Werewolf Womanist

It started with someone listing "places with uncanny energy," like gas stations on a road trip, empty movie theaters, etc.

Then someone reblogged it and said those are called "liminal spaces," defining liminal as in-between, neither one thing nor another.

Tomorrow (July 4th, 2026) is the 10 year anniversary of the-crepes-of-wrath's comment, which:

Predates the 2020 spike in interest by four years

Predates the original backrooms post, and the the creation of r/liminalspaces by three years

Predates the earliest mention that KnowYourMeme attributes to Twitter by two years

I'm pretty sure this is the moment the term "liminal spaces" was attached to this sort of imagery, and it's TEN YEARS OLD TOMORROW!

the-crepes-of-wrath did not invent the concept nor did they claim to! liminality was conceptualized by folklorists / anthropologists, initially to describe a three-part process of rites of passage. the wikipedia page goes into all kinds of contexts liminality has been applied in. unfortunately a lot of people do not know this & think "liminal" is just a word for "spooky or uncanny." a shame imo!

image descriptions and translations:

[social media screenshot from Le Parisien, a french journal "renting instead of buying AC, the good deal proposed by [Don't-Look-Them-Up] mid-heatwave."]

[journal article from Le Parisien that reads: "renting instead of buying AC, the good deal proposed by [Don't-Look-Them-Up] mid-heatwave.

Since the start of the summer, acquiring an AC has been challenging. To answer to buyers who are faced with empty storefronts, [Don't-Look-Them-Up] has found a trick: the punctual rental of cooling units."]

ahem. and the review