Towards a Topography of Grief: Discursive and Metaphorical Configuration of the Absentee in the Context of Perinatal Loss

This paper investigates the linguistic construction of the absent in the context of perinatal loss. Children who die at a very early stage leave little mark on the social world. In this particular form of grief, the notion of absence is inextricably entangled with the idea of the baby’s presence, sometimes even before she/he is actually conceived. Premature death translates into the baby’s loss of her/his “right to presence”. Unrecognized, unidentified and unnamed in private and public interactions, the baby falls into the category of the absentee. This paper seeks to encourage a linguistic and discursive reflection on this societal and ethical issue by showing how the absent is metaphorically represented in the discourse of bereaved parents, and how the latter manage to restore their baby’s right to presence in a movement known as re-enfranchisement, thus giving perinatal grief a societal and collective dimension. This process involves mobilizing metaphor, naming, interaction and the search for a topographical link with the deceased child.