In the month of June, ten years ago, i.e. in the year 2005, the Bollywood movie ‘Paheli’ (lit. riddle) was released. Starring popular actors Rani Mukerji and Shah Rukh Khan in the lead roles and directed by Amol Palekar, the movie presented a unique love story between a ghost and a human. Although the romantic trope played out in the movie was usual, with a mixture of songs, a bit of family drama and conventional Bollywood beauty standards of lead actors, it was the element of the ghost’s commitment to the heroine and staying beside her while her husband leaves her for work just after the marriage that added a distinctive layer. It is a ghost being a committed, caring, and devoted partner that made the story unique. In usual fictional or narrative portrayals, a ghost or a spirit is someone who usually gives an eerie feeling, not only because it is scary to encounter a ghost who could sabotage one’s life, but also due to the aspect of uncertainty attached to it. For instance, a ghost can disappear and reappear at its own will. One cannot pin down a ghost; it is like a wind which cannot be held captive. The sense of disappearance at will, along with having a presence while not being visible, as shown in popular fiction, a ghost’s presence can be felt, but it is not always visible to the naked eye, which makes the entity scarier, along with eliciting curiosity. That is why many supernatural ghost fiction and movies begin with a group of people on an adventure to find the ghost or experience its presence in a ghostly, deserted area. ‘The Houses October Built’, released in 2014, and ‘The Blair Witch Project’, released in 1999, are examples of such a genre. In contrast to this general understanding and portrayal of ghosts in fictional or mythical narratives, the ghost in ‘Paheli’ (which is more of a love story genre instead of a thriller one) appears to be a gentle one who takes up the appearance of the heroine’s husband and stays with her even at the end of the movie, defeating the attempts to capture him in a bottle that goes against the general view. While the movie is appreciated by the critics and film enthusiasts for subtly but prominently quashing patriarchal boundaries and presenting a supportive main lead who appreciates, respects and commits to the female lead, it is the aspect of the ghost or the features of the ghost as shown in the movie that requires attention. While the unconventional ghost exhibiting love, care, and compassion offers a distinctive case, it can be juxtaposed with the contemporary ‘normalised’ strategy of ghosting. The movie presented a ghost who defied the qualities of uncertainty and disappearance, while the modern-day love relationships, particularly but not confined to mobile dating apps or digitally mediated ones, involve ghosting in terms of unresponsiveness as performed by humans. This short article seeks to juxtapose the aspects of the ghost of ‘Paheli’ with the practice of ‘ghosting’ by people in the current day and age to show the nuances of ghosting in relationships. While the movie showed continuation of the relationship, ghosting is a breakup strategy, therefore the idea is not to compare the two but to analyse the aspects of ghosting in light of the themes of uncertainty, disappearance, and unilateral decision making in romantic partnerships, which are diametrically opposite to the certainty, commitment and mutual cooperation presented in the movie between the unconventional romantic partners. While the theme of the movie is mentioned briefly above. It is worthwhile to now understand what constitutes ghosting as a phenomenon, particularly prominent in the digitally mediated relationships.
In the contemporary age, where technology is omnipresent and pervades almost every area of human life, ghosting has become increasingly normalised as a way of ending a relationship, unilaterally via technological medium(s) (Timmermans et al, 2021). Although withdrawal and avoidance strategies for ending relationships are not new and have been studied under the rubric of breakup strategies, however, the technological medium has added a new layer to it (Baxter, 1982; Cody, 1982). For instance, either deleting or blocking the person on social media or merely being unresponsive has emerged as a prominent and easier way of cutting off ties in comparison with avoiding a person in a face-to-face setup (Tong & Walther, 2011). Therefore, in simpler terms, ghosting can be defined as a way of unilaterally ending a relationship through a technological medium whereby either a person becomes unresponsive or unfollows or blocks the account of the other person or deletes their contact number. The ease of withdrawal is not only facilitated by the lack of face-to-face interaction or meeting but also due to the relative anonymity, especially in cases where the two people belong to different social and environmental circles and have formed a relationship through social media (Timmermans et al, 2021). The partners in the framework of the ghosting phenomenon can be categorised as the ghoster and the ghostee, with the former being the one who ghosts while the latter is at the receiving end. A considerable amount of literature is emerging that studies such relationship dynamics in the digital setup, especially with respect to the mobile dating apps, where the aspects of blame, intent, grief, safety, self-esteem, and mental health-related consequences of such relationships are researched. However, it can be argued that avoidance becomes the key objective for ghosters, the reasons for which can range from loss of interest to concern for safety. Such avoidance by disappearing through technology without communicating the reason for it can lead to confusion and stress for the ghostee, who might wish to know the reasons and is rendered helpless. While such avoidance and withdrawal can occur in face-to-face setups as well, the ease of the technological medium is concerning. While studies show that ghosting is not always done with malicious intentions, it can impact the ghostee at both psychological and physical levels, whereby moving on without sufficient answers can become challenging (Timmermans et al, 2021; LeFebvre et al, 2019). While such a loss marked with ambiguity was earlier conceptualised as “physical absence with psychological presence or psychological absence with physical presence (Boss, 2007), ghosting now enables physical and psychological absence with technological presence” (LeFebvre, 2019, p. 143). The loss remains constant, but the changes in dynamics have led to a prominent change in how it is perceived and therefore, its impact on both the ghoster and the ghostee (Timmermans et al, 2021). This article has attempted to highlight the key features of ghosting as a contemporary relationship strategy without delving deeper into its causes, impacts and the role of technology, mobile data apps in the same. The focus has been to underline the ease of avoidance and withdrawal in a relationship under the label of ghosting.
Although ghosting has gained wider attention in recent years, modern relationships involve other aspects as well. For instance, while in some cases ghosting indicates a permanent cessation of a relationship, in others it might act as a temporary break and the relationship goes through an on-and-off pattern of interaction, which is generally called haunting. In some other cases, the interaction might continue through a technological medium with lesser emotional investment and effort, thereby leaving the scope for a possible resurrection of the relationship. Such convenience-based resurrection is referred to as zombie-ing (LeFebvre et al, 2019). While the differing nuances are noteworthy, the causal approach to relationships, which lacks commitment and is premised more on individual convenience and marked by wilful unilateral avoidance and withdrawal without closure, is in stark contrast with the movie ‘Paheli’ which highlighted the importance of commitment when avoidance and withdrawal was not only easier but even constituted a basic nature of a ghost. It is worth noting that the words used (ghosting, haunting, zombeing) for labelling these strategies in a relationship fall under the rubric of frightening and illusionary genres, thereby indicating the unpleasant side of contemporary digitally mediated relationships, which can be as easily broken as they are formed.
While the article is written with an academic inclination, the pertinent question that can be asked is whether emotions, which are a blend of perception of one’s own and relationships with others, can ever be empirically deciphered and explained, provided the complexities embedded in them.
References:
Baxter, L. A. (1982). Strategies for ending relationships: Two studies. Western Journal of Communication (includes Communication Reports), 46(3), 223-241.
Boss, P. (2007). Ambiguous loss theory: Challenges for scholars and practitioners. Family relations, 56(2), 105-110.
Cody, M. J. (1982). A typology of disengagement strategies and an examination of the role intimacy, reactions to inequity and relational problems play in strategy selection. Communication Monographs, 49(3), 148-170.
LeFebvre, L. E., Allen, M., Rasner, R. D., Garstad, S., Wilms, A., & Parrish, C. (2019). Ghosting in emerging adults’ romantic relationships: The digital dissolution disappearance strategy. Imagination, Cognition and Personality, 39(2), 125-150.
Tom Tong, S., & Walther, J. B. (2011). Just say ‘‘no thanks’’: Romantic rejection in computer-mediated communication. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 28(4), 488-506.
Timmermans, E., Hermans, A. M., & Opree, S. J. (2021). Gone with the wind: Exploring mobile daters’ ghosting experiences. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 38(2), 783-801.
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Sakshi Wadhwa is a PhD candidate at the Centre for the Study of Law and Governance and a member of the editorial team at TheDaak
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