Journal Article

Enduring Emotions: James L. Halliday and the Invention of the Psychosocial

Hayward, Rhodri

2009

Overview

Emotions maintain an ambivalent position in the economy of science. In contemporary debates they are variously seen as hardwired biological responses, cultural artifacts, or uneasy mixtures of the two. At the same time, there is a tension between the approaches to emotion developed in modern psychotherapies and in the history of science. While historians see the successful ascription of affective states to individuals and populations as a social and technical achievement, the psychodynamic practitioner treats these enduring associations as pathological accidents that need to be overcome. This short essay uses the career of the Glaswegian public health investigator James L. Halliday to examine how debates over the ontological status of the emotions and their durability allow them to travel between individual identity and political economy, making possible new kinds of psychological intervention.

• Publisher: The University of Chicago Press,University of Chicago, acting through its Press
• Subject: Accidents / Affectivity / Ambivalence / Anxiety / Ascription / Careers / Debates / Disease Outbreaks - history / Diseases / Emotion / Emotion theories / Emotional distress / Emotional expression / Emotional states / Emotions / Epidemiology / Focus: The Emotional Economy of Science / Glasgow / Halliday James L / Historians / History of science / History, 20th Century / Humans / Identity / Influenza, Human - history / Mental health / Mixtures / Natural law / Nature / Ontology / Pathology / Philosophy - history / Political economy / Psychodynamic therapy / Psychological aspects / Psychological intervention / Psychology - history / Psychosocial factors / Psychosomatic Medicine - history / Psychosomatics / Psychotherapy / Public health / Science / Science history / Scotland / Self concept / Social psychology / United Kingdom / Value systems