Materializing Human Disappearance: The Singularity of their Objects

Abstract

In this paper we approach the social trajectory of the objects involved in cases of human disappearance, the new meanings and uses these objects acquired, and how the fact of disappearance involve a change in the way they are conceive. Our premise is that disappearance practices have material support, that is cracked, first, now it can bear that what the disappeared person no more can reveal, second, some other(s) may give them further senses. Objects talk and objects are talked by others. Thus objects are more than composed by matter, they are part of the world of perceptions: materialities. We explore how this materiality, located in a liminal space, is been put on performance as witness of the past and trial evidences. They are objects on the edge of a lost life. The theoretical review and concrete cases arose the uncanny of these materialities, their singularity. This kind of materialities are loaded by meanings and uses that exceed their original life.