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ODRADEK CFP: Melancholy: black humor and its metamorphoses

08 Wednesday Feb 2017

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CALL FOR PAPERS

Melancholy: black humor and its metamorphoses

ODRADEK

Studies in Philosophy of Literature, Aesthetics and New Media Theories

 Odradek. Studies in Philosophy of Literature, Aesthetics and New Media Theories is an International Journal (http://zetesis.cfs.unipi.it/Rivista/index.php/odradek/index) founded by Zetesis (www.zetesisproject.com) Research Group on the Quarrel between Philosophy and Poetry. Zetesis is a Research Center related to the University of Pisa History, Philosophy, and Arts Department.

 The Journal publishes in online version powered by Open Journal System (OJS)

ISSN: 2465-1060

 Section Editor: Valentina Serio (Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa)

 Authors are cordially invited to submit papers for the upcoming fifth edition of the Journal that will deal with Melancholy: black humor and its metamorphoses.

 Submission deadline: 10th June 2017

Language: English, German, Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese.

The paper can be submitted online via OJS – Open Journal System:

http://zetesis.cfs.unipi.it/Rivista/index.php/odradek/index

 Authors can find submission guidelines at the following link:

http://zetesis.cfs.unipi.it/Rivista/index.php/odradek/about/submissions#onlineSubmissions

 All papers will be reviewed according to our peer review process policy:

http://zetesis.cfs.unipi.it/Rivista/index.php/odradek/about/editorialPolicies#peerReviewProcess

For any further detail or information please feel free to contact the section editor at:

valentina.serio@sns.it

The problem of melancholy is at the crossroad of a variety of branches of knowledge such as, literature, medicine, fine arts, music, and psychology. Indeed, the concept of melancholy had been employed over the centuries in order to designate different states of mind along with the related somatic symptoms: black mood, Sloth, spleen, mal de vivre, boredom, nausea, hysteria and depression. The protean nature of melancholy is, in fact, the result of a long tradition of reflection on this theme that can be traced back to the Ancient Greece.

Originally, the idea of melancholy comes from ancient Greek medicine, which is based on the study of four fundamental humors (blood, phlegm, yellow and black bile). According to the ancient medical tradition, the different combination of these humors is responsible for different temperaments, or dispositions, and, ultimately, for the health or the illness of human body. In this scenario, black bile – or melancholy, from ancient Greek mèlaina cholé – causes the worst physical and psychological features: ugliness, dullness, idiocy, sadness, foolishness, and so on.

This conception of melancholy as a malady survives during the Middle Age but, in addition, assumes a new religious meaning.

The Renaissance constitutes a turning point for the history of melancholy: at this point, melancholy is associated with genius. Starting from Marsilio Ficino, who retrieves and extensively recasts Aristotle’s Problemata XXXI, the melancholic humor becomes the one proper to geniuses, artists and scholars.

This idea is further developed in the Modern Age by a great number of thinkers and writers (for instance, think of Lawrence Sterne’s use of Burton’s study The Anatomy of Melancholy for justifying the setting out of his Tristram Shandy).

Between 19th and 20th centuries, some historians of art devote their studies to Albrecht Dürer’s Melencolia I and its legacy in the history of modern culture: think, for example, of Carl Gielhow’s Dürers Stich “Melencolia I” und der maximilianische Humanistenkreis, Heinrich Wölfflin’s Die Kunst Albrecht Dürers, and Aby Warburg’s Heidnisch-antike Weissagung in Wort und Bild zu Luthers Zeiten.

 In this way, they initiate a new metamorphosis of the understanding of this mood, which is developed in the works of thinkers such as Sigmund Freud, Walter Benjamin, Thomas Mann, Samuel Beckett, and Julia Kristeva.

For the fifth issue of Odradek, we invite contributors to consider a specific topic among the many dimensions of melancholy, and we welcome papers of various disciplines.

In the following list, you can find some possible topics:

  • Melancholy and music as therapy for the illness
  • Melancholy, literary genres and styles
  • Melancholy and its religious meaning, from the sin of Sloth to despair
  • Melancholy and the anxieties of Modern Age
  • Melancholy and the nature of the artist
  • Melancholy in filmography
  • Melancholy and the Warburg Institute

Versione italiana: Melancolia. Metamorfosi dell’umor nero

La storia della melancolia è certamente una storia ricca e di lunga durata: se volessimo seguirne l’intero percorso, dovremmo indagare a fondo in diversi ambiti: dalla letteratura alla medicina, dalle arti figurative alla musica e alla psicologica.

Il lessico stesso conferma la natura proteiforme di tale soggetto mettendo in risalto tutte le possibili ramifazioni: umor nero, accidia, spleen, mal de vivre, noia, nausea, isteria e depressione.

Originariamente, il concetto di melancolia proviene dalla medicina dell’antica Grecia, basata sulla distinzione di quattro umori fondamentali (sangue, flemma, bile gialla e bile nera). La loro varia combinazione determina temperamenti diversi, così come la condizione di salute o infermità del corpo umano. La bile nera – o melancolia, dal greco mèlaina cholé – causa le peggiori caratteristiche fisiche e psicologiche: bruttezza, idiozia, tristezza, follia e via dicendo.

Tale concezione della melancolia sopravvive nel Medioevo, assumendo nuovi significati religiosi. Il Rinascimento rappresenta un punto di svolta per la storia della melancolia: partendo dalle opere di Marsilio Ficino, in cui si recupera e sviluppa il passo XXXI dei Problemata, la melancolia diviene il temperamento proprio degli uomini di genio, artisti e intellettuali. Una simile idea è poi ulteriormente sviluppata in età moderna da numerosi pensatori e scrittori (solo per citare un esempio, si pensi all’appropriazione, da parte di Lawrence Sterne, dell’Anatomia della melancolia di Burton per giustificare l’impianto del suo Tristram Shandy).

Tra XIX e XX secolo, alcuni storici dell’arte hanno dedicato le proprie ricerche alla Melancolia I di Albrecht Dürer’s e alla sua influenza nella storia della cultura moderna. Si pensi, ad esempio, a Dürers Stich “Melencolia I” und der maximilianische Humanistenkreis di Carl Gielhow, Die Kunst Albrecht Dürers di Heinrich Wölfflin, e Heidnisch-antike Weissagung in Wort und Bild zu Luthers Zeiten di Aby Warburg. In tal modo, essi hanno inaugurato una nuova metamorfosi nella comprensione della melancolia, che include pensatori come Sigmund Freud, Walter Benjamin, Thomas Mann e Samuel Beckett.

Per il quinto numero di Odradek, invitiamo gli autori interessati a considerare su un aspetto specifico dei molti possibili della storia della metamorfosi della melancolia. In particolare, apprezzeremo la capacità dell’autore di muovere fra le diverse discipline coinvolte

Di seguito alcuna lista non esaustiva dei possibili temi:

  • La melancolia e il suo trattamento medico attraverso la musica
  • Melancolia, stili e generi letterari
  • La melancolia e il suo significato religioso, dal peccato d’accidia alla disperazione
  • La melancolia e le inquietudini dell’età moderna
  • La melancolia e la natura dell’artista
  • La melancolia nella filmografia
  • La melancolia e il Warburg Institute

CFP Emotion and Cognition

03 Friday Jun 2016

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Segnaliamo con piacere il seguente call for papers della RiFP – Rivista internazionale di Filosofia e Psicologia:

 

Emotions and Cognition: Philosophy, Psychology, and Neuroscience in Dialogue

 

What is an emotion? What is the relationship between emotion and cognition? How can one best articulate the distinction, if there is one, between cognition and emotion? What is the function of emotion with respect to cognition? And what contribution can neuroscience make to our understanding of emotions and the relationship between cognition and emotion? These are just a few of the key questions addressed by those philosophers, psychologists and neuroscientists who investigate emotional experience.

RiFP – Rivista internazionale di Filosofia e Psicologia, with the support of SINe – Società italiana di Neuroetica e Filosofia delle Neuroscienze, seeks to promote a broad interdisciplinary discussion on these themes for the first issue in 2017. RIFP and SINe invite all scholars who wish to contribute to this discussion to send original manuscripts on the relationship between emotion and cognition, from a theoretical and/or empirical and/or historical approach. The sub-themes of the present call for papers include, but are not limited to:

 

(a) work that focuses, including from a historical perspective, on the relationship between emotions and knowledge, by defining the possible differences between, or identity of, emotional experiences and cognitive processes. The relationship between emotion and reason has a complex and well-articulated history that has developed around two main perspectives: a Humean perspective that assigns an important role to the “passions”, and a Kantian perspective that, in contrast, downplays the emotions privileging the role of “disembodied” thought. That the emotions play a fundamental role in psychic life and mental processes no matter how the latter are defined, is today considered beyond doubt. Contemporary discussion instead focusses on the nature of the relationship between emotions and cognition in various circumstances. We are especially interested in contributions which provide a diachronic perspective on contemporary research, pointing out blind spots and dead ends in the debate to date, and indicating which avenues of research have the most potential for elucidating our understanding of the interactions between emotion and cognition. We will also welcome contributions that present the most influential contemporary proposals, outlining their strengths and weaknesses in order to provide a taxonomy that helps to map out the current discussion.

 

(b) work that considers the role of emotions in the genesis and interpretation of psychological “pathology”, explicating which conditions should in fact be defined as “pathological” and which might instead be reinterpreted and re-categorized  (as “normalcy”, “anomaly”, “different cognitive style”). In particular, we welcome contributions which offer new interpretive perspectives on emotional dysfunction and the various kinds of therapeutic modalities for the treatment of dysfunction.

 

(c) work that explores neurophysiological aspects of emotional experiences, focusing on the central role of the limbic system in producing the emotional experience that structures the behavior of the individual. Both from a neurobiological and a theoretical-interpretative point of view, the properties of the limbic system have received increasing attention leading to modifications in descriptions of this system in current research. Contributions that provide up to date information on current research and debates in this area are especially welcome.

 

(d) work investigating the connection between morals and emotions, focusing in particular on the links between research in ethics and cognitive neuroscience, which demonstrate that both descriptive and normative theories can and must (or, vice versa, cannot and must not) take into consideration and incorporate  new findings related to the role of brain functions in judgements and behaviors.

 

(e) work in behavioral economics and neuroeconomics that highlights the complementary and/or antagonistic role(s) of emotion and cognition in decision making. Only several decades ago, economics, considered as an autonomous discipline, tended to reduce decision making to a function based on the simple maximization of individual utility.

 

Manuscript preparation and submission

Manuscripts should not exceed 9,000 words (including footnotes) and must be submitted through the online submission procedure available on the journal internet site by September 30th, 2016.

Manuscripts written in Italian or English will be considered for publication. An English abstract of max. 150 words and 5 English key-words must be provided. Please, insert the code “Emotion&Cognition2016” in the box “Communications to the Editor” in the online submission form (step 1). Two separate documents should be submitted. The first document must be anonymous and contain only the manuscript and abstract without any identifying information about the author(s). A second document (called “supplementary file”) must be submitted separately (step 3) and include pictures, tabs, title, abstract, the whole manuscript as well as author(s)’ name, affiliation, e-mail, and surface postal address.

After a preliminary assessment by the Editorial Board, submissions undergo a double–blind peer review process. For instructions on how to prepare the manuscript, click on the link “How to ensure a blind review” available on the internet site. The decision will be communicated to the authors within 6 weeks after submission. After manuscript acceptance, an authors’ guideline will be provided to copyedit the final version of the manuscripts.

For further information please email Andrea Lavazza: lavazza67@gmail.com