Disappearance : The Normalisation of the Extreme

Interrogates how disappearance has become a normalised extremity and demands that we find new ways of seeing disappearance.

What was once a hidden secret defining totalitarian regimes has become the defining problem of our times. Every day, we hear about the disappearance of humans, communities, cultures and life-sustaining ecosystems. Disappearance has even been normalised to the extent that it has become a dominant theme in popular entertainment. This book maps out the history of disappearance in an urgent and timely intervention. Moving beyond old ideas concerning bodies, the authors demand that we see and respond to disappearance in new ways. Disappearance, they argue, is a form of neuroviolence that is inseparable from the invisible operations of power. Countering it not only requires that we make visible those forces which continue to annihilate life, but also that we look precisely at how disappearance now structures our societies and is inseparable from any concern with power in the world.