The Emotions: Social, Cultural and Biological Dimensions / Edition 1

by Rom Harre, W Gerrod Parrott

Overview

‘There is much that is fascinating here. Long-established experiments and conclusions are rubbished and reinterpreted, long-established assumptions and beliefs about emotions are soundly trounced, and generally a good going-over is delivered to the whole field... it is such a blockbuster that one can only reel backwards and tell anyone studying the subject that they would be crazy not to get it ' - Self & Society

This fascinating book overviews the psychology of the emotions in its broadest sense, tracing historical, social, cultural and biological themes and analyses. The contributors - some of the leading figures in the field - produce a new theoretical synthesis by drawing together these strands.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780803979291
Publisher:	SAGE Publications
Publication date:	09/23/1996
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x (d)

About the Author

Rom Harré is a Fellow of Linacre College, Oxford and Professor of Psychology at Georgetown University, Washington, DC

Professor W. Gerrod Parrott's central interest is the nature of human emotion. His published work has focused on three areas: philosophical and historical approaches to the concept of emotion; emotion's social foundations and functions, including such social emotions as embarrassment, shame, guilt, envy and jealousy; and the influence of emotion and emotional self-regulation on thought. He is the author of over 75 scholarly chapters and articles, and has published three books, Emotions and Culpability (with Norman Finkel, American Psychological Association, 2006), Emotions in Social Psychology (Psychology Press, 2001) and The Emotions: Social, Cultural, and Biological Dimensions (with Rom Harre', Sage, 1996). He served from 1995-1999 as Editor of the Journal Cognition and Emotion, and is presently the President of the International Society for Research on Emotion

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION: SOME COMPLEXITIES IN THE STUDY OF EMOTIONS
Overview - W Gerrod Parrott and Rom Harr[ac]e
Vignette 1 - Daniel N Robinson
Aristotle on the Emotions
Vignette 2 - James R Averill
Intellectual Emotions
PART ONE: THE SOCIAL DIMENSION OF EMOTIONS
Embarrassment and the Threat to Character - W Gerrod Parrott and Rom Harr[ac]e
Guilt and Remorse - Gabrielle Taylor
Shame and Guilt in Early New England - John Demos
Social Control of ‘Negative' Emotions - Janet Landman
The Case of Regret
Vignette 3 - Christopher Ricks
Keats and Embarrassment
Vignette 4 - Inmaculada Iglesias
Verg[um]uenza Ajena
PART TWO: HISTORICAL AND CULTURAL VARIETY IN EMOTIONS
Historical Perspectives on Grief - Peter N Stearns and Mark Knapp
Engendered Emotion - Catherine A Lutz
Gender, Power and the Rhetoric of Emotional Control in American Discourse
Emotion Talk across Cultures - Paul Heelas
Vignette 5 - Kenneth T Strongman and Luke Strongman
Maori Emotion
PART THREE: THE BIOLOGICAL DIMENSIONS OF EMOTION
An Analysis of Psychophysiological Symbolism and Its Influence on Theories of Emotion - James R Averill
Bodily States and Context in Situated Lines of Action - Gerald P Ginsburg and Melanie E Harrington
‘Facial Expression of Emotion' and the Delusion of the Hermetic Self - Alan J Fridlund and Bradley Duchaine
Emotional Self-Control and Self-Perception - James D Laird and Nicholas H Apostoleris
Feelings Are the Solution, Not the Problem
Self-Attention - Shame - Shyness - Modesty - Charles Darwin
Blushing
Vignette 6 - Keith Oatley
Emotions: Communications to the Self and Others
Vignette 7 - Kenneth T Strongman
A Private Eye into Disgust

Editorial Reviews

A class text for psychology students synthesizing recent thought on human emotions in a number of disciplines. Expands the perspective of Harr<'e>'s 1986 "The Social Construction of Emotions" by combining 13 original and reprinted reviews, interspersed with seven vignettes. They represent a wide range of techniques, including analytical philosophy, descriptive linguistics, historical and cultural comparisons of public practices, and neurophysiological studies of the brain. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Booknews

‘There is much that is fascinating here. Long-established experiments and conclusions are rubbished and reinterpreted, long-established assumptions and beliefs about emotions are soundly trounced, and generally a good going-over is delivered to the whole field... it is such a blockbuster that one can only reel backwards and tell anyone studying the subject that they would be crazy not to get it' - Self & Society

‘The book consists of a series of erudite chapters on a wide array of emotions, including regret, hope, embarrassment and grief. It includes new research on emotion, but also incorporates a number of older key works, such as a chapter by Darwin on blushing. The book provides insight into why the biological perspective has dominated psychological explanations of emotion... A strong feature of the book is its emphasis on a range of emotions beyond the "basic" emotions. In order to explain other emotional reactions, theorists find it necessary to draw on social and cultural features... the book... forces more biologically inclined readers to consider whether their theories can be applied to the rich array of emotions' - The Psychologist

From the Publisher