This paper argues that sociologist Erving Goffman's concept "non-person" should be expanded to denote a broad field of inquiry. It proposes that "non-person" be re-considered as "people who aren't really there", and it suggests that looking carefully at people who aren't really there draws together insights about invisibility, silence, and ignorance that otherwise tend to be discussed separately or in piecemeal fashion. In this sense, people who aren't really there offer a coherent field of study. Bringing together examples of people who both want to be imperceptible and who do not want to be imperceptible reveals crucial dynamics involving power, vulnerability, agency, desire, and subjectivity.
Don Kulick (Fri,) studied this question.