Klappentext A collection of essays on affect theory, by groundbreaking scholars in the field. Zusammenfassung A field-defining collection that consolidates thinking and builds momentum in the burgeoning area of affect studies.

Autorentext

Melissa Gregg works in the Department of Gender and Cultural Studies at the University of Sydney in Australia. She is the author of Cultural Studies’ Affective Voices.

Gregory J. Seigworth is a professor in communication and theater at Millersville University in Pennsylvania.

Klappentext

This field-defining collection consolidates and builds momentum in the burgeoning area of affect studies. The contributors include many of the central theorists of affect-those visceral forces beneath, alongside, or generally other than conscious knowing that can serve to drive us toward movement, thought, and ever-changing forms of relation. As Lauren Berlant explores “cruel optimism,” Brian Massumi theorizes the affective logic of public threat, and Elspeth Probyn examines shame, they, along with the other contributors, show how an awareness of affect is opening up exciting new insights in disciplines from anthropology, cultural studies, geography, and psychology to philosophy, queer studies, and sociology. In essays diverse in subject matter, style, and perspective, the contributors demonstrate how affect theory illuminates the intertwined realms of the aesthetic, the ethical, and the political as they play out across bodies (human and non-human) in both mundane and extraordinary ways. They reveal the broad theoretical possibilities opened by an awareness of affect as they reflect on topics including ethics, food, public morale, glamor, snark in the workplace, and mental health regimes. The Affect Theory Reader includes an interview with the cultural theorist Lawrence Grossberg and an afterword by the anthropologist Kathleen Stewart. In the introduction, the editors suggest ways of defining affect, trace the concept’s history, and highlight the role of affect theory in various areas of study. Contributors. Sara Ahmed, Ben Anderson, Lauren Berlant, Lone Bertelsen, Steven D. Brown, Patricia Ticineto Clough, Anna Gibbs,Melissa Gregg, Lawrence Grossberg, Ben Highmore, Brian Massumi, Andrew Murphie, Elspeth Probyn, Gregory J. Seigworth, Kathleen Stewart, Nigel Thrift, Ian Tucker, Megan Watkins

Zusammenfassung
A field-defining collection that consolidates thinking and builds momentum in the burgeoning area of affect studies.

Inhalt

Acknowledgments ix
An Inventory of Shimmers / Gregory J. Seigworth and Melissa Gregg 1
One. Impingements

1. Happy Objects / Sara Ahmed 29
2. The Future Birth of the Affective Fact: The Political Ontology of Threat / Brian Massumi 52
3. Writing Shame / Elspeth Probyn 71
   Two. Aesthetics and the Everyday
4. Cruel Optimism / Lauren Berlant 93
5. Bitter after Taste: Affect, Food, and Social Aesthetics / Ben Highmore 118
   An Ethics of Everyday Infinities and Powers: FÈlix Guattari on Affect and the Refrain/ Lone Bertelsen and Andrew Murphie 138
   Three. Incorporeal/Inorganic
6. Modulating the Excess of Affect: Morale in a State of "Total War" / Ben Anderson 161
7. After Affect: Sympathy, Synchrony, and Mimetic Communication / Anna Gibbs 186
8. The Affective Turn: Political Economy, Biomedia, and Bodies / Patricia T. Clough 206
   Four. Managing Affects
9. Eff the Ineffable: Affect, Somatic Management, and Mental Health Service Users / Steven D. Brown and Ian Tucker 229
10. On Friday Night Drinks: Workplace Affects in the Age of the Cubicle / Melissa Gregg 250
11. Desiring Recognition, Accumulating Affect / Megan Watkins 269
    Five. After Affect
12. Understanding the Material Practices of Glamour / Nigel Thrift 289
13. Affect's Future: Rediscovering the Virtual in the Actual / Lawrence Grossberg (An Interview with Gregory J. Seigworth and Melissa Gregg) 309
    Afterword. Worlding Refrains / Kathleen Stewart 339
    References 355
    Contributors 381
    Index 385