Shame and Pride Affect, Sex, and the Birth of the Self

by Nathanson, Donald L.

• ISBN13: 9780393311099
• ISBN10: 0393311090
• Edition: 00
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1994-03-17
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

This is a revolutionary book about the nature of emotion, about the way emotions are triggered in our private moments, in our relations with others, and by our biology. Drawing on every theme of the modern life sciences, Donald Nathanson shows how nine basic affects?nterest-excitement, enjoyment-joy, surprise-startle, fear-terror, distress-anguish, anger-rage, dissmell, disgust, and shame-humiliation?ot only determine how we feel but shape our very sense of self.For too long those who explain emotional discomfort on the basis of lived experience and those who blame chemistry have been at loggerheads. As Dr. Nathanson shows, chemicals and illnesses can affect our mood just as surely as an uncomfortable memory or a stern rebuke. Linking for the first time the affect theory of the pioneering researcher Silvan S. Thomkins with the entire world of biology, medicine, psychology, psychotherapy, religion, and the social sciences, Dr. Nathanson presents a completely new understanding of all emotion.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. 9
Introduction	p. 15
The Nature of Human Emotion	p. 33
What Is Emotion?	p. 35
The Affect System	p. 47
Feeling Good: The Positive Affects	p. 73
Pride	p. 83
Surprise-Startle: The Neutral Affect	p. 88
Feeling Bad: The Negative Affects	p. 92
Empathy: Affective Resonance and the Empathic Wall	p. 107
A Brief Digression: The Drives	p. 116
Dissmell and Disgust	p. 121
Shame-Humiliation	p. 134
The Development of Shame and Pride	p. 151
The Faces of Shame	p. 153
Size and Shape	p. 163
Dexterity and Skill	p. 168
Dependence/Independence	p. 179
The Self	p. 185
Shame and the Self	p. 197
Love and Sex: Getting Together	p. 215
Love, Exile, Excommunication, and Disgrace: Shame and the Other	p. 217
True Love	p. 236
The Generative System	p. 256
A New Theory of Sexuality	p. 269
Shame, Pride, and Sex	p. 285
The Compass of Shame	p. 303
The Compass of Shame	p. 305
Withdrawal	p. 315
Attack Self	p. 326
Avoidance	p. 336
Attack Other	p. 360
Buddy Hackett and the Comedy of Acceptance	p. 378
From Moment to Madness	p. 397
The Realm of Very Dense Affect: Mechanisms of Increase	p. 399
Overload: Affect Beyond the Limits of Tolerance	p. 414
A Brief History of Shame	p. 431
The Range of Shame	p. 455
Bibliography	p. 477
Index	p. 487
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.