Midwest Studies in Philosophy 41 (1):7-26 (2017)
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Abstract |
It can be tempting to think of affect as a matter of the present moment – a reaction, a feeling, an experience or engagement that unfolds right now. This paper will make the case that affect is better thought of as not only temporally extended but as saturated with temporality, especially with the past. In and through affectivity, concrete, ongoing history continues to weigh on present comportment. In order to spell this out, I sketch a Heidegger-inspired perspective. It revolves around two claims. The first is that we should understand what Heidegger calls 'Befindlichkeit' (findingness) as radical situatedness. Affectivity is a matter of 'finding oneself' constellated – thrown – into the world in ways that outrun what an individual or collective might grasp and process. The second claim is that the temporal dimension, as a relatedness to the past, takes precedence in affect's situatedness. Key to affect is the way in which the past continues to hold sway over present comportment, collectively and individually. In order to articulate this perspective, it is important to overcome the idea that affect must be understood mainly in terms of feeling or experiential states of other kinds. Better suited to grasp the idea of findingness is the concept of 'disclosive posture', as proposed by Katherine Withy. I suggest that this notion should be put at the fore of a phenomenological approach to situated affectivity.
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Keywords | affect temporality historicity Heidegger situatedness Befindlichkeit |
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DOI | 10.1111/misp.12076 |
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References found in this work BETA
[Book Review] the Racial Contract. [REVIEW]Charles W. Mills - 1997 - Social Theory and Practice 25 (1):155-160.
Sein und Zeit.Martin Heidegger - 1928 - Annalen der Philosophie Und Philosophischen Kritik 7:161-161.
Scaffoldings of the Affective Mind.Giovanna Colombetti & Joel Krueger - 2015 - Philosophical Psychology 28 (8):1157-1176.
View all 15 references / Add more references
Citations of this work BETA
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Beyond Mood and Atmosphere: A Conceptual History of the Term Stimmung.Gerhard Thonhauser - 2020 - Philosophia 49 (3):1247-1265.
Understanding Depressive Feelings as Situated Affections.Güler Cansu Ağören - 2021 - Sage Publications: Emotion Review 14 (1):55-65.
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