Critical Theory and Feeling

Simon Mussell is an independent researcher and editor

'From new materialism to affect theory to object-oriented ontology/speculative realism, the Frankfurt School and critical theory have seldom been swept up into their escape velocities. Simon Mussell’s book strikes like a force of gravity, a dialectical rebalancing that sturdies one’s feet before launch, rekindling the historical-materialist engines that drive critique’s politics to a full head of steam, shaking off whatever dust presumably clings to the Frankfurt School in order to show how emerging thought can always shudder in its orbit.'Gregory J. Seigworth, Professor of Communication Studies, Millersville University‘In a Brexit, Trump and “post-truth” world, Simon Mussell gives us first-generation critical theory tools to think through the emotional politics and political emotions of contemporary discontent. Chapters focused on hope, conscious un/happiness, and “entanglement of human beings, capital and objects” create a persuasive case for understanding the centrality of feelings in and for progressive social change.’Catherine Lane West-Newman, Senior Lecturer in Sociology and Criminology, University of Auckland

• Introduction: once more, with feeling 1 Thinking through feeling: critical theory and the affective turn 2 Feeling blue: melancholic dispositions and conscious unhappiness3 A feeling for things: objects, affects, mimesis 4 Expectant emotion and the politics of hopeCodaIndex