L'expression obligatoire de sentiments (Marcel Mauss)


Addressing the question “how do poems move people?” implies thinking about affects.

 

Contemporary discussions of affects in North American anthropology seem to be rather confusing, or not lead to productive and concrete discussions.

 

Even a very good recent review in the Annual Review of Anthropology, while helpful does not seem to entirely address the question. A major incertitude concerns actual empirical research on affects.

 

I find it rewarding to return to Mauss short essay on the “obligatory expression of feelings.” (1921). Here is a pdf of the French original, though a few footnotes seem to be missing.

 

The essay makes two crucial points. They appear basic, but they set an important trajectory to approach affect:

- Weeping (in the Australian ceremonies he is discussing) is not the outer manifestation of an individual interior, but it is a collective phenomenon.

- Weeping is not free, “spontaneous”, but it is obligatory.

 

Mauss is following Durkheim in establishing the idea of social phenomena/facts. These facts are characterized by their collective and obligatory character.

 

Mauss specifies the categories of people who are tasked with weeping, certain relatives and women.

 

He also adds that these “collective expressions” are a language:

“on fait donc plus que de manifester ses sentiments, on les manifeste aux autres, puisqui’il faut les leur manifester. On se le manifeste à soi en les exprimant aux autres et pour le compte des autres.”

 

This sentence captures what retrospectively can be seen as Mauss’ concern with the idea of reciprocity and exchange as foundational, as opposed to Durkheim’s emphasis on the indistinct whole.

 

And like in Vico, the obligation stems from the need to explain oneself and explain to others in order to be understood.

 

“Obligatory” for Mauss (and Durkheim) means socially sanctioned. But as the essay on the gift will make clear, obligation coincides with freedom, to the point where the two are undistinguishable.

 

Mauss’ argument delineates the specificity of “anthropology” in relation to psychology, but also suggests that the two disciplines work in parallel in analyzing how “obligatory” expression works. One would need to study George Dumas, the psychologist quoted in the article, with whom Mauss was exchanging ideas. The idea of the externality of obligation however can also be considered a step not only in isolating the sui generis character of social facts, but also in approaching “feelings” (sentiments) not as manifestations of individual self, but as natural and social phenomena. (social because natural, natural because social). In this regard it is also interesting to read Mauss review of Willam James’ book on experience.

 

Affects for Spinoza are not to be condemned but understood. They are not defects to be decried, nor—as it sometimes more common in our times—qualities to be praised. They are part of nature. Humans are not an empire within the empire of nature; they are no different than the rest of nature.

 

In order to understand affects, Spinoza studies them as lines and points, approaching them as ruled by the laws of nature. This for him means reflecting on the chains of causes and effects that trigger them and on the modifications that they bring to the body.

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