Feelings and Work in Modern History - (History of Emotions) by Agnes Arnold-Forster & Peter N Stearns & Alison Moulds & Susan J Matt

Book Synopsis

Work in all its guises is a fundamental part of the human experience, and yet it is a setting where emotions rarely take centre stage. This edited collection interrogates the troubled relationship between emotion and work to shed light on the feelings and meaning of both paid and unpaid labour from the late nineteenth to the twenty-first century.

Central to this book is a reappraisal of 'emotional labour', now associated with the household and 'life admin' work largely undertaken by women and which reflects and perpetuates gender inequalities. Critiquing this term, and the history of how work has made us feel, Feelings and Work in Modern History explores the changing values we have ascribed to our labour, examines the methods deployed by workplaces to manage or 'administrate' our emotions, and traces feelings through 19th, 20th and 21st century workplaces in Europe, Asia and South America.

Exploring the damages wrought to physical and emotional health by certain workplaces and practices, critiquing the pathologisation of some emotional responses to work, and acknowledging the joy and meaning people derive from their labour, this book appraises the notion of a 'work-life balance', explores the changing notions of professionalism and critically engages with the history of capitalism. In doing so, it interrogates the lasting impact of some of these histories on the current and future emotional landscape of labour.

Review Quotes

"This timely book probes not only how people have felt about work and at work, but also why they felt the ways they did. An important update on Hochschild's Managed Heart, it digs into the politics of emotional labour, making a significant revision to the history of work. Essential reading." --Rob Boddice, Senior Research Fellow at HEX, Tampere University, Finland

"Working life gives rise to many different emotions - from boredom and status anxiety to joy and fulfilment - as well as providing opportunities for friendship, camaraderie, and romance. This accomplished and wide-ranging collection asks searching questions about how work has made people feel since the late nineteenth century. It takes the study of this topic to a new level." --Thomas Dixon, Professor of History, Queen Mary University of London, UK

"This collection makes a critical contribution to the study of work and emotions, highlighting how emotion work shapes-and is shaped by-workers, workplaces, and systems of inequality." --CHOICE

About the Author

Agnes Arnold-Forster is a Postdoctoral Research and Engagement Fellow on the Wellcome Trust Investigator Award, Surgery & Emotion, based at the University of Roehampton, UK. She is a medical and cultural historian of modern Britain with expertise in the history of healthcare, labour, and the emotions. Her first book, The Cancer Problem, is forthcoming with Oxford University Press.

Alison Moulds is an independent scholar specializing in medical and cultural history. She was Engagement Fellow on the Surgery & Emotion project (University of Roehampton, UK) and Postdoctoral Researcher on the Diseases of Modern Life project (University of Oxford, UK). Her first book, Medical Identities and Print Culture, c.1830s-1910s is forthcoming with Palgrave Macmillan.