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This article sets out a conceptual framework for examining future building as an emotionally reflexive practice of intimacy and gendered agency. Emotionally reflexive future building is a relational activity, subject to gendering but open to queering. We illustrate this by drawing on cases taken from three qualitative studies that deal with the future building of women in relationships that do not conform to norms around having and rearing children. By referring to the future building of single mothers, women who are undecided about having children and women in non-cohabiting distance relationships we illustrate the significance of reflexively making sense of one's own and others' emotions in navigating gendered constraints and opportunities. Anger, despair, ambivalence, love, guilt and other emotions are key in how women with differing degrees of economic security imagine and try to create futures that queer gender. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reflexive emotionalisation means increased thinking about and acting on emotional experiences in response to major changes to social life, such as those accompanying colonisation. This article explains and develops this novel concept, assessing its usefulness through an exploratory assessment of reflexive emotionalisation in the formation of Aotearoa New Zealand as a colonised settler state. It is argued that as cultures met and sought to coexist, emotions were vital. Focusing on reflexive emotionalisation in Aotearoa reveals how differences in feeling rules were navigated, sometimes in violent ways, as power shifted towards the colonisers. Feelings of belonging are important in that ongoing process of reflexive emotionalisation, the elucidation of which provides a new understanding of social change and settler state formation that avoids casting colonised peoples as passive objects of 'progress' brought by colonisers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Clinical empathy has been studied in a number of health-care disciplines suggesting that higher practitioner empathy leads to improved patient health and wellness and improved patient outcomes. While some aspects of the physical therapist-patient relationship have been described, evidence of quantitative assessment of clinical empathy in physical therapists is scarce. To investigate the level of self-reported clinical empathy in physical therapists and its relationship to practice environment and workplace engagement, the Jefferson Scale of Empathy-Health Provider version (JSE-HP) and the Oldenburg Burnout Inventory (OLBI) were used. Study participants were 123 physical therapists working full time at either an acute care setting, a rehabilitation hospital, or an outpatient clinic. These physical therapists demonstrated a mean JSE-HP score of 118.5 (9.1) and a mean OLBI score of 15.63 (3.5). This mean empathy score was found to be higher than reported empathy level of some health disciplines such as nursing and pharmacy yet lower than others such as mental health workers, psychiatrists, and pediatricians. Practice setting was not found to be a significant factor regarding empathy levels in physical therapists. As reported in previous studies, there was a positive correlation between being female and having higher empathy levels. A positive correlation was found between age and work disengagement. Finally, our hypothesis regarding a negative correlation between empathy and work disengagement was confirmed, suggesting that workplace disengagement may diminish a physical therapist's empathy, which may then negatively affect patient clinical outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article develops a model of relational happiness that challenges popular individualized definitions and emphasizes how it can enhance the sociological analysis of inequality. Many studies of happiness suggest that social inequalities are closely associated with distributions of happiness at the national level, but happiness research continues to favour individual-level analyses. Limited attention has been given to the intersubjective aspects of happiness and the correlations between it and higher social equality. Conversely, key theoretical debates about inequalities, such as Axel Honneth and Nancy Fraser's exchanges, have only indirectly touched on happiness. A relational approach to happiness is not new, but what this article offers is a new combination of a relational understanding of happiness as an intersubjectively, culturally experienced complex of emotions with discussions about recognition of marginalized groups and redistribution of material resources. This combined approach can further debates about understanding and remedying social inequalities. It argues that theories and measurements of happiness must consider how it can be achieved collectively through working at mutual respect as well as greater material equality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The intention of this article is to challenge orthodoxies regarding heterosexuality, which have tended to constitute it as a static monolith and queer as the only potential site for a less oppressive sexuality. By contrast, we consider heterodox possibilities for pleasure and change within the realm of the dominant. We examine three examples – divergence, transgression and subversion – and then consider some terminologies that might flesh out experiential aspects of these examples of social change in heterosexuality. This conjunction offers a means to acknowledge heterosexuality’s coercive aspects while attending to its more egalitarian, less orthodox forms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented which discusses various topics within the issue including the book "Heterosexuality in Theory and Practice," framing heterosexuality in feminist critiques of pornography and representations of heterosexual sex in pornified culture.

This article focuses on the underresearched topic of how masculinity relates to emotional forms of caring within heterosexual relationships. Both scholarly and common sense thinking, often present heterosexual male partners as unable and/or unwilling to do emotion work, leaving women burdened with this task. However, contemporary relational complexity increasingly requires emotional reflexivity. Such reflexivity entails interpretations of one’s own and others’ emotions, and acting in light of those interpretations. The question here is to what extent and how that emotional reflexivity might effect a reshaping of heteromasculinity toward more caring forms of emotionality? Drawing on interviews with heterosexual couples in distance relationships, it is argued that emotional reflexivity may produce a variety of ways of relationally gendering emotions. Those who seem to adhere to ideas of men as emotionally restricted may claim tactile forms of emotional expression. However, there may be limitations to these forms in certain circumstances, and this may prompt a reflexive reorientation of heteromasculine emotionalities toward more verbal forms of support. The point of seeking to illustrate that masculinity and emotionality are open to such reflexive shifts is to debunk essentialist views of gendered emotionality which undermine efforts to achieve greater gender equality in intimate life. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The everyday novelties of contemporary society require emotional reflexivity (Holmes, 2010a), but how can it be researched? Joint interviews can give more insight into the relational and embodied nature of emotional reflexivity than analysis of text-based online sources. Although textual analysis of online sources might be useful for seeing how people relationally negotiate what to feel when feeling rules are unclear, interviews allow observation of emotional reflexivity as done in interaction, especially if there is more than one interviewee. This highlights not only the relational, but the embodied aspects of emotional reflexivity, and shows how it is a useful concept for researching aspects of emotionality not well addressed by other concepts such as “emotional intelligence” and “emotion work.” [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article develops the concept of affinity as one means available in understanding how citizens make, or fail to make, connections with politics and politicians. It is argued that the disappearance of class from much political discourse has led to more emotional ways of relating to politics. We claim that the reflexivity involved in political deliberation must take account of people's emotional responses to the political. We argue that one key element in these emotional responses is a feeling, or lack of feeling, of affinity. We propose that citizens often use feelings of likeness in their (dis)engagement with politicians, policies and parties. Understanding the emotional aspects of political (dis)engagement in this way is crucial in dealing with concerns about widespread disengagement from, and dissatisfaction with, electoral politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are signs that a significant number of British people do not feel that their concerns are being addressed by the mainstream parties or the political system. This paper attends to the quality of that political dissatisfaction amongst members of 'the white working classes'. There is a need to extend typical concerns about youth disengagement to adults and to consider the role that class plays. Lower participation in formal democratic processes may not mean disengagement from all forms of politics, but could have considerable consequences for who gains power and for the tone and focus of political debates and policies. Our project contributes to exploring political dissatisfaction by engaging with low wage workers in Yorkshire and the North West, where high support for the far-right BNP and low voter turnout are signs that mainstream politics and politicians are failing to impress. We asked people about their feelings in relation to mainstream politics and their concerns. These participants feel distanced from governing elites, formal political processes and old ideologies. They are searching for ways to make sense of their struggles to live a decent life, and in doing so must contend with the dominance of racist discourses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reflexivity refers to the practices of altering one's life as a response to knowledge about one's circumstances. While theories of reflexivity have not entirely ignored emotions, attention to them has been insufficient. These theories need emotionalizing and this article proposes that emotions have become central to a subjectivity and sociality that is relationally constructed. The emotionalization of reflexivity not only refers to a theoretical endeavour but is a phrase used to begin to explore whether individuals are increasingly drawing on emotions in assessing themselves and their lives. It is argued that dislocation from tradition produces a reflexivity that can be very dependent on comparing experiences and can move others to reflect and reorder their own relations to self and others. Thus, emotions are crucial to how the social is reproduced and to enduring within a complex social world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intimacy is usually thought to require physical proximity as a prerequisite, so how are intimate relationships maintained when partners do not live their daily lives in the same place? Couples who are frequently apart are not an entirely new phenomenon, but the dual-career, dual-household couples examined in this pilot study of contemporary distance relationships illustrate new ways of relating. This paper will explore these new ways of relating in terms of debates about the impact of individualisation processes on intimacy. It is argued that the extension of such processes to women has been limited. Ways of being intimate at a distance may offer alternative formulations of gender and power, but the rationalised timetabling necessary to maintain such relationships imposes new gendered constraints with bodily and emotional consequences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The sociology of emotion is rapidly becoming a popular field in sociology and the May 2004 issue of "European Journal of Social Theory" turns that interest to the sphere of politics. The main objective of this issue is to provide an understanding of the sociological importance of emotions, and specifically anger, in political life. Rather than addressing the extremely complicated interrelationship between different emotions, the contributions are focused on anger. Political sociology, while displaying an early interest in emotions, has only recently returned to that interest. The emotions involved in social movement politics have perhaps received the most attention. Many collections barely touch on emotions, this particular volume having one chapter on the topic, but others are more forthcoming. "Passionate Politics" re-establishes the importance of understanding emotions when studying social movements, discussing the interplay between rationality and irrationality. Within the collection, a range of emotions are discussed, both in their theoretical and their concrete manifestations within particular social movements.

The part anger plays in motivating political action is frequently noted, but less is said about ways in which anger continues to be a part of how people do politics. This article critically assesses approaches to emotions that emphasize managing anger in accordance with `feeling rules'. It reflects on the utility of Marxist notions of conflict as the engine of change for the understanding of how anger operates in political life. This involves understanding the ambivalence of anger and its operation within particular power relations. Shifting sets of conventions have had some continuity in discouraging women in Western nations (particularly white and middle-class women) from showing anger. But clearly, women do get angry and feminists have drawn on anger in acting politically. New Zealand feminist writings from the 'second wave' are taken as illustrative of the common difficulties Western feminists faced in dealing with anger. These difficulties were due to trying to juggle social conventions about femininity the political ideal of sisterhood, and the realities of dealing with other women in often new and experimental political processes. Anger could be personalized and hurtful, but in certain cases its expression was constructive in producing more respectful relations. Exploring these cases makes it clear how anger produces, and is produced by, relations with others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One thinks that romantic love is not a matter of rational choice, it sweeps over them, unstoppable, terribly passionate. Yet the new sentimental order is supposedly one in which choosing lovers is central. For sociologist, Anthony Giddens, a society increasingly focused on individual autonomy has produced greater diversity in sexual behavior and intimate relationships have become freer and more equal. He is particularly keen to argue that romantic love is highly reflexive, by which he implies a continued interrogation of emotion by reason. Sociologist, Bernadette Bawin-Legros fails to note that Giddens believes that romantic love has now been replaced by confluent love, which focuses on a special relationship rather than a special person. Bawin-Legros argues that a new sentimental order has emerged, one increasingly characterized by an individualism that promotes personal happiness over traditional ties and morals. An important aspect of the claims Bawin-Legros makes is her recognition of the fact that despite the range of choices of whom to love, how and for how long, people still wish for durable bonds as a protection from precariousness.

The rhythms of human bodies are profoundly implicated with the time regimes that are dominant in different societies. This article seeks to explicate the relations between the temporal dispositions of one aspect of the body, its defecatory capacities, and the chronological and spatial categorizations of modernity. This latter configuration is understood variously as being characterized by: the social relations of the 'civilizing process' (Elias); capitalist economic relations (Marx); instrumental rationality (Adorno and Horkheimer); and patriarchy (feminism). Focusing on each of these aspects of the modern allows us to chart historically the rise of a series of temporal regulations over acts of defecation. However, following the position of Sigmund Freud, we trace out one of the key dilemmas of modernity: while the times when defecation occurs have come under increasing levels of guidance and administration, the human body and its faecal capacities still continue to some degree to operate according to rhythms other than those imposed upon them, thus occasionally effecting a disorderly 'return of the repressed' in the realm of systematized time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The boundary between the personal and the political is contested. Feminist interventions in this contest since 1970 have been particularly significant. A brief discussion of how feminists have theorised the personal/political division serves as an introduction to my analysis of current struggles over that division in Western liberal democracies. My analysis focuses on the workings of representative processes. Efforts to represent interests are strongly interlinked with the representation of meanings or images. Representations rely on, even if they resist, dominant discourses which privilege certain meanings and interests over others. To illustrate this analysis I use media representations of the Clinton versus Paula Jones case, which has produced considerable debate about the personal/political boundary. The continued high poll ratings Clinton received at that time suggest that his sexual behaviour was not seen as interfering with his political performance. In contrast, assessments of Jones's political credibility appear considerably tied to evaluations of her 'personal' life. The difficulties of representing marginalised gender and class positions within current representative systems are explored in order to account for these differences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]