This book illustrates the theoretical relevance of emotions to analyse and interpret contemporary events and societies. Emotions explain social phenomena while providing critical and analytical tools to challenge dominant or conventional interpretations of them. Drawing on examples of empirical research on emotions, it examines the long-standing sociological significance of emotions, some of the most recent theoretical and methodological advances, and the importance of fruitful interdisciplinary contaminations. The book will appeal to students, scholars, and professionals interested in the intersection of emotions, society, and social change.
PART I _ Defining emotions from different disciplinary perspectives.-
Introduction.- Defining emotions from different disciplinary perspectives.-
Feeling Modernity: the early theorisations on emotions from the classics of
sociology.- Conceptualising emotions sociologically: contemporary theories on
emotions.- Between Positivist and Constructionist approaches, micro- and
macro- levels of analysis.- Emotions in different historical and cultural
contexts.- Love Studies and Black Feminist Theory.- Rethinking the
sociological relevance of emotions in light of recent social and political
phenomena.- PART II _ The theoretical and political relevance of emotions:
research areas.- Emotions and Social Control: Shame, Humiliation,
Embarrassment, and Conformity.- Emotions and Politics: The Social
Construction of Emotions in the Public Sphere.- Emotions and Social Class.-
Emotions and Capitalism.- Emotions and Violence.- Emotions, Technologies, and
Media.- Emotions, Relationships, and Intimacies.- Emotions, Citizenship, and
Social Change.- Concluding Thoughts: Future Prospects.
Alessandro Pratesi is an Associate Professor of Sociology in the Department of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Florence, Italy. His research interests include the sociology of emotions, care, relationships and intimacies, social inclusion, and citizenship. He is the author of Doing Care, Doing Citizenship. Towards a Micro-situated and Emotion-based Model of Social Inclusion (2018, Palgrave Macmillan).
