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• Response to ‘The liminal space palliative care volunteers occupy and their roles within it: a qualitative study’
  Rachel France
  Published on: 19 August 2020

• Published on: 19 August 2020

  Response to ‘The liminal space palliative care volunteers occupy and their roles within it: a qualitative study’

  • Rachel France, PhD Student The Open University

  I read with interest the paper titled ‘The liminal space palliative care volunteers occupy and their roles within it: a qualitative study’ by Vanderstichelen et al (1) which reported on volunteers who care for terminally ill people. I consider that the authors’ conclusion that these volunteers occupy a liminal space ‘betwixt and between’ staff and family members may be drawn from an incomplete understanding of Turner’s (2) concept of liminality.
  The term derives from limen meaning threshold and is used to denote moving across a boundary from one state to another. The model involves three stages: separation, transition (the liminal phase) and (re-) incorporation. Examples include changes in status, such as getting married or gaining majority, or in life-stage, such as birth and death.
  I argue that Vanderstichelen et al’s consideration that these volunteers occupy a liminal space ‘betwixt and between’ staff and family members since they provide care which includes aspects of that given by both these ‘conceptually rigid and mutually exclusive domains’ (p. 9) shows that the volunteer role here is ambiguous rather than liminal. While ambiguity is a core feature of liminality as described by Turner and can be applied to the volunteer role – for example, when there are unclear boundaries between volunteer and paid staff roles (3) - the presence of this feature alone does not make the role liminal.
  I acknowledge liminality has been used in some organisational li...

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  I read with interest the paper titled ‘The liminal space palliative care volunteers occupy and their roles within it: a qualitative study’ by Vanderstichelen et al (1) which reported on volunteers who care for terminally ill people. I consider that the authors’ conclusion that these volunteers occupy a liminal space ‘betwixt and between’ staff and family members may be drawn from an incomplete understanding of Turner’s (2) concept of liminality.
  The term derives from limen meaning threshold and is used to denote moving across a boundary from one state to another. The model involves three stages: separation, transition (the liminal phase) and (re-) incorporation. Examples include changes in status, such as getting married or gaining majority, or in life-stage, such as birth and death.
  I argue that Vanderstichelen et al’s consideration that these volunteers occupy a liminal space ‘betwixt and between’ staff and family members since they provide care which includes aspects of that given by both these ‘conceptually rigid and mutually exclusive domains’ (p. 9) shows that the volunteer role here is ambiguous rather than liminal. While ambiguity is a core feature of liminality as described by Turner and can be applied to the volunteer role – for example, when there are unclear boundaries between volunteer and paid staff roles (3) - the presence of this feature alone does not make the role liminal.
  I acknowledge liminality has been used in some organisational literature as a way of conceptualising a state where liminars are not one thing or another - for example, management consultants and temporary workers. (4, 5) However, the difference between this use and Vanderstichelen et al’s application of the concept to palliative care volunteers is that management consultants and temporary workers are categories of personnel who usually come and go within organisations. Volunteers meanwhile are typically a permanent actor group in palliative care settings borne out by my own research (an as yet unpublished ethnography of patient- and family-facing volunteers in two UK hospices) which showed volunteer roles were a well-defined part of the hospice organisational structure, with ‘job’ descriptions and subjected to specific volunteer policies.
  The focus on Turner’s model is on status change which I argue is lacking in the volunteer role: volunteers are not ‘betwixt and between’ two statuses. Perhaps within the frame of an individual’s life story can it be argued that being a volunteer represents a liminal phase. For example, if volunteering is undertaken with a view towards gaining a place at medical school then the volunteer could be said to be ‘betwixt and between’ school pupil and medical student. However, Vanderstichelen et al’s focus is not on the identity construction of individual volunteers.
  Therefore, while the role may be enacted in spaces where dying - a liminal state between living and death - is taking place, it itself is not liminal despite incorporating some of the characteristics of liminality, namely ambiguity (and possibly marginality). It is this clarification which is lacking in the paper.

  1. Vanderstichelen S, Cohen J, Van Wesemael Y, et al. The liminal space palliative care volunteers occupy and their roles within it: A qualitative study. BMJ Support Palliat Care 2018. Published Online First: 07 December 2018. doi: 10.1136/bmjspcare-2018-001632
  2. Turner V.W. The ritual process. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books; 1974.
  3. Hoad P. Volunteers in the independent hospice movement. Sociol Health Illn 1991;13;231-48.
  4. Czarniawska B, Mazza C. Consulting as a liminal space. Hum Relat 2003;56:267-90.
  5. Garsten C. Betwixt and between: Temporary employees as liminal subjects in flexible organizations. Organization Studies, 1999;20:601-17.

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  Conflict of Interest:
  None declared.

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