AMST 327
Feeling the Present Fall 2014
Division II
Cross-listed SOC 327
This is not the current course catalog

Feelings, moods, and affects are typically understood as bound to individual persons. However, this course examines not only how feelings and moods are profoundly collective but also why and how these collective moods have come to matter in contemporary culture, politics, and economy. Focusing on current and classic scholarship in critical political economy, neoliberalism, and affect studies – as well as film and popular culture – we will attend to the ways in which anxiety, depression, hope, rage, and other moods figure into everyday life, work, social movements, and other key sites. Topics considered include: mental health and the pharmaceutical industry; the social implications of financialization; the Tea Party and its political influence; the rise of social media; and the recent housing crisis.