Misery and Company: Sympathy in Everyday LifeIn a kind of social tour of sympathy, Candace Clark reveals that the emotional experience we call sympathy has a history, logic, and life of its own. Although sympathy may seem to be a natural, reflexive reaction, people are not born knowing when, for whom, and in what circumstances sympathy is appropriate. Rather, they learn elaborate, highly specific rules—different rules for men than for women—that guide when to feel or display sympathy, when to claim it, and how to accept it. Using extensive interviews, cultural artifacts, and "intensive eavesdropping" in public places, such as hospitals and funeral parlors, as well as analyzing charity appeals, blues lyrics, greeting cards, novels, and media reports, Clark shows that we learn culturally prescribed rules that govern our expression of sympathy. "Clark's . . . research methods [are] inventive and her glimpses of U.S. life revealing. . . . And you have to love a social scientist so respectful of Miss Manners."—Clifford Orwin, Toronto Globe and Mail "Clark offers a thought-provoking and quite interesting etiquette of sympathy according to which we ought to act in order to preserve the sympathy credits we can call on in time of need."—Virginia Quarterly Review |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 84
Page x
... social role centered around giving sympathy . The role derives from the more central , starring role , the sick role ... social interaction . Yet neither social scientists . nor crisis specialists such as hospital personnel or disaster ...
... social role centered around giving sympathy . The role derives from the more central , starring role , the sick role ... social interaction . Yet neither social scientists . nor crisis specialists such as hospital personnel or disaster ...
Page xi
... social bonds when I most needed them . Paul Williams suggested a number of factors that con- tribute to social and moral worth . Lynn Atwater and Howard Robboy called my attention to the pertinence for studying sympathy of their earlier ...
... social bonds when I most needed them . Paul Williams suggested a number of factors that con- tribute to social and moral worth . Lynn Atwater and Howard Robboy called my attention to the pertinence for studying sympathy of their earlier ...
Page 2
... sentiments , how- ever different from , or even contrary to our own . David Hume , A Treatise of Human Nature , 1739 ry to imagine a society without sympathy . Suppose unsympathetic 1. The Social Character of Sympathy.
... sentiments , how- ever different from , or even contrary to our own . David Hume , A Treatise of Human Nature , 1739 ry to imagine a society without sympathy . Suppose unsympathetic 1. The Social Character of Sympathy.
Page 5
... social life of its own . Feeling rules ( Hochschild 1979 ) and social logics ( Davis , Gardner , and Gardner 1941 ) provide scripts that guide people as they conduct their social life — and that , as we will see , includes feeling ...
... social life of its own . Feeling rules ( Hochschild 1979 ) and social logics ( Davis , Gardner , and Gardner 1941 ) provide scripts that guide people as they conduct their social life — and that , as we will see , includes feeling ...
Page 7
... social roles having to do with emotion ( Cancian and Gordon 1986 ) . Recast as description of the ideal emotional culture of his time and place , Smith's work is both insightful and useful as a benchmark of Western sympathy values and ...
... social roles having to do with emotion ( Cancian and Gordon 1986 ) . Recast as description of the ideal emotional culture of his time and place , Smith's work is both insightful and useful as a benchmark of Western sympathy values and ...
Contents
2 | |
Forms and Process | 26 |
Sympathy Entrepreneurs and the Grounds for Sympathy | 80 |
4 The Socioemotional Economy Social Value and Sympathy Margin | 128 |
5 Sympathy Biography and the Rules of Sympathy Etiquette | 158 |
The Sympathetic Response | 194 |
7 Sympathy Microhierarchy and Micropolitics | 226 |
8 Epilogue | 252 |
Research Strategies | 261 |
References | 281 |
Name Index | 299 |
Subject Index | 304 |
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Common terms and phrases
accounts actions actor American Appeal asked attention believe cards chapter characters claim consider create cultural described display economy emotions empathy example exchange expect experience explained feel sorry felt Field notes follow friends gifts give giving sympathy grounds husband important individual instance interaction Interview involved judge kind label less lives logic look luck married mean moral mother never notes obligation offer parents percent person plights poor presented Press principle problems reactions receive reciprocity relationship respondents role rules sense sentiment situation social society socioemotional Sociology someone sometimes story sympa sympathetic sympathizee sympathy margins talk things thought tion trouble understand usually victims vignette woman women worker worth York young