This book argues that the story of the orphan girl Pollyanna (namely, her strategy of playing the "glad games" to manage loss, abuse, and social prejudice) serves as a framework for critiquing historical forms of Western scientific Pollyannaism. The author examines Pollyannaism as it relates to the sciences, demonstrating how the approach has been used throughout modern Western history to enforce happiness and to criticize negative human emotional states. These efforts, carried out by scientists and popularized as scientific, focus on negating the role of the environment and on promoting varied forms of emotional control. Ultimately, the book emphasizes strategies used to compel individuals into becoming Pollyannas about science itself.

Autorentext

Oksana Yakushko, PhD, is Department Chair and faculty member at Pacifica Graduate Institute, Carpinteria, CA, USA.

Inhalt
Chapter 1: An Introduction to (Supposedly) Good Life****Chapter 2: Demonized Emotions and Tortured Bodies in the Age of Scientific ProgressRationalizing the Demonization and Murder of WitchesKilling the HealersRidding the World of Women with "Passions"Chapter 3: The Survival of the Happiest Who (Get To) Control the Resources and ProcreationAlternatives to Scientific Pollyannaism Found on the GalapagosThe Survival of the HappiestDarwin's Happy HousewivesChapter 4: Eugenic Scientific Utopias Filled with Socially Engineered Happy Productive PeopleThe Utopian Vissions of Eugenic Racial BettermentHappy Eugenic Brains and Resilient Germo-PlasmsThe Scientific Efforts to Rid the World of the "Evolutionary Unfit"Happy "Mothers of the Race"The Advanced Western Sciences of Eugenic Human BettermentTales of Finding Genetic Origins of Beauty and the BestOn Testing Intelligence and Finding (Un)HappinessChapter 5: From the Science of Human Betterment to the Science of Behavioral ControlThe Eugenic Roots of American BehaviorismDarwinism and the Sciences of Emotional ControlThe Myths and the Horrors of "Little Albert" ExperimentsThe Parenting Utopias and the "Dangers of Too Much Mother Love"Scientific Sadistic Pollyanaism: The Survivor StoriesChapter 6: Scientific Pollyannaism of Authentic Happiness, Learned Optimism, Flow and the Empirically Correct Positivity RatiosThe Exotic Resort Solutions to Re-Creating Scientific PollyannaismTorture and the Contemporary Scientific PollyannaismBuilding a New Religion from the Sciences of Happiness"Top Notch Research" of Positive PsychologyMore Secrets and Lies in Positive PsychologyFunding of New Scientific PollyannaismHappy Hateful StatesWinning the "Glad Games" by Ethnocentric Nationalism and Late Stage CapitalismRaising Pollyannas: The Sciences of Making Children Orphan Their FeelingsMythic Evolutionary Origins of PollyannaismHappiness is (Once Again) Mostly in Your GenesThe "Hard" Sciences Behind Contemporary Scientific PollyannaismChapter 7: On Being Pollyanna about Sciences****The Discovery of ScientismScientific or Scientistic Pollyannaism From The Hammer of Witches to "Race Realism"The Pioneering Funding of Scientific Racist PollyannaismHow Pollyannas Become Enlightened Through SciencesHopeful Sciences of White Supremacy and White NationalismOn Racist "Shameful Sciences" and the Empirical "Pretext" for Patriarchal "Happiness"Chapter 8: Critics and Critiques of Scientific PollyannaismThe Over-Emotional "Shrew" Whom Socrates Could Not "Break"Chesterton on Scientific Eugenics As "Our Happy Holiday in the Land of Nonsense""The Actual Unhappiness of the American Housewife" and the "Feminist Killjoy"The Political Use of Human Emotions: The Case of Neo-Liberalism"Psytizens" and the "Happiness Industry"Chapter 9: Re-telling the Story of Orphaned Girl Named Pollyanna