Introduction

Chapter 4 looks at emotional intersections around gender, which includes feminism. Feminism has engaged fully with emotions and as Ahall (2018: 41) shows, ‘a feminist approach to the politics of emotion through gender is about how we become invested in social norms, it is about the affective investments in gender as a social norm.’ A wide range of feminist writers and theorists will be considered in this chapter, particularly in the context of ‘the affective-turn’ in feminist theorizing. This chapter also looks at contemporary feminist perspectives on the emotions and reviews a wide range of contemporary feminist theoretical debates in the area.

Part II of the chapter is concerned with masculinities and emotions. De Boise and Hearn (2017), in an article entitled ‘Are men getting more emotional? Critical sociological perspectives on men, masculinities and emotions’, have challenged the idea of ‘emotional inexpressivity’ in men. This chapter will review and analyze a wide range of research on the relationship between masculinity and emotions.

Part I. Feminist perspectives on emotions – early perspectives – the ‘turn to affect’

A wide range of feminist writers and theorists will be considered in this chapter, particularly in the context of ‘the affective-turn’ in feminist theorizing. Pedwell and Whitehead (2012), in ‘Affective feminism: questions of feeling in feminist theory’, engage with the relationship between feminist theory and the ‘affective-turn’. As Pedwell and Whitehead (2012) comment:

There is a clear divide between ‘early’ feminist perspectives (Ahmed, 2004, 2010; Gorton, 2007; Hemmings, 2012; Pedwell and Whitehead, 2012), which focused on the ‘turn to affect’ in understanding gender in emotions, and contemporary feminist perspectives which focus on the relationship between feminism and neoliberalism. This is part of a broader debate on ‘the affective, cultural and psychic life of postfeminism’ (Gill and Scharff, 2011; Gill, 2017).