Feeling in theory : emotion after the "death of the subject" / Rei Terada.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Terada, Rei, 1962-

Contributor:

American Council of Learned Societies.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Emotions (Philosophy).

Subject (Philosophy).

Physical Description:

1 online resource (x, 211 p.)

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, MA : Harvard University Press, c2001.

Summary:

Because emotion is assumed to depend on subjectivity, the death of the subject would also seem to mean the death of feeling. This work transforms the debate on emotion by suggesting a new relation between the subject and the existence of emotion.

Because emotion is assumed to depend on subjectivity, the "death of the subject" described in recent years by theorists such as Derrida, de Man, and Deleuze would also seem to mean the death of feeling. This revolutionary work transforms the burgeoning interdisciplinary debate on emotion by suggesting, instead, a positive relation between the "death of the subject" and the very existence of emotion. Reading the writings of Derrida and de Man--theorists often seen as emotionally contradictory and cold--Terada finds grounds for construing emotion as nonsubjective. This project offers fresh interpretations of deconstruction's most important texts, and of Continental and Anglo-American philosophers from Descartes to Deleuze and Dennett. At the same time, it revitalizes poststructuralist theory by deploying its methodologies in a new field, the philosophy of emotion, to reach a startling conclusion: if we really were subjects, we would have no emotions at all. Engaging debates in philosophy, literary criticism, psychology, and cognitive science from a poststructuralist and deconstructive perspective, Terada's work is essential for the renewal of critical thought in our day.

Contents:

Acknowledgments Abbreviations and Textual Note Introduction: Emotion after the "Death of the Subject" PART 1:COGITO AND THE HISTORY OF THE PASSIONS 1. Philosophy of Emotion 2. Cogito and the History of the Passions 3. Feeling and Phenomena 4. Imaginary Seductions 5. Idea-Signs of Passion PART 2: PATHOS (ALLEGORIES OF EMOTION) 6. Emotion and Figure 7. Safety and the Sublime 8. The Allegory of Emotion 9. Inner Voices, Hostile Strangers: Moral and Social Feelings 10. Emotion Degree Zero PART 3: A PARALLEL PHILOSOPHY 11. Nobody's Passion: Emotion and the Philosophy of Music 12. Emotional Reference 13. Why You Can't Make a Subject That Feels Pain 14. From Affection to Affect 15. The Regime of Affect PART 4: PYSCHE,INC.:DERRIDEAN EMOTION AFTER DE MAN 16. Hardly Thinking 17. Psyche and Prosopopoeia 18. "The Theater of Petty Passions" L'ame 19. Conclusion: Night of the Human Subject Notes References Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (p. [191]-205) and index.

ISBN:

9780674044296

0674044290