Sociology of the Emotions

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Sociology of the Emotions

• 19 November, 2007

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The Emotions Lecture Outline

• Classical sociology and the emotions
• Sociological approaches to the emotions
• The Managed Heart (Hochschild 1985)
• Theoretical background
• Methodology
• Findings
• Conclusions

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The Emotions in Sociology

• Classical theory
• Historical neglect
• Dualist philosophical tradition
• Focus on large-scale issues
• Emotions experienced as unique, individual

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The Emotions in Sociology

• Relevance for sociology
• Simultaneously individual and social
• Link individual experiences to social structure
• Relational and interactive
• Underlie large-scale processes
• Expressed through group solidarity and conflict
• The emotions follow sociologically-relevant
  patterns

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The Emotions in Sociology

• Two sociological approaches to the emotions
• Historical/structural (Elias)
• Interactionist (Goffman)
• Both intended to challenge biological
  reductionism
• While acknowledging that the emotions are embodied

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Emotion Management

• An attempt to display/experience appropriate
  emotions

• Surface acting
• Deep acting

• Draws upon Goffmans notion of impression
  management

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Feeling Rules

• Govern our emotional displays
• Shape expression and experience
• Relevant to social roles
• Also to issues of power and deference
• Learned through social interactions
• Called to account
• Reactions to supposed emotions
• Open (somewhat) to negotiation
• Particularly in informal interactions
• Errors require intervention

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Arlie Hochschild The Managed
Heart

• Examines how society uses feelings
• Influenced by
• Symbolic interactionism
• Marxism
• Asks How do companies structure emotional
  exchange?
• Methodology
• Observations and interviews with flight
  attendants, instructors and executives at Delta

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Emotional Labour

• Emotion management on the job
• Face-to-face or voice-to-voice contact
• Intended to create emotions in the customer
• Training involves control of the workers feeling
  states
• Surface acting
• Deep acting

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The Costs of Emotional Labour

• Modifying feelings/displays on the job
• How to identify with role and hold onto a
  separate self requires depersonalisation
• Option 1 Surface acting
• Viewed as phony
• Option 2 Deep acting
• Estrangement from the emotions
• Undermines authenticity
• Alienates the worker from her emotions

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Implications

• Resistance
• As demands increase
• Cultural emphasis on genuine emotions
• Rise in emotional therapies
• Move toward re-sensualization (Maffesoli 1996)
• Shift to the natural and collective
• Paradox for emotion management