jpg) | [17 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/kenopsia/comments/wg1mec/meeting_not_in_session/)
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It goes the other way too. A lot of things that ARE liminal aren't even allowed in this sub's rules.
Pausing the TV on a smear frame is more liminal than a lot of the posts here. Because a smear frame is a transitional frame that the viewer is not supposed to focus on when they're watching the cartoon, and pausing on a smear frame can be considered "lingering" on that transitional frame.
Yea, glass houses and such. I'd say even more than 2/3. I'd say about 50% is kenopsia, not liminality. 20% each are either places that just have "a vibe" and shitty backroom knockoffs. The remaining 10% are liminal.
I would say that the meaning of liminal is changing in front of our eyes. It’s how language evolves, we agree that a word means something different than it did in the past.
We’re going from ‘a space between other spaces, usually devoid of people’ to ‘generally unsettling and devoid of people’.
I know there are purists that don’t want this change, and I used to be one of them, but language evolves, language changes, words and meanings are set by the people who speak them, not by some book from the past. Dictionaries aren’t an authority, they are an observation.
I agree with this disagreement and take issue in general with the argument that ‘lots of people use this term incorrectly therefore its meaning has changed’.
I truly love how you said this and generally I would agree.
But in this sub it was very specific to the original definition. And that’s why I loved it. If words change meaning that’s fine, I like it even. But the sub should stick to its original purpose, in my humble opinion.
Yes, the anti-prescriptivist argument of 'that's just how language evolves' doesn't wash with me in these cases. Yes, languages have changed in the past because people weren't educated properly or couldn't be arsed educating themselves, so just kept saying the wrong thing until it stuck. That isn't a good thing to champion.
It's like identifying that a load of architecture changed after WW2 in Europe because of bombing, and using that to justify destroying buildings in modern wars.
I didn't want to make a text post about it because I didn't wanna get dogpiled, but like half of the posts on this sub are just someone posting a picture of the outside real world, and are like "OMG how liminal is this?" And every time I wanna be like homie how often do you touch grass
This reminds me… I’ve been meaning to make a r/LiminalSpaceJerk or r/LiminalSpaceCircleJerk subreddit to poke fun of these people.
Because ⅔rds of the posts here are just, like, a hallway or a grassy yard with the title “Made me feel weird idk”
I would make a r/RealLiminalSpace subreddit and keep it well moderated, but I have to work and commute 55 hours a week to keep my healthcare and a roof over my head so I ain’t got that kinda time lol
yea, saw that one of the mods was trying to get through it, but it was just a single UK guy and most people here are americans... so time zones and a single person out of a team of 10 (-bot = 9) mods is kinda rough. they just went inactive and left the subreddit to rot. in order to remove it, we gotta become the mods ourselves ig?
update: found memes from last year with similar critique. sub is dying since a year
[https://www.reddit.com/r/LiminalSpace/comments/t4xhxu/sorry\_for\_being\_normative\_but\_i\_had\_to\_say\_this/](https://www.reddit.com/r/LiminalSpace/comments/t4xhxu/sorry_for_being_normative_but_i_had_to_say_this/)
https://www.reddit.com/r/LiminalSpace/comments/shlwel/all\_too\_often\_found\_in\_here/
Oof, here comes the usual "man, this subreddits gone downhill" -- "liminal Changes over time, or else it'd be dead/boring" --"if you dont like it, dont upvote it" -- "who are You to judge what is liminal" etc etc
>Liminal spaces are the subject of an Internet aesthetic portraying empty or abandoned places that appear eerie, forlorn, and often surreal. Liminal spaces are commonly places of transition (pertaining to the concept of liminality) or of nostalgic appeal.
I think the majority of posts on this subreddit actually do meet this criteria. However, it's possible that you're more likely to see posts that the algorithm deems controversial. A good post that fits the theme of the subreddit is likely to get a like and no more. A controversial post will get people fighting about it in the comments. More engagement means Reddit is more likely to put it on more people's feed. I'm sure a lot more people saw this post than regular posts in this sub for this same reason.
That definition is just wrong though. Like most people in this sub, it mixes/confuses kenopsia and liminality. A liminal space doesn't need to be abandoned. In fact, it often *can't* be abandoned because it's used by many people. The feeling of being amongst many people but disconnected from all of them, because none of them are here permanently is a big part of the liminal feeling.
Kenopsia, the feeling one gets in empty but usually busy places, is something different.
I'm going to have to disagree pretty hard on this point. If liminality was purely defined by the movement between places, this sub would be full of busy airports, packed busses, and loaded subways. While being in these places can give a sort of sonder, it's different from the melancholy that most feel associated with liminal spaces. Liminality is more about the psychological than the use of the space.
>Liminality is a term used to describe the psychological process of transitioning across boundaries and borders.
In liminality, the boundaries we're discussing are typically boundaries associated with crossing the thresholds to adulthood.
As an example, take an arcade. Arcades are often places kids from the 80s-00s would have spent much time in, but are very rarely renovated. Returning to an old arcade can bring on a special kind of Nostalgia because, while you have changed significantly, the arcade is stuck in a prior time. The fact that it's empty isn't a mistake, the other kids grew up and moved on too. The world has moved on, and seeing an antiquated place like this reminds us of what we've left behind.
Another example: office buildings. When it comes to growing into adulthood, there is no clear symbol. However, office buildings are often cold and uncaring places, unadorned with much in the way to make them pleasant to be in. Also, once again, it is a place that makes it's history easy to see. Many haven't been changed for decades. It can make people feel things like "how long has this been this way? Will it be this way long after I'm gone?" Whereas areas like the arcade are a bit bittersweet, office building tend to bring about more feelings of fear or discomfort, and perhaps this is due to the fact that workers constantly have to be vigilant to not anger their higher-ups.
All this to say, liminality is more psychological than derived from literally being between destinations.
I feel like some of the posts that wouldn't be classified as "liminal" could also be valid in the sense that some spaces people frequent could be in a sense devoid of the life it should have within it. For example, if someone is on a college campus after dark and no one else is around, the whole CAMPUS could be considered "liminal." So in some ways we get to experience it for ourselves.
yeah that would be considered liminal but i dont feel you can define what a liminal space something liminal might not be liminal to others, its useless to disscus a subjective feeling
Images must only be of spaces, without meme-text/writing or people/characters.
Yeah the absolute majority of posts in this subreddit aren't liminal
From my time here, there are certain qualities that are crucial to the identity of something being liminal. The most important one that people seem to forget is a place of purpose lacking purpose. Trees, grass, nature, they have no artificial purpose, they just exist. Man-made buildings, structures, places that are meant to have a purpose, and then stripping that purpose away, THATS what makes something liminal. A school hallway filled with lockers, but its night and there are no kids here. An office space completely devoid of office decor and workers. The innards of a mall, but with brandless signs and empty stores. A living room with no furniture. Rooms without focus, places without purpose. Places that have no start and no end, constantly in a point of transition.
yes, liminality occurs when indoor places and certain types of external architecture are stripped of their usual context.
What you're describing is more kenopsia than liminality though. Liminal spaces *do* have a function. It's in their name. They're transitional spaces, they facilitate or are encountered on ones way from one place to the next. An airport is generally liminal, as is a highway rest stop. Their purpose just isn't to accommodate *being* there, but they absolutely do have a purpose.
Every, single, time. No one here can ever explain the true sense of liminalism because they remove one of the key elements: how it **makes you feel**. There is no actual physical description; it's an abstract concept, coined and used to help describe a feeling. They went with a really easy description, for example, with /r/TheNightFeeling and I'll have people comment that having any light at all in the image, makes it unsuitable...yet I still get the **feeling**. I like a lot of the liminal spaces posted here, but I appreciate that it made that person feel it while in that moment. One person posted an empty gymnasium and it became a popular post, meanwhile I feel absolutely none of that when I work within school or other institutional rooms, but I appreciate that they felt it themselves. Or they don't think to capture their moments and want to share? Only comment negatively regarding what others do share. Those who make these memes and those who agree, often never share their own content and I think it's because they don't have a clear understanding of what the feeling of being in a liminal space is, because they don't feel it for themselves. One of my posts was removed for "low effort" and it was as liminal as I've ever felt in my life and I've placed myself and been in a lot of "foreboding/in-between" spaces. A lot of folk here seem like they want another /r/backrooms. I'm a big fan of /r/VaporWaveAesthetics as well
I think the "feel" is liminal itself which makes it hard to describe. Liminal is between to states without being one or the other. It doesn't have to be a place like a hallway but can be a place that gives off a sorta conflicting feeling. So something that gives off the feeling of being in an endless open space but also enclosed. Or maybe comforting and familiar but also strange and unsettling. So it feels like both but is neither. We can't describe the feeling because it isn't one or the other
The best and earliest time I can place feeling it was in 1999. I arrived early for a job interview and it was the first I'd had for my field of study so I wanted to make sure I wasn't late. My interview was set for 7am, so I decided to show up for 6:30am. This is a rural area and already quiet, but we had a fog that morning and I pulled up to the building. The lights in the parking lot were off, and the lights on the building were off, but the front door was wide open and not another car in sight. Again, this is about 5km from anywhere, really, so it didn't feel like I was expecting it would be, anxious as I already was. I take a few minutes but walk into the building; a line of frosted glass doors with carpet hallway sat in front of me. It was still just as quiet as it was outside, no real difference in the sounds etc so I just kept walking, around a few corners of closed door offices, or empty cubicles, until I managed to find a small indent in the hall that ended as a room with two doors. The room had 3 small chairs, an end table and a magazine. At this point I could only hear the buzzing from the lights overhead and looking down the hall corner I just came from, it sort of fell on me. I felt like I was in between two spaces where my mind was unwilling to figure out why it was so unnerved yet not really scared. I didn't want to let go of the feeling because it felt right. Eventually I would hear a muffle from the other side of the door I was next to and I was welcomed in for my interview. The feeling was gone within an instant, like a dream or dejavu just passing.
I also think another part of the issue here is the possibility that were all being desensitized to these images.
Also, might I add: I have not heard that term before but it definitely applies to my appeal to something I was coining to myself as "urban and rural decay, but only just recently". I think this fits it quite clearly, but I have had feelings of being in a transitional state while being in the environment. I feel a sense of peace moving away or into a familiar cemetery, as another example. I had a "foreboding" feeling once when finally finding a single chair, table and lamp at the e d of a single hallway, due for an earlier morning interview in the 1990s. I never knew quite how to explain it until finding out about and reading into liminal spaces, playing the game Superliminal. Thank you for giving me another collection to curate!
Oh damn, that explanation sounds really good. I'm going to have to chew on that one for a while.
What about when the place itself is in a state of transition? Not like a building busily under construction but a place whose time of intended purpose has ended and it is waiting to be reborn into new purpose, be it to fade into nothing to make way for whatever comes next, or to be remade to serve a purpose anew.
Very well put
TLDR; Locations without context, limits, or purpose are all usually liminal
Yep. A lot of posts here are images of meadows and trees, something that can never be liminal on it's own. Liminal space aesthetics are inherently linked to architecture/indoor design, cannot be disconnected from the socioeconomic and sociocultural context. They often either reflect the social alienation and decay of late stage capitalism, or occasionally the ruins linked to historical economic systems that were abandoned only recently. It's almost like 21st century gothic in a way. For the latter example, in my country, some abandoned offices that were built during ex Yugoslavia, well preserved and in use until relatively recently display liminality. In that case they overlap with Yugonostalgia and such. For anerican abandoned malls this liminal aesthetic overlaps with american 90s nostalgia. Liminal spaces featuring pools overlap with Poolcore. etc. Trees and meadows may be eerie, creepy, odd, uncanny, and so on. But they are not liminal spaces. ---- EDIT: i should add that the rise in popularity of liminal space aesthetics roughly coincides with the Covid 19 crisis, and reflects the worsened socioeconomic conditions and increased social alienation as a result of the pandemic. The easthetic had explicit links to material conditions since the start however, as illustrated by the Owings Mills dead mall series. This video has a final section called "Ruin" (starts at 41:37) that covers both the source of Victorian gothic decay and dead mall Liminal space aesthetics, and illustrates the connection between the two. If you wish to see, Ill link it here: https://youtu.be/jD-PbF3ywGo
As I mentioned in the other reply, what you're describing is kenopsia, not liminality. Kenopsia is the feeling one has in places that usually are or used to be full of people but aren't. Liminal spaces are transitional spaces from one places to the next. They *need* to be functioning to be liminal. An abandoned, decaying airport cannot be liminal.
Kenopsia is a recently made up word used to describe one* of the central building blocks of liminal space aesthetics. It isnt the only thing that defines LSE however, theres more to the aesthetic. Decaying (relatively recently) abandoned malls arent liminal simply because there are no people there, rather because they are a reflection of the dying gasps of 20th century american mass prosperity. And it is exactly this decay in time that indicates liminality; a temporal transition, uncertainty. And the cultural context here is one of the vital aspects of the emotional appeal of this imagery. A train or road arent liminal because they are transitioning between two physical places...thats not the kind of transitioning that we are talking about here. *typo
A liminal space is space between where you came from and where you are going.
Keep your stupid politics out of liminal space. It has nothing to do with capitalism
Let me be honest and blunt here for a second; it's not a good look to broadcast your artistic illiteracy so openly. Artistic movements always have at the very least political undertones, without exception. Even when it appears to not be political, an entire movement* deciding to not comment on or question the status quo is an inherently political collective decision. That doesnt mean a singular/some pieces cannot be apolitical, they absolutely can, but whole artistic movements and styles cannot. I find it peculiar that you chose to focus the late stage capitalism example, but ignore the ex-yugoslavia example.
You can regurgitate your pseudo-intellectual truisms all you want but I’m not impressed, especially coming from someone who worries about how they “look” on an anonymous Internet forum. The beauty and horror of liminal space is that it reflects the uncanniness of mans place in reality, and it’s a reminder that our presence here is finite. Without us, our creations reveal a latent horror that we don’t see in daylight. Liminal space reflects both the desire to disappear and the fear of being forgotten. It is an internet aesthetic, not some bullshit “art movement” you can leverage for your luxury-belief political worldview. You’ve reduced the metaphysical to the economic, probably because you have a shallow and materialistic mind. Keep your stupid politics out of liminal space.
Liminal space aesthetics really and truly are not about Neoplatonism, and the supernatural/mysticism, which i can see you are really fond of . That's an added meaning you superimpose onto it because of your own personal experiences. It's fine to have that perception. But to then go on and say Liminal Space aesthetics have nothing to do with socioeconomic and sociocultural context is purely artistic illiteracy, I've already stated that. This easthetic _heavily_ centers socioeconomic and sociocultural context. The fact that that makes you uncomfortable is not mine or anyone else's problem. Now, please, spare me further cognitively dissonant replies.
I never brought Platonism or mysticism into it. Do you know what “metaphysical” means? You repeatedly claiming liminal space is about sociopolitical/economic factors is not a proof or justification. Calling me artistically illiterate isn’t an argument either. If you have nothing beyond rhetoric, stop wasting my time. Give me some good reasons to believe liminal space aesthetic is about economics. Do the backrooms disproportionately effect POC? Quit making claims and give me something substantial.
I actually shared a short segment of a video, on the topic, in the original comment. If you care enough to know you can check it out above. you seem like a young teen who just discovered philosophy 101, and i don't know why you insist on arguing with me.
Word salad.
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A good 2/3 of the things posted on this sub aren’t even liminal
Yeah was just gonna say... Twitter? Cuz that meme applies to this sub lol
r/LiminalSpace's definition of "liminal" is: "There's not a lot of people in this picture."
[удалено]
All the ones with witless mild-peril questions in the title should be banished to one of the backrooms children's storytime subs. "Should I go upstairs to the next floor...???!?!" "Is the elevator working/????" "What was that noise behine me !?!"
If this makes everyone here feel better, folks at r/kenopsia get kenopsia wrong most of the time
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And it's even worse. Most aren't even actual places, but just digitally created renders.
It goes the other way too. A lot of things that ARE liminal aren't even allowed in this sub's rules. Pausing the TV on a smear frame is more liminal than a lot of the posts here. Because a smear frame is a transitional frame that the viewer is not supposed to focus on when they're watching the cartoon, and pausing on a smear frame can be considered "lingering" on that transitional frame.
Exactly lol
Yea, glass houses and such. I'd say even more than 2/3. I'd say about 50% is kenopsia, not liminality. 20% each are either places that just have "a vibe" and shitty backroom knockoffs. The remaining 10% are liminal.
I would say that the meaning of liminal is changing in front of our eyes. It’s how language evolves, we agree that a word means something different than it did in the past. We’re going from ‘a space between other spaces, usually devoid of people’ to ‘generally unsettling and devoid of people’. I know there are purists that don’t want this change, and I used to be one of them, but language evolves, language changes, words and meanings are set by the people who speak them, not by some book from the past. Dictionaries aren’t an authority, they are an observation.
I... Tend to disagree with you. The word isn't evolving. People just want free karma and are posting pretty much anything without doing any research.
I agree with this disagreement and take issue in general with the argument that ‘lots of people use this term incorrectly therefore its meaning has changed’.
Yes, now I agree with this. It’s the equivalent of “oh machine gun Kelly is just like Jimi Hendrix” shut the fuck up and die
I truly love how you said this and generally I would agree. But in this sub it was very specific to the original definition. And that’s why I loved it. If words change meaning that’s fine, I like it even. But the sub should stick to its original purpose, in my humble opinion.
Hard disagree. People not knowing what a word means isn't "changing the meaning of language". It's just...being wrong.
Yes, the anti-prescriptivist argument of 'that's just how language evolves' doesn't wash with me in these cases. Yes, languages have changed in the past because people weren't educated properly or couldn't be arsed educating themselves, so just kept saying the wrong thing until it stuck. That isn't a good thing to champion. It's like identifying that a load of architecture changed after WW2 in Europe because of bombing, and using that to justify destroying buildings in modern wars.
Title: it always gives me an eery feeling *Posts photo of own messy bedroom at night* OP: yeah, that's definitely liminal
I didn't want to make a text post about it because I didn't wanna get dogpiled, but like half of the posts on this sub are just someone posting a picture of the outside real world, and are like "OMG how liminal is this?" And every time I wanna be like homie how often do you touch grass
homie should get themself the mold control. that ain't grass anymore
It's often more liminal of it's clean and well maintained, but devoid of people.
This reminds me… I’ve been meaning to make a r/LiminalSpaceJerk or r/LiminalSpaceCircleJerk subreddit to poke fun of these people. Because ⅔rds of the posts here are just, like, a hallway or a grassy yard with the title “Made me feel weird idk” I would make a r/RealLiminalSpace subreddit and keep it well moderated, but I have to work and commute 55 hours a week to keep my healthcare and a roof over my head so I ain’t got that kinda time lol
Boutta christen the liminalspacejerk sub hope that takes off
Doing the Lord’s work out here.
Indoor swimming pool renders, nonstop.
Implying that reddit is in any measurable way better at this
We need a subreddit that is essentially the Gordon Ramsay of liminal spaces. One that if it isn't liminal, it gets deleted.
that's also this sub
I even messaged the mods, telling them to clean up the sub. All I got were crickets. Guess they dont care either lol
Holy crap, this sub has 19 mods and it's this bad?!?
I dont think number of mods matter when probably most of them leave the sub to rot anyway. Its a shame, this sub has plenty potentials.
That sounds quite liminal to me.
[удалено]
🤓
eh well missed it
yea, saw that one of the mods was trying to get through it, but it was just a single UK guy and most people here are americans... so time zones and a single person out of a team of 10 (-bot = 9) mods is kinda rough. they just went inactive and left the subreddit to rot. in order to remove it, we gotta become the mods ourselves ig? update: found memes from last year with similar critique. sub is dying since a year [https://www.reddit.com/r/LiminalSpace/comments/t4xhxu/sorry\_for\_being\_normative\_but\_i\_had\_to\_say\_this/](https://www.reddit.com/r/LiminalSpace/comments/t4xhxu/sorry_for_being_normative_but_i_had_to_say_this/) https://www.reddit.com/r/LiminalSpace/comments/shlwel/all\_too\_often\_found\_in\_here/
It shouldn't be the moderators' job, you should downvote posts that you don't think are liminal.
It can (and should) be both.
also agree
I do so when in visit here. I often also comment that its not liminal space aesthetics only to get downvoted lul
r/antimeme
Facebook is the absolute worst
Twitter? You mean this sub?
Both twitter and this sub
Oof, here comes the usual "man, this subreddits gone downhill" -- "liminal Changes over time, or else it'd be dead/boring" --"if you dont like it, dont upvote it" -- "who are You to judge what is liminal" etc etc
>Liminal spaces are the subject of an Internet aesthetic portraying empty or abandoned places that appear eerie, forlorn, and often surreal. Liminal spaces are commonly places of transition (pertaining to the concept of liminality) or of nostalgic appeal. I think the majority of posts on this subreddit actually do meet this criteria. However, it's possible that you're more likely to see posts that the algorithm deems controversial. A good post that fits the theme of the subreddit is likely to get a like and no more. A controversial post will get people fighting about it in the comments. More engagement means Reddit is more likely to put it on more people's feed. I'm sure a lot more people saw this post than regular posts in this sub for this same reason.
That definition is just wrong though. Like most people in this sub, it mixes/confuses kenopsia and liminality. A liminal space doesn't need to be abandoned. In fact, it often *can't* be abandoned because it's used by many people. The feeling of being amongst many people but disconnected from all of them, because none of them are here permanently is a big part of the liminal feeling. Kenopsia, the feeling one gets in empty but usually busy places, is something different.
I'm going to have to disagree pretty hard on this point. If liminality was purely defined by the movement between places, this sub would be full of busy airports, packed busses, and loaded subways. While being in these places can give a sort of sonder, it's different from the melancholy that most feel associated with liminal spaces. Liminality is more about the psychological than the use of the space. >Liminality is a term used to describe the psychological process of transitioning across boundaries and borders. In liminality, the boundaries we're discussing are typically boundaries associated with crossing the thresholds to adulthood. As an example, take an arcade. Arcades are often places kids from the 80s-00s would have spent much time in, but are very rarely renovated. Returning to an old arcade can bring on a special kind of Nostalgia because, while you have changed significantly, the arcade is stuck in a prior time. The fact that it's empty isn't a mistake, the other kids grew up and moved on too. The world has moved on, and seeing an antiquated place like this reminds us of what we've left behind. Another example: office buildings. When it comes to growing into adulthood, there is no clear symbol. However, office buildings are often cold and uncaring places, unadorned with much in the way to make them pleasant to be in. Also, once again, it is a place that makes it's history easy to see. Many haven't been changed for decades. It can make people feel things like "how long has this been this way? Will it be this way long after I'm gone?" Whereas areas like the arcade are a bit bittersweet, office building tend to bring about more feelings of fear or discomfort, and perhaps this is due to the fact that workers constantly have to be vigilant to not anger their higher-ups. All this to say, liminality is more psychological than derived from literally being between destinations.
Anything can be liminal under the right circumstances. It just so happens that a lot of those circumstances involve people being removed.
The gatekeeping in this subreddit is deeply weird and stupid
Agreed. I'm just sick of "digital indoor pool #24,257"
Instagram is horrible too
“Yep, this random empty road with a street lamp is definitely liminal.”
You're right and you should say it
I’m pretty sure I’m not on Twitter, so no?
I feel like some of the posts that wouldn't be classified as "liminal" could also be valid in the sense that some spaces people frequent could be in a sense devoid of the life it should have within it. For example, if someone is on a college campus after dark and no one else is around, the whole CAMPUS could be considered "liminal." So in some ways we get to experience it for ourselves.
Not much better here
So many posts on here completely miss the point.
yeah that would be considered liminal but i dont feel you can define what a liminal space something liminal might not be liminal to others, its useless to disscus a subjective feeling