Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Foreword
- Editor's preface
- List of contributors
- Chronology
- Introduction
- Part I Affect theory
- Introduction
- Selections by Silvan S. Tomkins
- Part II Affect and ideology
- Introduction
- Selections by Silvan S. Tomkins
- Ideology and affect
- The socialization of affect and the resultant ideo-affective postures which evoke resonance to the ideological polarity
- Commentary: The ideology of research strategies
- Part III The face of affect
- Introduction
- Selections by Silvan S. Tomkins
- Part IV Script theory: The differential magnification of affect
- Introduction
- Selections by Silvan S. Tomkins
- Part V Human being theory: A foundation for the study of personality
- Introduction
- Selections by Silvan S. Tomkins
- A complete annotated bibliography of Silvan S. Tomkins's writings
- References
- Author index
- Subject index
- Titles in the series
Ideology and affect
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 November 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Foreword
- Editor's preface
- List of contributors
- Chronology
- Introduction
- Part I Affect theory
- Introduction
- Selections by Silvan S. Tomkins
- Part II Affect and ideology
- Introduction
- Selections by Silvan S. Tomkins
- Ideology and affect
- The socialization of affect and the resultant ideo-affective postures which evoke resonance to the ideological polarity
- Commentary: The ideology of research strategies
- Part III The face of affect
- Introduction
- Selections by Silvan S. Tomkins
- Part IV Script theory: The differential magnification of affect
- Introduction
- Selections by Silvan S. Tomkins
- Part V Human being theory: A foundation for the study of personality
- Introduction
- Selections by Silvan S. Tomkins
- A complete annotated bibliography of Silvan S. Tomkins's writings
- References
- Author index
- Subject index
- Titles in the series
Summary
Proud and aloof on the banks of the mainstream of human history, American psychology guards its virginity. It will give itself to the laboratory but not to man in real time. It is haunted by the vision of exposing the causal roots of things. But effects are epiphenomena, important only because they are produced by first causes. And so human responses are degraded to the status of operational criteria for the presence of some prior stimulus. This is but one of the many sources of the chaste indifference of American psychology to human history.
We will argue that a complete science of man must focus not only on the causal mechanisms underlying cognition, affect and action, but also on the cultural products of man. Man is to be found as much in his language, his art, in his science, in his economic, political and social institutions, as he is to be found in his cerebrum, in his nervous system, and in his genes. We would urge that the biopsychological mechanisms and the social products be integrated into a science of man and not polarized as competitors for the attention of psychology. Further, the psychologist should be equally at home in the laboratory as in the library, as in the armchair, as in the computer room, as on the streets, or in the field.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Exploring AffectThe Selected Writings of Silvan S Tomkins, pp. 109 - 167Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1995
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