In this article, Rosenwein examines the historiographyof emotions throughout Western history. She describes the first calls for a history of emotions and the theoretical perspective that emerged based on the grand narrative linking progress to emotional restraint. She then surveys more recent theoretical approaches to emotions, before concluding with her approach based on the recognition of “emotional communities.”
Rosenwein argues that historians have neglected emotions in the past because they were primarily writing history with political aims in mind. Rosenwein considers Febvre, who in 1941 called for writing histories of emotions. In her analysis, his appeal was not driven by a real recognition of the value of emotions but rather by a need to identify how some periods “could keep passions tamped down better than others” (823) – and in so doing construct a rational, ordered civilization. In her view, Febvre was advocating “public policy masquerading as history” (823).
Next, Rosenwein discusses the “emotionology” endorsed by Peter and Carol Stearns. In this field, the emphasis is less on feelings themselves and more on the social norms towards emotions and their expression (especially in public contexts). Rosenwein describes this as an examination of the “managed hearts of the past” (824). The Stearnses attempted to avoid “elite” history and therefore turned to “non-elite” sources such as advice manuals. Rosenwein argues that emotionology therefore excludes almost all pre-modern sources, meaning that medievalists find it impossible to engage in “true” emotionology. The Stearnses acknowledge this limitation by claiming that there was essentially no management of public emotion – no “general emotional control” (825, citing Stearns 25) – in the Middle Ages.
The German historian Norbert Elias supported this view in his 1939 book, republished and translated in the 1970s. In it, he traces the evolution of emotional control from the rude and violent folk to the restrained and civilized court, which became institutionalized with the emergence of the modern state. Indeed, Elias identifies the history of Western civilization with the history of increasing emotional restraint. Rosenwein finds echoes of this paradigm in many great theorists, from Weber to Freud to Foucault. In fact, Rosenwein sees this “grand narrative” as part of the wider use by historians of the Middle Ages as a “convenient foil for modernity” (828). She also sees a similar pattern in the use of the South – both American and European – to describe emotions and the subsequent move to civilize and tame them.
Rosenwein next turns to the Annales school, which reacted against elitist tendencies of traditional historiography by centering the “folk.” In so doing, the Annalistes “depicted the masses as passive slaves to their own mental structures” (831). Medievalists often adopt this perspective, which in Rosenwein’s view is another manifestation of Elias’ grand narrative – identifying civilization with emotional restraint. To flesh out a specific example, Rosenwein highlights the work of Peter Dinzelbacher. He largely aligns with the Annalistes, but with a distinctive emphasis on the church. Dinzelbacher agrees that the masses were slaves to mental structures, but argues that it was the church who knew how to kindle these emotions in the medieval population. Delumeau, similarly, argues that the fears are “not the passions of primitive minds but rather the transferal and broadening out of the emotional climate of the monastery” (832).
Rosenwein asserts that the grand narrative adhered to by these diverse scholars has a clear conceptual understanding of emotions at its heart. This is what Rosenwein calls “the ‘hydraulic’ model: the emotions are like great liquids within each person, heaving and frothing, eager to be let out” (834). This model derives from the medieval humors, but also accords with early-twentieth-century scientific theories of energy. The turning point in the grand narrative can be imagined as the moment when the immense flow of liquid was finally constrained and confined to its proper place. This view was “dethroned” in the 1960s and 70s by two rivals: first, the cognitive view by which emotions derive from perception and judgment; second, the view by which emotions and their display are created and transformed by their social context.
In response to the shifts in the theoretical understanding of emotion, historians have adopted new perspectives on the history of emotions. One example Rosenwein gives is Reddy’s theory of “emotives.” These are the processes by which all of us manage and shape our emotions. This theory subsumes the earlier emotionology by acknowledging that emotives are influenced both by societal norms and by individual choices. A much broader array of sources is seen as acceptable for this theory. In particular, Rosenwein asserts that medievalists think about gestures as valuable sources for emotives. An example comes from Althoff’s examination of confraternities. He sees gestures – and therefore emotions – as constituting “the medium through which power was expressed, understood, and manipulated” (841). Emotions are governed by coherent social rules that allow for their use as carriers of information – for example, about the possibility of peace, friendship, or enmity. One issue with the theory of emotives that Rosenwein highlights is that it hinges on power and politics, even though emotions were “as much a part of intimate family constellations as of high politics” (842).
In response to these trends, Rosenwein suggests her own historical approach to emotions. Her theory is based on the concept of “emotional communities.” Each of these communities has their own way of evaluating emotions and modes of emotional expression. Rosenwein recognizes that people moved amongst these communities and adjusted their approaches to emotions appropriately. What might seem to be contradictory values and attitudes in a society are seen as the characteristics of different emotional communities. Rosenwein’s model accounts for the diversity of medieval approaches to emotions by recognizing the various emotional communities in which people can exist – even simultaneously. The narrative a historian should emphasize is not based on the progress of emotional restraint but rather “on the interactions and transformations of communities holding various values and ideas, practicing various forms of sociability, and privileging various emotions and styles of expression” (845).
Rosenwein’s scholarship in this paper is admirably expansive and sensitive to her predecessors. She successfully probes a variety of sophisticated theoretical perspectives to create a coherent, sustained narrative of historiography. Her conclusion provides an intriguing and convincing suggestion for a better theoretical approach to emotions.