Introduction to the Special Issue on emotions in social life and social policy

Abstract

This Special Issue deals with emotions in social life and social policy. Over several decades, a wide body of social scientific literature has shown that everyday social roles and institutions are defined and organised not only through rational action, but through human emotions as well. It is now well recognised that emotions have a central role in the maintenance of gender and other social structures, whether at work, in family and community life, or in shaping the dynamics of social movements and politics (Goffman 1963; Hochschild 1983; Kemper 1990; Holmes 2004; Flam and King 2005; Barbalet 2006; Clarke et al. 2006; Hoggett 2009). To bring together contemporary Australian scholarship across this broad and burgeoning field, and to expand our knowledge of emotions as they operate in specific social contexts, researchers from the Universities of Sydney and New South Wales convened a workshop in October 2011 titled 'Emotions in social life and social policy: new advances in sociological and policy research'.