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Received: 31 August 2020    Revised: 1 March 2021    Accepted: 2 March 2021

DOI: 10.1111/ijcs.12678

SPECIAL ISSUE ARTICLE

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The interplay between liminality and consumption: A

systematic literature review with a future research agenda

Jessica Darveau1  | Mustapha Cheikh-­Ammar2

1
Marketing Department, Faculty of Business
Administration, Laval University, Québec,
QC, Canada
2
Management Information Systems, Faculty
of Business Administration, Laval University,
Québec, QC, Canada
Correspondence
Jessica Darveau, Marketing Department,
Faculty of Business Administration, Laval
University, 2325 Rue de la Terrasse, Québec,
QC G1V 0A6, Canada.
Email: jessica.darveau@fsa.ulaval.ca
Abstract
During the last three decades, the concept of liminality has been used by consumer
researchers to examine consumption-­related phenomena associated with ambigu-
ous transitions and meaningful transformative events. Inspired by the richness of
this concept, researchers have continuously applied and extended the theoretical
lens it affords to new and emerging contexts. However, the literature on liminality
remains fragmented, and it is sometimes confusing because of the complex relation-
ship between liminality and consumption. To dispel this confusion, this study builds
on the findings of a systematic literature review to clarify the interplay between
liminality and consumption and to develop a comprehensive framework for examin-
ing their relationship with each other. This framework offers a theoretical lens for
the conceptual investigation of this interplay and, ultimately, for the development
of a theory of liminal consumption. Four different conceptual associations between
liminality and consumption are identified: liminal products, liminal consumption,
consumption-­caused liminality, and liminality-­caused consumption, and their unique
manifestations are theorized. Using the notion of lifeworld existentials, this study
also examines various types of liminal experiences and shows that they have four
overarching modes: time, space, position, and the body. Important avenues for future
research are also discussed.

KEYWORDS
consumer research, consumption, liminal consumption, liminal experience, liminality,
systematic literature review, theory building

1 |  I NTRO D U C TI O N impressive number of studies, although to a certain extent a “dis-

The concept of liminality is related to the ambivalence experienced
by a voyager who has embarked on a transitional journey. Leaving
behind known ground to travel to a new reality, the voyager, also re-
ferred to as the liminar, will only reach this new reality once the tran-
sitional journey has been completed (Tagliaventi, 2020). The concept
of liminality has its roots in anthropology (Van Gennep, 1960), but it
is now widely used in a multitude of academic disciplines, including
cultural studies, sociology, management, and consumer research.
In the management literature alone, this concept has inspired an
connect from the original anthropological research on liminality”
has been observed (Söderlund & Borg, 2018, p. 18). In contrast,
consumer research studies adopting liminality as a theoretical lens
have remained much closer to the original concept. However, this
has not prevented consumer researchers from offering contempo-
rary interpretations of liminality and discussing novel applications of
it inspired by consumption-­related phenomena.
Liminality is above all an experience, one that is characterized
by powerful, emotionally charged feelings, and it is this experiential
dimension of liminality that has received considerable attention in

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consumer research. Indeed, the concept of liminality has provided a
rich theoretical lens for examining consumer behavior in relation to
significant life events involving various types of transitions. During
the last decade, consumer research mobilizing the concept of limin-
ality has seen exponential growth, with the concept frequently ex-
tended and applied to new and emerging contexts (e.g., Beudaert,
2020; Sudbury-­Riley et al., 2020). This research trend is expected
to continue because an ever-­increasing number of “transitory sit-
uations and transformative events” (Szakolczai, 2009) is affecting
the lives of individuals and collectivities in the contemporary world.
Among other things, these situations and events can be related to
marginal identities and environmental crises (Appau et al., 2020), or
to the dissolution of order and the loosening of social and cultural
structures that occur at a time of constant mobility, one of the key
characteristics of liquid modernity (Ulver & Ostberg, 2014). Some
of these situations and events may even lead to the development of
a positive view of liminality as a formative experience that enables
consumers to experience multiple and more fluid transitions. One
thing is clear: these issues point to a growing need to develop a more
extensive theory of liminality. To do so, it will be necessary to begin
by conducting a systematic overview of the concept of liminality in
the literature so that researchers have a better understanding of
the mechanisms linking liminal experiences with consumption. This
overview will help build a more suitable theoretical framework for
interpreting the interplay between liminality and consumption, one
that is grounded in existing consumer research and that provides a
clear direction for future work on this interplay.
The boundaries of liminality are a fertile topic for further ex-
ploration. Guided by a rich body of consumer research on liminal-
ity, this systematic literature review answer calls for the “further
development of liminal consumption theory” (Tonner, 2016, 116)
by critically assessing this theoretical lens. The literature on limin-
ality is fragmented, and at times it can be confusing because of the
multifaceted relationship between liminality and consumption. The
nature and the direction of the association between these two con-
cepts can change significantly depending on the context under con-
sideration. For example, variants of the concept of liminality have
sometimes been used to describe voluntary and playful experiences
that contrast sharply with the more traditional liminal experiences
frequently described as imposed and necessary (Turner, 1974).
Moreover, consumption has been seen as a remedy for negative
emotional states such as stress, anxiety, discomfort, and ambiva-
lence that are often associated with liminal experiences. Yet con-
sumption itself has also been found to engender feelings of liminality
because it sometimes leads people to “feel wrong” about themselves
or about their consumption choices (Thomsen & Sørensen, 2006, p.
915; Cody & Lawlor, 2011). Given the current state of knowledge on
liminality, there is clearly a need for a comprehensive overview of
how the concept of liminality is used in consumer research and for a
detailed explanation of how this concept is related to consumption.
The multidisciplinary interest in the concept of liminality and the
theoretical potential of this concept is indicated by the high number
of studies that have engaged with it outside the field of consumer
DARVEAU and CHEIKH-­AMMAR
research (Söderlund & Borg, 2018). However, there are almost no
detailed overviews of the use of this concept in consumer research,
which is surprising given the great interest that consumer research-
ers have shown in it. The present study addresses this research gap
by providing a systematic literature review of work on liminality in
consumer research. The goal of this study is to clarify the concept of
liminality, to develop liminality more adequately as a theoretical lens,
and to facilitate the use of this theoretical lens in future research.
Centered on theory development, this type of literature review, also
known as a theory-­building review (Post et al., 2020), is a typical
domain-­based review, one of the five genres of systematic literature
reviews suggested by Paul and Criado (2020). Theory-­building re-
views can advance theory using a multitude of different approaches,
including one that focuses on providing conceptual clarity (Post
et al., 2020, p. 355), which is the approach that we adopt here. Thus
the present study has three main research objectives: (a) it seeks
to clarify the concept of liminality and its theoretical and practical
applications by drawing on seminal works in consumer research; (b)
it endeavors to provide a comprehensive theoretical framework that
unpacks the complex relationship between liminality and consump-
tion; and (c) it aims to present a research agenda to guide future work
on liminality in general and on some specific facets of it that have
only received limited attention in the literature. In other words, this
literature review provides a critical assessment of the relationship
between liminality and consumption and draws a comprehensive
portrait of the interplay between them by examining a wide range
of studies that have been conducted in a variety of sociocultural set-
tings. To do so, it builds on an extensive set of consumer research
articles on liminality published during the 35-­year period between
1985 and 2020.
The study is organized as follows. We begin by explaining the
methodological steps necessary to review the consumer research
literature on the relatively mature topic of liminality. We then lay the
conceptual foundations for a comprehensive investigation of limin-
ality by briefly examining the concept of liminality in some seminal
work in anthropology and in consumer research. Next, we discuss
the main findings of the literature review and show that they make
possible a conceptual framework for a theory of liminal consump-
tion. Finally, we explore the theoretical and practical implications of
the literature review.
2 | M E TH O D
2.1 | Search process
Systematic review articles are likely to be useful when they are de-
veloped based on widely used theories, methods and constructs, as
seen in some recent review articles (Dhaliwal et al., 2020; Kumar
et al., 2020; Mishra et al., 2020; Paul & Mas, 2020). That said, this
section describes the systematic steps undertaken to conduct a
theory-­building review on liminality using the guidelines specified
by Paul and Criado (2020) and Post et al. (2020). Figure 1 provides a
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F I G U R E 1   Search process using the PRISMA protocol
general description of the search process. To ensure that this search
process was rigorous and transparent, we adopted the PRISMA
four-­stage protocol (Lim et  al.,  2021; Moher et  al.,  2009). At the
identification stage, our aim was to find relevant studies published
in reputable peer-­reviewed journals. We did so using the Academic
Journal Guide ranking list (2018), also known as the “ABS list,” from
the Chartered Association of Business Schools. This is a well-­known
ranking system that has been adopted by business schools all around
the world.
We then narrowed our selection to marketing journals ranked
as 2, 3, 4, and 4* in the ABS list, rankings that apply to any jour-
nals with a citation impact factor. We also included two reputable
journals with high-­impact factors that are known to regularly publish
consumer research, namely the Journal of Business Research and
the Journal of Consumer Culture. This gave us a total of 42 journals
to consider. We proceeded to search each of these journals using
Google Scholar, a search engine that makes it possible to identify
relevant articles rapidly and that gives direct click-­through access
to their full-­text versions in academic databases (Lim et al., 2021).
To be as comprehensive as possible, our review covered all the re-
search published in the selected academic journals in all the years
available until the month of October 2020. In the search, we used
the keyword “liminal” to ensure that any articles containing either
the word “liminal” or the word “liminality” were identified. There are
no specific derivatives or synonyms of “liminal”; therefore, it is highly
likely that our search using this keyword alone sufficed to identify all
the potentially relevant studies.
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The identification stage yielded 435 articles for assessment
in the next stage. After debating the issue during the screening
stage, the authors decided to concentrate on articles published in
academic journals and to exclude ones appearing in the proceed-
ings of Advances in Consumer Research (n  = 71). This allowed us
to avoid having to consider duplicate studies, that is, ones that had
first appeared in conference proceedings before being published in
academic journals. The full texts of the remaining articles (n = 364)
were then reviewed to determine the eligibility of these articles.
During this stage, we selected articles that feature a significant use
of the concept of liminality either in inductive or in deductive the-
oretical reasoning. We, therefore, excluded articles that only super-
ficially mention the terms “liminal” or “liminality.” Naturally, we also
excluded the ones in which these terms only appear in the reference
list. Moreover, given that our main objective was to unpack the re-
lationship between liminality and consumption, we excluded articles
that primarily address the implications of liminality at a strategic or at
a business level. Each article was scrutinized by both authors and not
accepted for inclusion unless they both agreed that it respected the
eligibility criteria mentioned above. Of the 364 articles, 224 were
excluded, leaving 140 articles to be included for analysis (Table 1).
2.2 | Content analysis
The content of the articles was analyzed in two phases. The
first phase relied on the theories, contexts, and methods (TCM)
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TA B L E 1   List of journals in the review

Articles Citations

Article rank Journal title (n = 140) Citation rank Journal title (n = 17,741)

1 Consumption Markets & Culture 26 1 Journal of Consumer Research 10,856

2 Journal of Consumer Research 19 2 Journal of Marketing 1,727
3 Journal of Business Research 16 3 Consumption Markets & Culture 1,300
4 Journal of Marketing Management 15 4 Journal of the Academy of 666
Marketing Science
5 Journal of Consumer Behavior 12 5 Journal of Business Research 551
6 Marketing Theory 9 6 Journal of Marketing Management 457
=7 European Journal of Marketing 8 7 Marketing Theory 422
=7 Journal of Consumer Culture 8 8 Journal of Consumer Behavior 331
9 Journal of Public Policy & 4 9 Psychology & Marketing 277
Marketing
=10 Journal of Services Marketing 3 10 Journal of Public Policy & 259
Marketing
=10 Journal of Macromarketing 3 11 Journal of Consumer Culture 218
=10 Qualitative Market Research: An 3 12 Journal of Macromarketing 134
International Journal
=13 Journal of Retailing and Consumer 2 13 European Journal of Marketing 125
Services
=13 Journal of Strategic Marketing 2 14 International Journal of Research 114
in Marketing
=13 Journal of the Academy of 2 15 Journal of Services Marketing 72
Marketing Science
=17 Journal of Consumer Affairs 1 16 Journal of Consumer Psychology 54
=17 Psychology & Marketing 1 17 Journal of Strategic Marketing 42
=17 Journal of Consumer Psychology 1 18 International Market Review 40
=17 Journal of Marketing 1 19 Qualitative Market Research: An 34
International Journal
=17 International Journal of Research in 1 20 Journal of Retailing and Consumer 25
Marketing Services
=17 International Market Review 1 21 International Journal of Market 20
Research
=17 International Journal of Consumer 1 22 International Journal of Consumer 11
Studies Studies
=17 International Journal of Market 1 23 Journal of Consumer Affairs 6
Research

framework (Paul & Benito, 2018) to synthesize the literature on limi-
nality and to begin clarifying the concept of liminality. The second
one focused on theory-­building using a combination of inductive and
deductive approaches to theorize the interplay between liminality
and consumption.
More specifically, the two authors read the articles inde-
pendently and used the TCM framework to codify important aspects
of them and guide the analysis. For each aspect, unique codes were
developed and debated iteratively before they were applied to the
entire sample. For example, the contexts were grouped into three
main categories: identity-­
related transitions, object-­
related tran-
sitions, and communitas. The results of this initial content analysis
are presented in the next section: Overview of Liminality. This initial
content analysis served as the basis for the next coding phase, the
one centering on the interplay between liminality and consumption.
As will be discussed in more detail below, most of the selected
studies were qualitative in nature and required a correspond-
ing qualitative analysis technique based on existing guidelines
(Spiggle, 1994). This involved retrieving and codifying excerpts doc-
umenting descriptions of liminal experiences and/or featuring a rela-
tionship between liminality and consumption. Tabulations were then
created to report on liminal concepts such as liminal space and to
list manifestations of them. Figures were also created to explore the
relationship between these concepts so that more abstract concep-
tualizations could gradually be inferred. Van Gennep's (1909/1960)
notion of the unfolding sequence of rites of passage could then be
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iteratively extended to conceptualize the various associations be-
tween liminality and consumption.
As a logical outcome of the two phases of the data analysis, the
findings of this literature review are divided into two sections. The
first one discusses the origins of the concept of liminality and its
evolution in anthropology and consumer research. In addition, it pro-
vides a brief summary of the main published articles on the topic of
liminality, specifies their distribution in the selected journals, and in-
dicates which ones have been cited the most. Using the TCM frame-
work, an overview of the research on liminality is also presented to
shed light on the theories, contexts, and methods featured in the
published work discussing this research. The second section is an
in-­depth examination of the various manifestations of the interplay
between liminality and consumption that have been highlighted in
consumer research. A comprehensive theoretical framework that
spells out the relationship between liminality and consumption is
developed, four conceptually different associations between lim-
inality and consumption are theorized, and the notion of lifeworld
existentials (Van Manen, 1990) is used to identify four overarching
lived experiences of liminality.
3 | OV E RV I E W O F LI M I N A LIT Y
3.1 | The origins of liminality
The term “liminality” derives from the Latin words “limen” and
“limes,” which mean “threshold” and “limit” (Szakolczai, 2009). The
concept of liminality was originally introduced by the anthropol-
ogist Arnold Van Gennep in The Rites of Passage (1909/1960) to
discuss important rituals marking significant individual and collec-
tive life events such as pregnancy, weddings, and funerals. These
events often include a “before” and an “after” that are separated
by thresholds or limits that have to be crossed. According to Van
Gennep (1909/1960), they usually follow a sequence consisting
of three periods: a separation or preliminal period, a transition
or liminal period, and an incorporation or postliminal period. Van
Gennep (1909/1960) also maintains that each of these periods in-
volves a set of culturally meaningful rituals. It is important to note,
however, that although Van Gennep (1909/1960) is mainly inter-
ested in the liminality experienced during major life events, he oc-
casionally discusses examples of liminal experiences that involve
being outside of time or space.
The concept of liminality was taken up and further elaborated
by the anthropologist Turner (1969), who views liminality as a de-
fining life experience characterized by a suspension of reality and
its embedded certainties. According to Turner (1969), this type of
suspension can target identities, norms, structures, safety, and
order. As a result, persons transitioning through a liminal life ex-
perience find themselves “betwixt and in-­b etween,” until they re-
turn from this experience transformed (Turner, 1969, p. 95). Turner
(1969) refers to these persons as “liminars,” but also as “passen-
gers,” “threshold people,” and “liminal beings” (pp. 94–­95). Turner
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(1969) maintains that liminars “elude or slip through the network of
classifications that normally locate states and positions in cultural
space” (p. 95). In other words, liminars embody the ambiguity and
confusion characteristic of liminal suspensions. However, Turner
(1969) makes clear that liminality is not restricted to individual ex-
periences of transition, for he introduces the term “communitas”
to describe groups of individuals who, although different in some
important respect such as social standing, share a common collec-
tive experience or state of liminality (Turner, 1967). Communitas
“refers to a sense of community that develops when individuals
from various backgrounds convene, share ritual experience and
create special social bonds” (Husemann et al., 2016, p. 3362). This
means that communitas can lead to a situation where society is
temporarily “unstructured,” for although the persons it brings to-
gether can have important differences, they find themselves mo-
mentarily united because of liminality (Turner, 1969, p. 96). Turner
also coined the term “liminoid” to describe more voluntary and/
or optional experiences of liminality that contrast with ones that
are imposed and necessary (Turner, 1974). Liminoid experiences
sometimes have the playful quality of short-­
lived events such
as festivals, carnivals, and artistic performances. Moreover, it is
noteworthy that Turner examines the liminality not only of indi-
viduals and groups, but also of places, times, situations, roles, and
symbols, among other things.
3.2 | Liminality in consumer research
The seminal works of Van Gennep (1909/1960) and Turner
(1969) inspired consumer researchers to investigate a variety of
consumption-­related phenomena characterized by the individual or
collective experience of being “in-­between.” This use of the concept
of liminality by consumer researchers dates back to the late 1980s
and early 1990s, a period during which some of the most important
foundational work on liminality first appeared in consumer research.
Using this theoretical lens, consumer researchers examined equivo-
cal consumption experiences. For example, they looked at consump-
tion experiences considered extraordinary, ones characterized by
ambiguity, ones related to communitas in consumer culture (Belk
et al., 1988; Lanier & Rader, 2015), and ones associated with iden-
tity transitions (Schouten, 1991). As indicated in Figure 2, during this
period and up until the year 2000, only a handful of articles featur-
ing the concept of liminality were published (n = 14). However, sev-
eral of them profoundly shaped later applications of the concept of
liminality and, as indicated in Table 2, they remain some of the most
frequently cited articles that use this concept and some of the most
frequently cited ones per year. For instance, consumer researcher
Russell Belk, who is named as one of the authors of 12 publications
in this literature review—­and who was one of the first to introduce
the concept of liminality into the field of marketing—­has had a sig-
nificant impact on its use in consumer research.
Up until 2010, the average number of articles using liminality as a
theoretical lens published per year remained relatively stable at 1.6.
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F I G U R E 2   Growth of the number of published consumer research articles featuring liminality

TA B L E 2   The ten most cited articles

Total Citations
citations per year

Rank Author(s) (n = 11,288) Rank Author(s) (n = 547.41)

1 Belk et al. (1989) 2,550 1 Brown et al. (2003) 101.59

2 Brown 1,727 2 Belk et al. (1989) 82.26
et al. (2003)
3 Celsi et al. (1993) 1,533 3 Celsi et al. (1993) 56.78
4 Schouten (1991) 1,111 4 Husemann and 56
Eckhardt (2019)
5 Belk et al. (1988) 1,061 5 Holt and Thompson 51
(2004)
6 Belk and Costa 880 6 Leigh et al. (2006) 46.64
(1998)
7 Holt and 816 7 Scott et al. (2017) 41.67
Thompson
(2004)
8 Leigh et al. (2006) 653 8 Belk and Costa 40
(1998)
9 Kates (2002) 491 9 Schouten (1991) 38.31
10 Kozinets 466 10 Belk et al. (1988) 33.16
et al. (2004)

Note: Citations per year = Total citations ÷ Current year (2020) minus year of publishing.

The average increased to 7.6 articles between 2010 and 2014, and
to 11 articles between 2015 and 2020. This increase is also observed
in the management and organizational studies literature as well as in
other disciplines (Söderlund & Borg, 2018). The articles included in
this literature review are representative of the knowledge accumu-
lated by consumer researchers who use the theoretical lens of lim-
inality to examine the impactful transitions and the transformative
events that shape the lives of individuals and collectivities. The TCM
framework presented below (Figure 3) unpacks the process through
which this knowledge was accumulated and sheds light on the the-
ories, contexts, and methods featured in the consumer researcher
literature.
3.2.1 | Theories
The articles in our literature review adopt either inductive or deduc-
tive approaches in their use of the concept of liminality. That is, they
use liminality either as an a priori theory to help examine a transition of
interest or as a post hoc explanation of a transition occurring in a con-
text of interest. This means that some of these studies use liminality
to formulate and support research questions and objectives, but that
in other ones liminality emerges from patterns identified in the data. It
is clear that both of these approaches can lead to sound contributions
to the understanding of liminality and can be valuable to theory build-
ing, for both of them have been used to develop rich accounts of the
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F I G U R E 3   TCM framework—­An
overview of theories, concepts, and
methods
TA B L E 3   Typical liminal experiences
Identity-­related
transitions
Motherhood/
Pregnancy
Demographic
Death-­related
Social status
nature of liminality and its relation to consumption. Moreover, in sev-
eral studies in our sample, the concept of liminality is used to support
or to complement other theoretical frames. In what follows, we divide
these frames into two groups: theories and theoretical lenses. Both
are widely used in consumer culture studies like the ones examined in
this literature review. In the studies in our sample, the theory of self
(Holt & Thompson, 2004; Thomsen & Sørensen, 2006) and the theory
of grief (Guillard, 2017; Nations et al., 2017) are among the most fre-
quently used. The sacred-­secular binary opposition (Belk et al, 1989;
Sudbury-­Riley et al., 2020) and vulnerability (Beudaert, 2020; Fox &
Hoy, 2019) are among the most frequently used theoretical lenses.
3.2.2 | Contexts
The studies in our sample examine multiple contexts, but these con-
texts can be categorized in terms of two basic types of liminal expe-
rience. Some studies focus on the individual (consumer) experience
of liminality, whereas other ones focus on the collective experience
of liminality.
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Articles References
13 AbiGhannam and Atkinson (2016), Cappellini and Yen (2016),
Del Bucchia and Peñaloza (2016), Fox and Hoy (2019),
Johnstone and Todd (2012), McNeill and Graham (2014),
Min and Peñaloza (2018), Phillips and Broderick (2014), The
VOICE Group (2010a, 2010b), Thomsen and Sørensen (2006),
Tonner (2016), Voola et al. (2018)
9 Al-­Abdin et al. (2016), Cody and Lawlor (2011), Gentina et al.
(2017), Gentina et al. (2012), Harrison et al. (2015), Kapoor
et al. (2018), Ruvio and Belk (2018), Yau and Christidi (2018)
8 Drenten et al. (2017), Hackley and Hackley (2015), Gentry
et al. (1995a, 1995b), Guillard (2017), Nations et al. (2017),
Quilliam (2008), Turley and O'Donohoe (2017)
4 Castilhos and Fonseca (2015), Fernandez et al. (2011),
Schouten (1991), Ulver and Ostberg (2014)
The liminal consumer
As indicated in Table 3, a significant number of consumer research
studies use the concept of liminality to explain life-­altering transi-
tions. Given the importance of the theme of consumer identity pro-
jects in consumer research, it should come as no surprise that the
concept of liminality has offered an interesting theoretical lens for
investigating consumer behavior and consumption practices at vari-
ous stages of identity transitions. The transition to motherhood and
pregnancy, which already occupied a central place in Van Gennep's
(1909/1960) seminal work, has received considerable attention from
consumer researchers.
We were able to identify 13 articles with a direct focus on this
transition. Examples of liminal transitions identified by our review
include other major life changes such as the transition to a new age
category (e.g., Cody & Lawlor, 2011), the modification of an import-
ant relationship or a person's professional status (e.g., Fernandez
et al., 2011; Ulver & Ostberg, 2014), changes such as the death of a
loved one that impacts a person's circle of close friends and family
members (Drenten et al., 2017), the occurrence of a natural disas-
ter (Baker et  al.,  2007, Cheung & McColl-­Kennedy, 2015), and the
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toppling of a political system (Al-­Abdin et al., 2016). These liminal
transitions vary in nature, and some are considered more desirable
than others (e.g., a promotion vs. a job loss). Some only occur once,
whereas others can reoccur several times over the course of a life-
time (e.g., the transition to adulthood vs. career changes), and some
tend to be more predictable than others (e.g., a wedding vs. a natural
disaster). Most importantly from a consumer research perspective,
the role that consumption plays in these transitions depends on their
nature.
The liminal collective
The above transitions occur at the individual level, but liminality
can also be related to collective transitions such as the ones that
family members experience together (Pettigrew et al., 2014). We
saw earlier that this collectively experienced liminality is often re-
ferred to as communitas. As indicated in Table 4, temporary cul-
tural events such as festivals are contexts where typical examples
of liminal experiences involving communitas occur, and they are
fertile ground for consumer research (Jahn et al., 2018). However,
collective experiences of liminality are not always temporary, and
they are not necessarily connected to cultural events. Some occur
among more structurally organized groups such as religious con-
gregations that follow rituals like worshipping in a church (Appau
et al., 2020) or online communities that are formed on the basis of
common interests like using the Weight Watchers' program to diet
(Moisio & Beruchashvili, 2010). They can also be related to extraor-
dinary events such as pilgrimages and extreme sports activities
(Celsi et al., 1993; Husemann et al., 2016; O'Guinn & Belk, 1989).
Moreover, there are some studies that examine individual and col-
lective experiences of liminality together, thereby suggesting that
some liminal experiences can be both individual and collective when
they are shared within a larger group. Cappellini and Yen (2016, p.
1261) provide an example of this type of liminal experience in their
examination of online communities of mothers.
Some of these liminal experiences have been described as
“liminal-­
like” or “liminoid.” This is because liminoid experiences,
in contrast to other liminal experiences, tend to be voluntary and
playful rather than imposed and necessary (Turner, 1974). However,
the claim that liminoid experiences can be counted as liminal ex-
periences is the subject of an ongoing debate because liminoid
experiences are not characterized by an identity transition (Appau
et al., 2020). Although it is not our intention to engage in this de-
bate, we include studies on liminoid experiences in our literature
review and have taken them into consideration in our effort to the-
orize liminal consumption. We have decided to do so for one main
reason. Although liminoid experiences such as those that are had at
festivals rarely involve life-­altering transitions, they can still involve
temporally entering into liminal-­like experiences. In the context of
these temporary experiences of liminality, a transition is a process
in which a person goes “from being an ‘outsider’ to becoming a
member” (Goulding et al., 2002, p. 268). After all, the experience of
“in-­betweenness” is the key link between the transitional and the
liminal. It is this being in the middle of—­or being in between—­roles,
situations, or spaces that constitutes liminality per se. Van Gennep
(1909/1960) discusses such “territorial passages” at length, stressing
their importance in rites of entry into the home, rites that are seen as
involving liminal experiences even though they have little to do with
life course transitions.
3.2.3 | Methods
The fact that the majority of the studies we review use a qualita-
tive research methodology is a clear indication that the marketing
literature has remained close to the anthropological roots of the
concept of liminality. Of the articles reviewed, 111 are qualitative
studies (79.3%), and only 4 (2.9%) use quantitative data analysis
methods (either regression analysis or structural equation mod-
eling). The remaining 25 are conceptual or theoretical studies. Of
the studies in which the data are qualitative, 84 use semi-­structured,
in-­depth interviews as the main data collection method, and 38 are
based on ethnography or on other closely related methods such as

TA B L E 4   Typical collective liminal

Communitas
Sports or Leisure
Retail or Markets
Religion or Spirituality
Support or discussion
groups
Articles References
experiences
17 Belk and Costa (1998), Buchanan-­Oliver and Seo (2012), Celsi
et al. (1993), Chaney (2019), Chaney and Goulding (2016),
Goulding and Saren (2009), Goulding and Saren (2016),
Goulding et al. (2002), Griffin et al. (2018), Hackley
et al. (2012), Hewer and Hamilton (2010), Jahn et al. (2018),
Kates (2002, 2003), Skandalis et al. (2016), Taheri et al. (2016),
Tumbat and Belk (2011)
7 Belk and Bryce (1993), Belk et al. (1988), Harvey et al. (2017),
Kozinets et al. (2004), Maclaran and Brown (2001), O'Guinn
and Belk (1989), Stevens et al. (2019)
5 Belk et al. (1989), Gentry et al. (1995), Hewer and
Hamilton (2010), Husemann and Eckhardt (2019), Husemann
et al. (2016)
5 Cappellini and Yen (2016), Fox and Hoy (2019), Loane
et al. (2015), Moisio and Beruchashvili (2010), Tonner (2016)
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netnography. Moreover, it is important to note that several of the
studies using ethnography also rely on interviews and observations.
In addition to primary data, secondary data are also used in some of
the studies in our review. These secondary data have been mainly
collected from archival media such as online communities, visual ad
contents, industry reports, and cultural discourses in magazines and
newspapers.
We have now completed our general overview of the concept
of liminality and discussed its origins in anthropology as well as the
importance that it has acquired in consumer research during the last
few decades. In what follows, we develop a more coherent and com-
prehensive theory of liminal consumption by examining more thor-
oughly and critically assessing the main concepts used by consumer
researchers to analyze the interplay between liminality and con-
sumption. We also introduce some new concepts to help represent
the current state of liminality theory and its applications in consumer
research more adequately.
4 | TOWA R D A TH EO RY O F LI M I N A L
CO N S U M P TI O N
The concept of liminality is multifaceted, and its use in consumer
research has not always been homogeneous. This is because that
which it conceptualizes can take multiple forms—­among other liminal
“entities,” there are objects, persons, behaviors, and experiences—­
and it is also because the nature and the direction of the relationship
between liminality and consumption can vary significantly depend-
ing on contextual specificities. For example, the concept of liminal-
ity has been used to examine compulsory and inflicted experiences,
but it has also been used to examine voluntary and desirable ones.
In addition, it has been suggested that consumption is a means to
ease liminal transitions but that it is also possible for consumption to
amplify liminal experience itself (e.g., Cody & Lawlor, 2011; Thomsen
& Sørensen, 2006). This may appear contradictory, especially since
no comprehensive theory offering a holistic view of the interplay
between liminality and consumption currently exists. The theoreti-
cal framework developed in this section and presented in Figure 4
eliminates these apparent contradictions by explaining the con-
ceptual possibility of coexisting antithetical relationships between
F I G U R E 4   The interplay between
liminality and consumption
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liminality and consumption. It also opens up promising avenues for
future research and sheds light on some consumer behaviors related
to liminality that have yet to be adequately explored.
Although this theoretical framework conceptualizes a sequen-
tial process with the help of the terms “preliminal,” “liminal,” and
“postliminal,” terms that have been previously used in the literature,
this conceptualization does not reduce the phenomena in question
to nothing over and above temporally linked segments. Instead, it
represents them as elements of a sequence that can be interpreted
in terms of four modes of liminality that we describe using the no-
tion of existentials, that is, temporal, spatial, relational, and corporeal
lived experiences (Van Manen,  1990). For example, the sequence
consisting of preliminal space, liminal space, and postliminal space
is the sequence representing liminal transitions related to spatiality.
Table 5 provides a description of the main concepts that we develop
in our study to theorize the relationship between liminality and
consumption.
4.1 | Liminal products
Our literature review sheds light on two types of liminal products (or
services). The first type consists of products that are inherently limi-
nal, ones for which we use the term “intrinsically liminal.” The second
type consists of products that are liminal by association, ones for
which we use the term “extrinsically liminal.”
4.1.1 | Intrinsically liminal products
The liminality of intrinsically liminal products is rooted in their funda-
mentally “ambiguous nature” (Denegri-­Knott & Molesworth, 2013).
For example, such products may be “‘betwixt and between’ spe-
cific age categories and socialization levels” (Cody & Lawlor, 2011,
p. 219). To a large extent, they elude definition and are difficult to
categorize because their target consumers can only be loosely de-
fined or because their nature can vary depending on consumer
perceptions. For instance, body sprays are a product that, unlike
deodorants, can be used both by older teenage girls and by girls at
the beginning of puberty, but the latter “merely require body sprays
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TA B L E 5   Main concepts in a theory of liminal consumption

Concepts Description Examples

Liminal products
Intrinsic Consumer products/services with ambiguous properties Bokek-­Cohen (2015), Cheetham and
McEachern (2013), Tonner (2016), Wijland (2011)
Extrinsic Consumer products in a transition Cody and Lawlor (2011), Coskuner-­Balli and
Sandicki (2014), Hirschman et al. (2012),
Roster (2014), Stevens et al. (2007), Suarez
et al. (2016)
Liminal consumption
to overcome liminality Consumption to facilitate a liminal transition or to help AbiGhannam and Atkinson (2016), Fernandez
overcome liminal feelings et al. (2011), Johnstone and Todd (2012), Nations
et al. (2017), McNeill and Graham (2014), Noble and
Walker (1997), Schouten (1991), Voola et al. (2018)
to enhance liminality Consumption bound to the liminal period/space or used Al-­Abdin et al. (2016)a , Cody and Lawlor (2011);
to enhance the liminal experience (“sacra”) Hirschman et al. (2012)a , Kozinets et al. (2004),
Tonner (2016), Tumbat and Belk (2011)
Consumption-­caused liminality
that precipitates Consumption that causes a person to separate from a Barnhart et al. (2014), Hackley et al. (2013; 2015),
liminality prior reality and to transition into a new one Nakata et al. (2019), O'Leary et al. (2018), Patterson
and Schroeder (2010)
that sustains liminality Consumption that entraps a person with liminality and Beudaert et al. (2012016), Min and Peñaloza (2018),
prevents him or her from escaping from it The VOICE Group (2010a), Yau and Christidi (2018)
Liminality-­caused consumption
to hold off liminality Consumption to postpone or push away separation from Cody and Lawlor (2011), Min and Peñaloza (2018),
a prior reality Tonner (2016)
to commemorate Consumption to remember and keep memories of Al-­Abdin et al. (2016)a , Hirschman et al. (2012)a 
liminality liminality alive
a
Article that tackles more than one concept.

for aesthetic purposes, [a use of this product] allowing a tentative
trial-­size engagement with the teen consumption realm” (Cody &
Lawlor, 2011, pp. 219–­220). Household pets, although not products
per se, also offer an example of intrinsic liminality. This is because,
from their owners' perspective, they occupy a liminal position “be-
tween animals and humans” (Hirschman, 1994, as cited in Cheetham
& McEachern,  2013, p. 91). Moreover, they can also be seen as
“both consumption object[s] and non-­human subject[s]” (Cheetham
& McEachern,  2013, p. 93). Although this holds true for all liminal
experiences, the way that consumers interact with household pets—­
and the way that they perceive them—­provide a striking example of a
liminal experience of ambiguous subject-­object relations (Cheetham
& McEachern, 2013).
4.1.2 | Extrinsically liminal products
The liminality of extrinsically liminal products is not based on any
inherent characteristic that they possess. Instead, it has to do with
the way that they relate to a liminal phase or space, or to a liminal
transition that their owner is going through. For instance, prod-
ucts can be extrinsically liminal because they are consumed dur-
ing a liminal phase of a transition that a liminar is experiencing. In
such a case they are referred to as “sacra” because they are closely
tied to liminal rites and because their use is “bound in the liminal
period” (Tonner, 2016, p. 108). Products can also be extrinsically
liminal because of their position in a liminal space. For example,
the hallway of a home, which is a transitional passageway situ-
ated “at the threshold of other private and communal spaces in
the home” (Stevens et al., 2007, p. 244), can be a typical space
for liminal objects such as magazines between readings. Moreover,
products can be extrinsically liminal without being related to a
specific phase or space in a person's experience of a liminal transi-
tion. This occurs when the products themselves are in the midst of
a transition, such as one occurring at the same time as a transition
in the life of their owners. For example, Roster (2014) describes a
situation in which a product is discarded by its owner and later ap-
propriated by a new one. In acquiring this product, the new owner
gives it the opportunity to reenter the market and potentially to
have a new utility. The saying “One man's trash is another man's
treasure” aptly captures the nature of the unique transition in the
status of this product (Roster, 2014, p. 325).
4.2 | Liminal consumption
Cody and Lawlor (2011) theorize liminal consumption as “a restora-
tive obscurity replete with [the] consumption activities of those
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who are essentially no longer, but not yet” (Cody & Lawlor, 2011,
p. 214). This definition, which intimately ties liminal consumption to
the transitional life experiences of liminars, is one of the very few
definitions of liminal consumption found in the literature. However,
given the wide conceptual range of this definition, it should come
as no surprise that researchers have developed two completely dif-
ferent interpretations of liminal consumption. To help clarify the
concept of liminal consumption, we use the terms “consumption
to overcome liminality” and “consumption to enhance liminality” to
refer to the forms of liminal consumption corresponding to these
two interpretations.
4.2.1 | Consumption to overcome liminality
Inspired by Van Gennep's (1909/1960) seminal work, Noble and
Walker (1997) were among the first researchers to provide a theo-
retical framework to explain the relationship between consumption
and liminality. To do so, they built on the notion of the extended
self (Belk, 1988), positing that during a liminal period, “symbolic con-
sumption may be used to facilitate the transition to the new role”
(Noble & Walker, 1997, p. 32). This focus on role changes means
that Noble and Walker's (1997) theoretical framework only applies
to consumption during the liminal period of an identity transition,
a period typically characterized by role ambiguity. Consistent with
this perspective on liminal consumption, a number of studies have
investigated the ways that liminars use consumption as a means
to overcome liminality. In these studies, liminality—­particularly as
it manifests itself in the liminal period of an identity transition—­is
mostly viewed as an unsettling or disturbing experience. For this
reason, most of the studies in question focus on the ways that mean-
ingful possessions can facilitate a liminal identity transition by help-
ing persons to incorporate a new role into their lives and to leave
behind a previous one.
Consumption to overcome liminality is very similar to the “sym-
bolic consumption” discussed by Noble and Walker (1997), for it is a
type of consumption that helps reduce feelings of ambiguity and dis-
comfort experienced during the transition to a new role or identity
or to a new type of social status. The underlying assumption is that
life transitions are often stressful experiences and that coping mech-
anism may be needed to overcome the liminality associated with
them (AbiGhannam & Atkinson, 2016; Johnstone & Todd, 2012). The
simple activity of sharing a meal during a time of crisis is a typical
example of this type of consumption, for it is a consumption activity
that can help relieve the stress and the strain of a difficult situa-
tion (Voola et  al.,  2018). Moreover, consumption to overcome lim-
inality is a springboard for postliminal reincorporation. For example,
physical transformations like plastic surgeries (Schouten, 1991) are
a type of liminal consumption that has been shown to ease identity
transitions involving fundamental changes to personal relationships,
professional status, or other key life situations. Similarly, Nations
et al. (2017) provide an intriguing example of liminal consumption
in the context of grief involving the substitution of meaningful
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possessions for the bodily presence of persons who are now de-
ceased. Although comforting at first, this type of consumption can
lead to perpetual liminality if it is not limited to a temporary stage
in the transition process. It is clear that depending on a multitude
of factors, including the nature of the life change that a person is
experiencing and his or her individual characteristics as a consumer,
specific types of consumption may be required for a successful es-
cape from liminality. For instance, Ulver and Ostberg (2014) find that
when dealing with the entanglement of horizontal identity and ver-
tical status transitions, liminars choose between these two facets
of their self-­concept and favor consumption practices that resonate
either with their identity or with their status, depending on which of
the two constitutes the most dominant facet.
4.2.2 | Consumption to enhance liminality
Liminal consumption is not always undertaken to overcome the
feelings of ambiguity and/or discomfort related to a life transi-
tion. Instead, it can be tied to the liminal experience itself since
consumption can enhance or augment this experience. As already
mentioned, we describe this type of liminal consumption as con-
sumption to enhance liminality. Sacra—­items encountered in the
midst of a transition that are only useful during the transitional
period—­fall into this category since their consumption is closely
related to the liminal experience itself (Tonner,  2016). Maternal
products such as nursing bras and maternal services such as aqua-­
natal classes are typical examples of such products because they
can be used to enhance the liminal experience of being pregnant
or being a new mother (Tonner, 2016). This means that consump-
tion to enhance liminality “mediate[s] ambivalence” during a tran-
sition to allow positive liminal feelings to emerge and take center
stage (Tonner, 2016, p. 107). This contrasts sharply with consump-
tion to overcome liminality, which is an effort to diminish the ex-
perience of liminality, typically by reducing the negative feelings
associated with it.
Consumption to enhance liminality can also be bound by a
liminal space. For example, in their exploration of the garage as
a culturally rich household space, Hirschman et al. (2012, p. 370)
show how the garage is a fertile ground for liminal consumption
involving activities that take place or possessions that are stored
in this space. Kozinets et al. (2004) show that the ESPN Zone is a
spectacular retail environment replete with numerous consump-
tion objects that help create an otherworldly consumer fantasy.
In such environments, consumption is used to enhance a playful
liminal experience, which means that it may be best to describe
them as liminoid spaces.
4.3 | Consumption-­caused liminality
Consumption-­caused liminality can be defined as liminality that is
induced by consumption (Thomsen & Sørensen, 2006). However,
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the concepts that this definition brings into play do not necessarily
refer to the same behavior. Indeed, two distinct interpretations of
consumption-­caused liminality appear to exist in the literature, one
that focuses on consumption that sustains liminality and another
one that focuses on consumption that precipitates liminality.
4.3.1 | Consumption that sustains liminality
Thomsen and Sorensen (2006) introduced the concept of
consumption-­caused liminality in reference to products or activities
that “induce feelings of liminality” (p. 921). They were also the first
researchers to discuss consumption that sustains liminality, a type
of consumption-­caused liminality that amplifies and heightens feel-
ings of liminality. In their study of the role of prams in motherhood,
Thomsen and Sørensen (2006, p. 921) found that for mothers-­to-­be
prams purchased during an earlier pregnancy provoke unwanted
memories of their former liminal identity as first-­time mothers. It is
also important to note that when liminars engage in consumption that
sustains liminality, they are held back in their transitional progress.
In their discussion of young independent adults who feel infantilized
when parents provide them with food, Yau and Christidi (2018) use
the evocative term “entrapped liminality” to describe this type of
experience. The young adults in their study experience stagnation
and have the impression that a “reversal into a previous life stage”
is occurring (p. 2390). By reviving a former liminal self, consumption
that sustains liminality can also be an experience that “delay[s] or
prevent[s]” the escape from liminality (Nations et al., 2017, p. 420).
For example, Pettigrew et al. (2014) note that when it involves the
disorientation of a liminal phase, addictive consumer behavior such
as gambling and drinking can prohibit a person's transition to a new
phase.
4.3.2 | Consumption that precipitates liminality
In the literature, there is a second interpretation of consumption-­
caused liminality, one that highlights a phenomenon that is very dif-
ferent from consumption that sustains liminality. This second type
of consumption-­
caused liminality revolves around consumption
that precipitates liminality in the sense that it causes people to step
across the threshold of liminality. This means that it leads them into
an experience of liminality as opposed to maintaining them in one
that already exists. In doing this, it can cause them to separate from a
prior life situation in order to transition into a new one. For example,
Patterson and Schroeder (2010, p. 255) draw attention to the unique
propensity of tattoos to “refigure the body [and shift] identity into
liminal zones between [the] subject (of the tattoo, of identity) and
[the] object (of the gaze, of social stigma).” Consumption-­caused
liminality can also involve consumption activities that have the ca-
pacity to transform the space in which they occur into a liminal one
(O'Leary et al., 2018). For example, Hackley et al. (2015) show that
certain transgressive consumption activities of young persons, ones
DARVEAU and CHEIKH-­AMMAR
such as excessive drinking, often occur in specific urban spaces and
that this can have the effect of transforming these spaces into desig-
nated liminal zones for risky and/or illicit practices.
4.4 | Liminality-­caused consumption
The concept of liminality-­caused consumption that we explain in this
section picks out a unique and rarely examined relationship between
consumption and liminality. In contrast to what has been discussed
so far, liminality-­caused consumption involves an inverse causal re-
lationship between consumption and liminality in which the latter
triggers consumption. This type of consumption has two possible
forms: consumption to hold off liminality and consumption to com-
memorate liminality.
4.4.1 | Consumption to hold off liminality
Even if consumers expect certain inevitable liminal transitions to
take place, they may seek to postpone them. This means that con-
sumption can be used to hold off liminality and prevent a full separa-
tion from an initial preliminal state or situation. This can be observed
in the “private passions” that Cody and Lawlor (2011, p. 215) de-
scribe as consumption activities allowing liminars to “indulge in a lit-
tle of their former selves, however socially unacceptable that might
be.” More specifically, Cody and Lawlor (2011) offer the example of
teenage girls who resent abandoning child consumption practices
such as playing with dolls. Thus, by definition, consumption to hold
off liminality is more likely to occur in the preliminal period during
which there is a strong attachment to preliminal identities and to
corresponding consumption activities that sustain these identities.
For example, Tonner (2016, p. 111) shows that some mothers-­to-­be
allow themselves “private passions,” not only for the sake of indul-
gence, but also to ensure a sense of continuity in their female iden-
tity and to avoid “submitting to a ‘pregnant’ identity.” These findings
highlight the fact that transitions are more fragmented and less lin-
ear than they often appear. Similarly, in the context of transitions
to motherhood, Min and Peñaloza (2018) describe the refusal of
mothers-­to-­be to identify with their pregnant body and their pref-
erence for consumption activities that reflect their preliminal non-­
pregnant self.
4.4.2 | Consumption to commemorate liminality
A second type of liminality-­caused consumption that we identified,
consumption to commemorate liminality, shows how liminal experi-
ences can be defining moments that have a durable impact on individ-
uals and collectivities. Indeed, liminal experiences have the capacity
to influence future consumption behavior profoundly. Consumption
to commemorate liminality pays tribute to completed transitions
through a process of remembering that sometimes involves cherished
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TA B L E 6   Modes of liminality

Existentials Related terms Examples References

Liminal time Liminal time; Liminoid time; Liminal
period; Liminal stage; Liminal phase;
Liminal situation; Liminal occasions;
Liminal moment
Liminal Liminal space; Liminal place; Liminal site;
space Liminal realm; Liminal zone; Liminal
boundariesa  • Hallway: in-­between home spaces
Liminal Liminal consumers; Liminal role; Liminal
position status; Liminal people; Liminal figures;
Liminal identity; Liminal community;
Social liminality; Liminal boundariesa  • Tattoo: in-­between subject and
Liminal body Liminal state; Liminal condition; Liminal
experience; Liminal characteristics;
Liminal qualities; Liminal disembodied
period
a
Article that features more than one existential.
• Vacation: in-­between everyday Al-­Abdin et al. (2016), Belk (2000), Belk
routine periods and Costa (1998), Belk et al. (1989), Costa
• Fantasy event: in-­between ordinary (1998), Cova et al. (2017), Gentina et al.
everyday periods (2012)
• Arab spring: in-­between present and
past
• Adolescence: in-­between childhood
and adulthood
• Dance floor: in-­between space of Hewer and Hamilton (2010),
ordinary movements Hirschman (1994), Hong and
Vicdan (2016), Richard (2009), Roux et al.
• Ecovillages: in-­between “privacy (2017), Stevens et al. (2007), Yalkin and
and sharing; segregation and (hyper) Veer (2018)
inclusion; idealism and pragmatism”
(p. 123)
• Garage: in-­between home and street
• Goth: in-­between gender types Beudaert et al. (2012016), Chu et al. (2018),
• Disability: in-­between normal social Goulding and Saren (2009)a , Gurrieri
interactions (2012), Hamilton et al. (2012), Kadirov
et al. (2016), Lai et al. (2015), Loomba
object; self and society; personal (2017), Maguire (2010), Patterson and
identity projects and marketplace Schroeder (2010)a 
cultures
• Cultural intermediaries: in-­between
work positions
• Pregnant body: in-­between not Beudaert et al. (20120166)a , Ferguson
pregnant and post-­pregnancy (2018), Husemann and Eckhardt (2019),
• The corpse: in-­between dead and Min and Peñaloza (2018), Nations et al.
alive; human and nonhuman; familiar (2017), Patterson and Schroeder (2010)a 
and strange
• The disabled body: in-­between sick
and well; dead and alive
• The skin: in-­between inside and
outside
• The slowed-­down body: in between
social acceleration and deceleration

memorabilia (Hirschman et al., 2012). Certain products and consump-
tion practices can be conserved after a liminal experience has ended,
whereas other ones are as temporary as the liminal experience itself.
For instance, Al-­Abdin et al. (2016) find that after the liminal experi-
ence of a political revolution has come to an end, former liminars may
continue to commemorate this experience by deliberately avoiding
any products and consumption practices associated with it.
4.5 | Modes of liminality
Whether it occurs voluntarily or involuntarily, whether it is tied to
a permanent change or to a temporary one, liminality is above all a
lived experience that unfolds in a more or less structured way in a
life event such as a transition. This suggests that it would be useful
to organize the literature on liminality in terms of existing categories
of lived experiences, for although all lived experiences are unique,
they can still be described and interpreted in terms of structures of
meaning. In this regard, the four lifeworld existentials discussed by
phenomenologist Max Van Manen (1990) are particularly interesting
since they constitute four unique structures of meaning that guide
the lived experiences of all human beings, regardless of their cultural
and/or social differences. These existentials allow individuals to
make sense of everyday lived experiences and together they “form
an intricate unity” that shapes these experiences (Van Manen, 1990,
p. 105). The four existentials identified by Van Manen (1990) are
time (temporality), space (spatiality), human relations (relationality),
and body (corporeality).
In the following section, we use these lifeworld existentials to
differentiate between four modes of liminal experience and to the-
orize the way that each one relates to consumption (see Table 6).
We also discuss cases, which have been highlighted in the literature,
where two or more modes of liminality intersect in one and the same
experience.
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4.5.1 | Liminal time
As an existential, temporality is not related to objective clock time,
but instead to the subjective “temporal way of being in the world”
(Van Manen, 1990, p. 104). In his talk “Images of Anti-­temporality,”
Turner (1982) explains that ordering is the principal function of time.
In other words, time is used to organize objects and events in a co-
herent orderly manner. Thus numerous types of temporalities are
possible. There are brief passages of time in which people have fun,
memorable moments in people's lives, periods that influence the fu-
ture or shape how people see their past, and ones that have a his-
torical significance related to “human cultural time” (Turner, 1982,
p. 243).
However, liminality is characterized by timelessness, so that it
cannot be defined by time. That is, in liminal experiences, objects
and/or subjects tend to be outside of time, disconnected from the
temporal order. Liminality involves breaking free from temporality,
disordering “normal” time through a disconnection from chrono-
logical structures, and enabling a subjective liminal time to emerge
(Turner, 1974). Unfolding sequentially, the liminal transitions of life
changes and events occur in a liminal “timeless” time in between
a preliminal “before” and a postliminal “after.” Moreover, although
liminality is by definition temporary, some studies have examined
the possibility of a form of liminality that stretches over extended
periods of time, perhaps even indefinitely as it slowly mutates into a
state of limbo (Appau et al., 2020; Pettigrew et al., 2014).
One much-­discussed type of liminal transition that highlights lim-
inal time is related to age. This type of transition features age-­related
consumption that occurs before, during, and after the liminal time.
For example, there are teenagers who experiment with age-­related
consumption either by adopting products considered too mature for
their age group or by adopting products considered more appropri-
ate for younger children (Cody & Lawlor, 2011). Certain consumption
activities such as the use of makeup by young girls can be part of a
transition toward adulthood (Gentina et al., 2012). In contrast, other
consumption activities can freeze time and hold off a life transition
with the result that the consumer has difficulty giving up the com-
forting habits of a preliminal time. On the other hand, consumption
activities can also accelerate life transitions and precipitate a prema-
ture liminal time experience (Cody & Lawlor, 2011).
Disconnection from everyday routines and schedules can high-
light liminal time even more. For example, time spent on vacation
when one is temporarily away from one's everyday tasks can be an
opportunity to break free from mundane activities and forget about
the passing of time (Belk et al., 1989). Cultural activities and events
like the modern mountain men Rendezvous described by Belk and
Costa (1998) are another opportunity to escape from ordinary rou-
tines by fostering creative reconfigurations of time. At such events,
participants distance themselves from their modern reality by en-
gaging in cultural practices from a bygone era. The anachronistic
quality of this experience and its voluntary character make a kind of
liminoid time possible (Belk & Costa, 1998).
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4.5.2 | Liminal space
From a phenomenological perspective, space has little to do with
the geometrical dimensions that we refer to when we describe the
size, the shape, and the volume of objects and locations. Existential
space, the space in which people spend their human existence, is
the experiential life space that forms the sociocultural landscape in
which they move through their lives and find themselves at home.
This type of spatiality has emotional and attitudinal significance, for
the existential space “in which we find ourselves affects the way
we feel” (Van Manen,  1990, p. 102). This phenomenological char-
acterization of existential space applies to liminal space as well,
for the latter can affect the consumers, the consumption objects,
and the consumption activities that are located in it. To capture the
“in-­betweenness” of liminal space, researchers often refer to inter-
stices, which are by definition spaces or gaps in between two other
spaces. The “liminal space between city and sea” occupied by surfers
(Canniford & Karababa, 2013, p. 134) is a typical example of an in-
terstice. The surfer metaphorically inhabits the interstice separating
the wilderness of the untamed, primeval beach from the urbaneness
of the synthetic, rationalized city (p. 134).
In addition to the human beings who inhabit liminal spaces,
there are also objects, practices, and events that occur within them.
In this regard, the design and the appropriation of private spaces
exemplify spatial liminality particularly well (e.g., Lastovicka &
Fernandez,  2005; Suarez et  al.,  2016). Two private spaces that we
have already mentioned provide especially clear examples of lim-
inal spatiality: the household hallway and the household garage.
The positioning of a magazine in the liminal zone of the household
hallway, where it is highly visible and constantly accessible for the
consumption pleasures associated with reading it, is not accidentally
but purposefully functional (Stevens et al., 2007, p. 244). As for the
household garage, it is a transitional space for material possessions,
one whose positioning in between other interior and exterior spaces
reaffirms its liminality (Hirschman et  al.,  2012, p. 369). Moreover,
since the garage stores recent possessions as well as ones from a
more distant past, it can allow liminal time and liminal space to inter-
sect in one and the same lived experience.
Previous research has shown that the properties of a liminal
space are internalized by the persons inhabiting it and that they
shape the consumption activities that these persons engage in
(Denegri-­K nott & Molesworth,  2010, 2013; Harvey et  al.,  2017;
Kerrigan & Hart, 2016). This is particularly true of the virtual
spaces where digital consumption takes place, for this unique type
of consumption is as immaterial as the liminal space in which it
occurs. As we saw earlier, the integration of immersive technol-
ogies into physical spaces such as retail environments (Kozinets
et al., 2004) can give these spaces liminal or liminoid qualities by
creating an alternative reality. Kozinets et al. (2004) argue that
these spectacular spaces are somewhat similar to Foucault's idea
of heterotopia as they contain multiple layers of seemingly incom-
patible spaces.
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4.5.3 | Liminal position
Van Manen (1990, p. 104) defines relationality as “the lived relation
we maintain with others in the interpersonal space that we share
with them.” In other words, relationality has to do with the way we
approach, see, and learn about others, and with how engaging in
these behaviors makes us feel. It also has to do with how identity and
status emerge from consumer interactions with social constructions,
with cultural discourses, and with other persons in general. Building
on this idea of relationality, we want to introduce the concept of
liminal position in order to examine cases where a liminal experience
results from an incapacity to conform to social expectations.
It is now clear that liminars are consumers who occupy an ambig-
uous position in relation to “normal” others. With respect to social
expectations, it is here that liminal position becomes theoretically
interesting, for it can be used to explain transgressions of prevailing
norms and standards. However, this relational liminality is subjec-
tive, since some persons may not desire a “normative identity” as the
outcome of a liminal transition (Ruvio & Belk, 2018). On the contrary,
a voluntarily assumed liminal identity may be the desired identity for
consumers who seek the uniqueness that it provides. In line with
this notion of transgressive liminal identities, Goulding and Saren's
(2009) investigation of gender expressions in the context of Goth
festivals highlights the celebration of “the multi-­dimensional nature
of gender and the liminality of aesthetic conventions of beauty” (p.
43). In such a context, the liminal deconstruction of gender norms
is used to bring about a desired creative reconfiguration of gender
identity.
Moreover, the “normal” other may represent an ideal version of
an identity with which a person feels compared. For example, a new
mother may begin to reflect on the various types of consumption
that she should avoid in order to respect as closely as possible so-
ciocultural norms of ideal motherhood (Thomsen & Sørensen, 2006;
Tonner, 2016). In such a case, consumption activities become instru-
mental for negotiating proximity to a desired identity and maintain-
ing distance from unwanted otherness (Darveau, 2018). Failure to fall
in line by adopting the “right” consumption practices can heighten
feelings of liminality in relation to other members of the same soci-
ety or culture. Beudaert et al. (2016) use the term “social liminality”
to describe the liminality that disabled persons experience as an out-
come of their interactions with “normal” others. Since it is a question
of both the liminal position and the liminal body of these persons,
this is another example of a liminal experience in which there is an
intersection between two modes of liminality.
4.5.4 | Liminal body
The corporality of the lived body is based on “the phenomenologi-
cal fact that we are always bodily in the world” (Van Manen, 1990,
p. 103). In other words, it is based on the existential truth that it is
above all by way of our physical bodies that we exist in and move
through the experiential world. This explains why people tend to
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reveal and conceal aspects of themselves, either deliberately or un-
consciously, in and through their bodily presence. As for the liminal
body, it is the locus of liminal experiences in which the body is the
vehicle through which liminars make sense of contradictions and
ambiguities. For instance, Min and Peñaloza (2018, p. 12) identify
a liminal experience of pregnancy, describing how the pregnant
women participating in their study lived through a “disembodied pe-
riod in which [they] experienced their changed bodies as something
apart from themselves [and in which they] struggled to deal with
this estrangement in consumption.” Indeed, some of these women
had feelings of incompatibility with respect to their pregnant bod-
ies and adopted consumption practices to allow themselves to con-
tinue identifying with their preliminal bodies. Although there may
be a connection between the liminal experience of these pregnant
women and the “private passions” of Cody and Lawlor's (2011)
tweens, because in both cases there is a preference for a prior self,
in the case of the pregnant women this preference is not caused by
the refusal to move forward (as in consumption to hold off liminality)
but instead by the disembodying experience of not being able to find
oneself in the corporality of one's present liminal state.
Resonating with liminal space, the liminal body is itself a space
with boundaries that can be extended and transgressed. Patterson
and Schroeder's (2010) examination of tattoo culture highlights
human skin as a privileged liminal space with extraordinary sym-
bolic potential where consumers can inscribe their personal stories.
According to these authors, human skin manifests a high degree
of liminality because it “reflects the dynamic relationship between
inside and outside, [between] self and society, [and] between per-
sonal identity projects and marketplace cultures” (Patterson &
Schroeder, 2010, p. 254). Although their focus is on the metaphorical
nature of skin as a liminal space, their conceptualization of this space
draws attention to the simultaneous coexistence of three different
modes of liminality: body, position, and space.
In their unique take on liminality as a “philosophy,” Buchanan-­
Oliver et al. (2010) discuss the notion of a post-­human consumer cy-
borg, an entity that would be part human and part machine, without
fully being either the one or the other. They argue that the consump-
tion of highly technological products or services such as pacemakers
contributes to the liminal merger of humans and machines. This high-
lights a peculiar new attribute of the liminal body that these authors
call “liminality of form,” which is a type of liminality “in which the ap-
pearance of the body is increasingly modified in its interaction with
technology” (Buchanan-­Oliver et al., 2010, p. 646).
The use of the body to help go through a liminal transition is an-
other one of its liminal functions. For example, Kapoor et al. (2018)
examine the use of dance to cope with identity ambiguity and with
liminal positions involving the negotiation of a homosexual identity
in a heteronormative society. These authors show that during his
performance, a male dancer can attempt “to forge a world based on
what he desires reality to be—­a world without shame and humilia-
tion” (Kapoor et al., 2018, p. 14). They also discuss chronic liminal-
ity, noting that there can be a voluntary return to the liminal body
when the need to cope with identity confusion arises again. We have
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already seen that the body can be a site or a vehicle for the lived ex-
perience of liminality. Here it becomes the means by which a person
attempts to cope with feelings of liminality.
5 |  D I S CU S S I O N A N D AV E N U E S FO R
FU T U R E R E S E A RC H
The concept of liminality has received significant attention from
consumer researchers. Indeed, for several decades they have been
applying it to new and emerging contexts. Their interest in this con-
cept stems from its descriptive and explanatory power in research
on consumer experiences involving unsettling transitions and trans-
formative events. Moreover, it is likely to continue to be useful to
consumer researchers because contemporary society is marked by
constant changes and continual transformations, with numerous
identity, relationship, and global economic transitions unfolding at
an ever-­increasing pace (Ulver & Ostberg, 2014). The concept of
liminality will also continue to be useful because contemporary so-
ciety faces important challenges related to marginalized identities
and environmental crises (Appau et al., 2020). That being said, the
literature on liminality is somewhat fragmented and has not fully
succeeded in clarifying the relationship between liminality and con-
sumption. This is because liminality is a multifaceted phenomenon
that can be interpreted in numerous different ways. The present
study has attempted to answer calls for the development of a more
adequate theory of liminal consumption (Tonner, 2016, p. 116) by
critically assessing the contribution of this theoretical lens to con-
sumer research and by building a comprehensive theoretical frame-
work that details the interplay between liminality and consumption.
The results of our literature review make an important contribution
to consumer research on liminality by helping to unpack the complex
relationship between liminality and consumption.
By reviewing prior research that has adopted the theoretical lens
of liminality to examine consumption, we help clarify the distinct and
sometimes apparently contradictory uses of consumption by liminal
consumers. More specifically, we make key distinctions concerning
what we see as the four main concepts required to develop an ade-
quate theory of liminal consumption: (a) liminal products, (b) liminal
consumption, (c) consumption-­caused liminality, and (d) liminality-­
caused consumption. This involves unpacking the notion of liminality
in order to avoid any possible confusion—­in particular, any confusion
stemming from the coexistence of multiple interpretations—­
that
might reduce its theoretical utility in future research. To this end, we
isolate two potential interpretations of each of the four main con-
cepts describing the unique role of consumption in liminal experi-
ences. We also provide additional terminology such as “consumption
to overcome liminality” and “consumption to enhance liminality” to
describe the phenomena picked out by these interpretations or by
the four main concepts in general and to help specify their implica-
tions. At the same time, we highlight the fact that liminality is an am-
biguous experience. That is, it can be either a negative experience,
in which case liminal consumption can be used to overcome it, or a
DARVEAU and CHEIKH-­AMMAR
positive experience, in which case liminal consumption can be used
to enhance it. These multiple interpretations help capture the unde-
niable complexity of liminal experiences by bringing into focus the
elaborate interplay between liminality and consumption.
Up until now, the literature has failed to make clear whether prod-
ucts can be liminal by themselves or whether they can only be liminal
by association. We maintain that both of these positions are valid. In
our descriptions of liminal products, particularly those that we define
as extrinsically liminal, we stress that dimensional overlaps or entan-
glements tend to occur in the context of liminal experiences with
them. That is, products may be described as liminal because they are
consumed during liminal periods such as transitions, because they are
consumed in a liminal space, and/or because they are consumed by
liminal consumers. We argue that our proposed concept of liminality-­
caused consumption counterbalances the equally intriguing concept
of consumption-­caused liminality (Thomsen & Sørensen, 2006) and
sets the ground for future research on the mechanisms through which
liminality creates preferences for certain products or consumption
practices. Consumption to commemorate liminality is another con-
sumption behavior that deserves further attention from researchers.
This type of consumption seems to indicate that postliminal consumers
sometimes want to conserve traces of their liminal experiences. In this
commemorative context of liminal consumption, future research could
examine the use of cherished possessions as liminal souvenirs that help
consumers remember and even celebrate past liminal experiences.
In consumer research and in other fields, studies of liminality have
followed in Turner's (1969) footsteps and theorized time and space as
key aspects of liminal experiences. Building on Van Manen's (1990)
notion of lifeworld existentials, we suggest that there are four modes
of liminality: liminal time, liminal space, liminal position, and the liminal
body. We argue that each of these four modes of liminality is a distinct
sense-­making orientation that structures liminal consumption experi-
ences. Thus, in addition to time and space, our theoretical framework
conceptualizes two other modes of liminality, liminal position and the
liminal body, that we believe future research should examine more
closely. Moreover, in line with Van Manen's (1990, p. 105) claim that his
four lifeworld existentials “form an intricate unity” in lived experience,
we also believe that future research should investigate the intersec-
tions between these four modes of liminality. Although prior research
has hinted at a potential intersection between liminal position and the
liminal body in work on topics such as the impact of pregnancy on
consumption practices related to motherhood, more insights may be
obtained by attempting to map all the possible intersections between
these four modes of liminality. For each of these modes, this literature
review provides an overview of these intersections as they have been
investigated in existing research, but we are convinced that exploring
the full set of intersections is a rich avenue for future research.
The year 2020 has been a historic time with life-­changing events
such as the Black Lives Matter movement and the COVID-­19 pan-
demic that have inspired far-­reaching reflection. Deeply meaningful
contexts have emerged in which liminal position has been embod-
ied in extremely vivid ways. With regard to the Black Lives Matter
movement, future research could consider addressing the issue of the
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enduring liminal position of marginal identities as well as the issue of
consumption as resistance. As for the COVID-­19 pandemic, it would
be interesting to examine how this health crisis has significantly dis-
rupted consumer trends and behaviors by transforming some of the
most common forms of normal human interaction into liminal experi-
ences. In fact, researchers might look into the idea that 2020 is a “lim-
inal year” that has drastically altered consumption practices and paved
the way for a radical transition into a new consumption normality.
Furthermore, by organizing our review of the literature on limin-
ality using the four modes of liminality, we have been able to shed
light on the fundamental characteristics of the suspension that oc-
curs when consumers begin a liminal experience. These fundamental
characteristics are all related to the theory of binaries, and they all
have to do with the presence of dichotomies as the basis of every
lived experience of liminality. For example, spatial liminality involves,
among other things, a blurring of the boundaries between fantasy
and reality or between the private and the public. One particularly
interesting avenue for future research would be the investigation of
dichotomies like the sacred-­profane dichotomy that can be consid-
ered transversal to the extent that they are found in more than one
mode of liminality. It would also be interesting to investigate the ways
that liminality contributes to the deconstruction of dichotomies—­
such as those associated with the concepts of class, gender, and
sexuality—­that occurs during certain festivals, social movements,
and special events. Future research could also examine the ways that
binaries can blend together or the ways that they can pull further
apart through liminal consumption. Finally, also on the theoretical
front, coping theory (e.g., Folkman & Lazarus, 1984) could offer new
insights into how consumption can be used to cope with the liminal
experience. Given that liminality is often a stressful experience, it is
surprising that coping has not been exploited as a theoretical lens for
exploring the interplay between liminality and consumption. In addi-
tion, researchers could consider using the stress-­coping model to in-
vestigate the appraisals and the consumption decisions that people
make to deal with liminality. On the methodological front, it is clear
that the majority of the studies we reviewed relied on qualitative
research techniques to examine the concept of liminality. Future re-
search could look into exploring novel techniques that can also be
valuable in investigating individual's complex experiences, such as
those related to liminality (e.g., Lim, 2018). Table 7 (adapted from

TA B L E 7   Avenues for future research

Themes/Contexts Possible research questions Methods

Social crisis
Marketplace discrimination
Natural disasters
Liminality-­caused consumption
Liminal souvenirs
Modes of liminality
Position/body
Theoretical angles
Theory of binaries
Coping theory
How do consumers experience marketplace discrimination based on Ethnography, in-­depth interviews
race, gender, and age differences? What are the collective or individual
responses to marketplace-­c aused liminality?
How do communities come together during unexpected collective Surveys, focus groups,
experiences of liminality? How do liminal states fluctuate during netnography combined with
prolonged times of liminality? How does the interplay between secondary data analysis of
consumption and uncertainty unfold in the post-­liminal future? online community activity
How do liminal experiences have a durable impact on future consumption? Ethnography, in-­depth interviews
In what circumstances will consumption be used to commemorate a
liminal experience and how does that interact with consumer identity
projects? Is there such a thing as a liminal souvenir? If liminal souvenirs
exist, how do consumers interact with them and what are they used for?
How do adults who are in between younger adulthood and older In-­depth interviews, surveys
adulthood experience liminality and how does this impact their
consumption? How does individual experience of physical aging
moderate a person's experience of liminality? How do people in a
marginal social position use consumption as a means of resisting an
enduring liminal position? How do crises like the Covid−19 pandemic
cause social disruptions and turn the most common human interactions
into liminal ones? How do artificial intelligence and its applications cause
liminality?
How can additional binary oppositions (or dichotomies) be leveraged to Ethnography, in-­depth interviews
shed light on liminal experiences? The reality-­fiction, private-­public, and
order-­chaos dichotomies are but a few examples of ones that could be
leveraged.
How can coping theory help shed light on the ways that consumption is In-­depth interviews, surveys
used to cope with liminal experiences? How can the interplay between
liminality and consumption be interpreted using coping theory?
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Lim et al., 2021) summarizes the avenues for future research that we
have discussed and provides potential research questions.
Like all research results, the findings of the present study have
limitations. First, given that we concentrate on the interplay between
liminality and consumption, we do not consider liminality either at
the business or at the strategic level. It is likely that taking into ac-
count studies that examine liminality outside of consumption con-
texts would provide useful insights. However, since very few studies
adopt liminality as a theoretical lens for examining liminality outside
of consumption contexts, we do not believe that our choice affects
the relevance of the results presented here. Another limitation of
our study is that it only reviews articles published in peer-­reviewed
journals, that is, journals ranked in the ABS list as 2, 3, 4, and 4*. This
means that we have automatically excluded published articles that
did not appear in highly ranked journals as well as work-­in-­progress
papers. Both these exclusions may have caused us to overlook some
alternative perspectives on this research topic. Nevertheless, we are
confident that our study sample, which is based on a rigorous search
process, provides an adequate representation of the current state of
knowledge on this research topic.
6 |  CO N C LU S I O N
The theoretical lens of liminality has been used to accumulate
knowledge about consumption-­related phenomena for several dec-
ades, but up until now, there has been no comprehensive account of
liminal consumption to clarify the interplay between liminality and
consumption. By drawing on a systematic review of the concept of
liminality, one that accounts for the methods, theories and contexts
that have been previously examined in the literature, we developed
a framework that can help researchers achieve a better understand-
ing of the mechanisms linking liminal experiences with consumption.
This theoretical framework unpacks the multifaceted interplay be-
tween liminality and consumption; a framework that is grounded in
existing consumer research, and that provides a clear direction for
future work on the topic.
By doing so, this study clarifies the concept of liminality and its
theoretical and practical applications. Ultimately, we are confident
that our literature review and our theoretical framework will help
advance consumer research on liminality and shed additional light
on the complex relationship between liminality and consumption.
We believe that this literature review can serve as a program for fu-
ture research on applications and possible extensions of a theory of
liminal consumption. The research agenda we provide should guide
future work interested in the concept of liminality in general, but
it can also be useful for those interested in some of the concept's
unique facets and manifestations, that we discuss and that have only
received limited attention in the literature. Above all, we hope that
future research will broaden our theoretical framework by further
elaborating its key concepts.
DARVEAU and CHEIKH-­AMMAR
DATA AVA I L A B I L I T Y S TAT E M E N T
The data that support the findings of this study are available from
the corresponding authors upon reasonable request.
ORCID
Jessica Darveau  https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4437-1562
Mustapha Cheikh-­Ammar  https://orcid.
org/0000-0002-9673-6607
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Turley, D., & O’Donohoe, S. (2017). Mortality, morality and the mar-
ketplace: Empathetic improvisation and the double duty of care
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DARVEAU and CHEIKH-­AMMAR

Markets & Culture, 20(5), 456–­476. https://doi.org/10.1080/10253​ AU T H O R B I O G R A P H I E S

866.2017.1367679
Turner, V. (1967). The forest of symbols: Aspects of Ndembu ritual. Cornell
University Press.
Jessica Darveau is an Assistant Professor of Marketing at the
Turner, V. (1969). The ritual process: Structure and anti-­structure. Aldine. faculty of business administration, Laval University. She received
Turner, V. (1974). Dramas, fields and metaphors: Symbolic action in human her PhD in Marketing from HEC Montreal. Her research has been
society. Cornell University Press. funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
Turner, V. (1982). Images of anti-­temporality: An essay in the anthropol-
of Canada, and by the Fonds Québécois de la Recherche sur la
ogy of experience. The Harvard Theological Review, 75(2), 243–­265.
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0017​81600​0 018332 Société et la Culture. Her work has appeared in the International
Ulver, S., & Ostberg, J. (2014). Moving up, down or sideways? Exploring Journal of Research in Marketing, Journal of Business Ethics and
consumer experience of identity and status incongruence. European Psychology & Marketing among others.
Journal of Marketing, 48(5–­6), 833–­853. https://doi.org/10.1108/
EJM-­07-­2012-­0 418
Van Gennep, A. (1909/1960). The rites of passage. University of Chicago Mustapha Cheikh-­Ammar is an Assistant Professor of Information
Press. Systems at the faculty of business administration, Laval
Van Manen, M. (1990). Researching lived experience: Human science for an University. Before joining Laval he was an Assistant Professor at
action sensitive pedagogy. Althouse Press.
Ivey Business School, University of Western Ontario. He earned
Voola, A. P., Voola, R., Wyllie, J., Carlson, J., & Sridharan, S. (2018).
Families and food: Exploring food well-­being in poverty. European his PhD in Business Administration from HEC Montreal, where he
Journal of Marketing, 52(12), 2423–­ 2448. https://doi.org/10.1108/ was also a member of the Canada Research Chair in Information
EJM-­10-­2017-­0763 Technology Implementation and Management. His work has
Wijland, R. (2011). Anchors, mermaids, shower-­curtain seaweeds and
appeared in the European Journal of Information Systems,
fish-­shaped fish: The texture of poetic agency. Marketing Theory,
11(2), 127–­141. https://doi.org/10.1177/14705​93111​4 03217 Information & Management, and the Journal of Organizational
Yalkin, C., & Veer, E. (2018). Taboo on TV: Gender, religion, and sexual and End User Computing among others.
taboos in transnationally marketed Turkish soap operas. Journal
of Marketing Management, 34(13–­14), 1149–­1171. https://doi.
org/10.1080/02672​57X.2018.1520738 How to cite this article: Darveau J, Cheikh-­Ammar M. The
Yau, A., & Christidi, S. (2018). Shackles of care: Family power struggles
interplay between liminality and consumption: A systematic
and negotiation strategies for food provision in adulthood. European
Journal of Marketing, 52(12), 2378–­2404. https://doi.org/10.1108/ literature review with a future research agenda. Int J Consum
EJM-­11-­2017-­0 838 Stud. 2021;45:867–­888. https://doi.org/10.1111/ijcs.12678