In their chapter, ‘The Collective Disorientation of the Covid-19 Crisis’, Fernandez Velasco, Perroy and Casati (2021) reflect on the ‘multifarious state of disorientation’ that many of us have found ourselves in during the pandemic. They provide a rich and insightful account, which ties together complementary strands of research in various disciplines. In particular, they do an excellent job of bringing phenomenology into dialogue with relevant findings in the cognitive sciences. The term ‘disorientation’ can be used to describe a range of experiences, arising in contexts that include illness, bereavement and loss, political change, and migration. What might these experiences have in common? For instance, how does feeling spatially disoriented in unfamiliar surroundings resemble disorientation in the face of political upheaval? In an earlier study of disorientation, Harbin (2016: 13–17) settles for family resemblance between the various forms of disorientation. Instead, Fernandez Velasco, Perroy and Casati seek to identify a feature shared by all. Disorientations, they propose, involve a feeling stemming from the ‘evaluation and regulation of processes integrating frames of reference pertaining to a variety of domains’. I have some sympathy with this overall approach and accept that all disorientations may well share something in common. However, in what follows, I want to draw a distinction between two importantly different types of disorientation (both of which accommodate considerable variety). This will involve further reflecting on the interpersonal and social dimensions of disorientation.

In finding our way around different ‘domains’, from the spatial to the political, we do not rely exclusively on internalised frames of reference. Instead, we often proceed under the assumption that specific individuals or other people in general will be able and willing to provide information, guidance and support, if and when needed. The following predicaments can thus be distinguished: (a) an experience of uncertainty over how to proceed; and (b) an experience of uncertainty that further incorporates a sense of being unable to depend on others. In the former case, the experience of disorientation is limited; it arises against a backdrop of social relations and associated norms that may offer the prospect of relief. The latter, however, can amount to what we might call existential disorientation, something that is not experienced as contingent and escapable.