Sociology of Emotion

Undergraduate

How are personal emotions made socially? While perceived to be the most private aspect of human life, emotions are at the heart of the social world. Take “Climate Emotions” or “Eco-anxiety.” How can a global problem become a deeply personal issue? How do we suffer social problems individually? Taking inspiration from this seeming paradox, this course applies a sociological lens to understand how emotions are made at the intersection of the individual and social life. In order to unpack the process, first we equip ourselves with theoretical tools, learning how different sociologists approach emotions from critical, interactionist, and cultural lenses. Then, we apply these paradigms to two related domains: political life and mental health, which helps us connect micro-level analyses to macro-dynamics. In politics, we look at populist emotions, social movements, and nostalgia. We study how nationalist emotions are built cognitively, and why political emotions can be divisive as well as bridging. With mental health, we think about therapy sociologically and question why mental health problems are on the rise. We historicize sociology’s treatment of the subject: a move from approaching treatment facilities as total institutions to seeing therapy as a tool of civil repair. We theorize the benefits of destigmatizing therapy and ask if therapy can liberate us from social problems. Within this context, we meditate on the Mindfulness Movement. SO Th 4pm-5:55pm