Paper short abstract:

I examine the language used when Spiritualist mediums communicate with spirits. Mediums say they are demonstrating the proof of human survival after death. Moments of doubt mark interactions between mediums and recipients as they try to come to agreement on the character of an invisible being.

Paper long abstract:

Spiritualism, a religion often associated with Victorian Britain, is alive and well in Australia with more than 11,500 adherents. A central tenet of Spiritualism is that there is no such thing as death. People who die physically simply move to a new level of existence and go on to make continual spiritual progress. In this paper, I examine the language used in ritual performances in which mediums identify the spirits of deceased people trying to make contact with the physically living. Spiritualist mediums hold that they are not engaged in religious practice, but rather are empirically demonstrating the proof of human survival after physical death. As such, there are moments of hesitation, doubt, and denial in interactions between mediums and recipients as the partners in dialogue attempt to come to an agreement on the character of an invisible being. In connecting spirits from the astral plane to humans in the physical one, mediums aim to share messages that will assist the living--both in terms of concrete, practical ways about how to handle life's difficulties, and in more philosophical terms of understanding that there is no such thing as death and kinship is quite literally forever.