I’D VISIT A DOCTOR, BUT WHEN I PONDER IT, I GET THE BLUES: On affective atmospheres in Russina medical institutions (original) (raw)
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Qeios, 2022
The article deals with the issues of affective atmosphere conceptualization and atmosphere research. Using the concepts of affective atmospheres by such phenomenologists Hermann Schmitz (1928-2021), Gernot Boehme (1937-2022) and Tonino Griffero (1958), the author introduces the case of Russian medical institutions' atmospheres. The use of the "atmospheric approach" in social sciences in general, and anthropology, in particular, allows one to resist the scholars' prevailing distancing strategies that reduce social reality to mere statistical measurements or semiotics. Contemporary approaches to atmospheric design, implemented in many applied fields (urbanism, musical composition, theater, painting, marketing, etc.) give hope that medical anthropologists will soon be able to apply this knowledge for the transformation of medical institutions' atmospheres into an independent and effective therapeutic tool that not aggravates, but rather facilitates the condition of visiting patients.
Вестник Самарской гуманитарной академии. Серия "Философия. Филология". 2016. № 2 (20). С. 88-109., 2016
В статье предпринимается попытка анализа современных медико-антропологических исследований феномена пациентского опыта. Концептуализация данной проблематики стала следствием процессов гуманитаризации системы медицинского образования и развития комплекса медико-гуманитарных дисциплин, включающего в себя медицинскую антропологию. Становление медицинской антропологии связано с критикой биомедицинской модели мышления и попытками разработать культурно-ориентированный подход к осмыслению проблем здоровья и болезни. С позиций такого подхода опыт переживания пациентами конкретных заболеваний включает в себя не только физические, но также моральные и социальные страдания, причиняемые культурой. Современные медико-антропологические исследования, кроме того, проливают свет на такую сторону пациентского опыта как политическая борьба за свои права и более эффективное лечение. The article attempts to analyze modern medical and anthropological studies of the phenomenon of patient experience. Conceptualization of this problematic was the result of the processes of humanitarization of the system of medical education and the development of a complex of medical and humanitarian disciplines, including medical anthropology. The emergence of medical anthropology is associated with criticizing the biomedical model of thinking and trying to develop a culturally-oriented approach to understanding health and disease problems. From the standpoint of this approach, the experience of patients experiencing specific diseases includes not only physical, but also moral and social suffering caused by culture. Modern medical and anthropological research, in addition, sheds light on this aspect of patient experience as a political struggle for one's rights and more effective treatment.
In this paper I reflect on the concept of affective atmospheres in the context of the distinction between affect and emotion that has emerged in recent work on emotion, space and society. The concept of atmosphere is interesting because it holds a series of opposites -presence and absence, materiality and ideality, definite and indefinite, singularity and generality -in a relation of tension. To develop this account of atmosphere I juxtapose Marx's materialist imagination with a phenomenology attentive to singular affective qualities. By invoking a material imagination based on the movement and lightness of air, we learn from the former about the turbulence of atmospheres and their indeterminate quality. From the latter, we learn that atmospheres are singular affective qualities that emanate from but exceed the assembling of bodies. As such, to attend to affective atmospheres is to learn to be affected by the ambiguities of affect/emotion, by that which is determinate and indeterminate, present and absent, singular and vague.
In past decades, the subject atmosphere and mood has gone beyond the physio-meteorological and psychological scopes and become a new direction of aesthetics which concerns two sides of the same phenomenon. As the primary sensuous reality constructed by both the perceiving subject and the perceived object, atmosphere and mood are neither a purely subjective state nor an objective thing. Atmosphere is essentially a quasi-object pervaded by a specific affective quality and a ubiquitous phenomenon forming the foundation of our outer life experiences, while mood is a quasi-subject pervaded by specific objective quality and thus a ubiquitous phenomenon forming the foundation of our inner life experiences. A practical dimension is thereby, from the outset, embedded in the consideration of both concepts. This is mainly characterized by actions and, correspondingly, ethical aspects, which concern the design and creation of atmosphere and thus the triggering of mood through works of art. Here, on the one hand, the process of artistic formation, long neglected in the European tradition, is given prominence as an aesthetic practice, and on the other hand, an interactive dialogue is effectively established between the artist, the work and the viewer. Due to the fact that atmosphere and mood, both as in-between, emphasize the interaction of the perceiver and the perceived from two sides, here the decisive question is: in what kind of environment do we live or participate and in what way do we experience it? The focus of aesthetics is now not on the conventional issue whether the environment is beautiful or gives us a sense of beauty, but on how the environment influences our feeling of being there (Befinden) through our own sensuality. Such an approach would contribute to a critical transformation in aesthetic methodology, namely from the ontological and/or epistemological what to the phenomenological and anthropological how. The tension between atmosphere and mood, as revealed here, opens up a large space for exploring a new understanding of aesthetics. On this basis the special issue pursued to diversify this discussion on an international level. ARTICLES 8 Martina Sauer und Zhuofei Wang – Introduction 11 Zhuofei Wang – An Interview with Gernot Böhme 19 Elisabeth Neumann – Being Scared and Scaring Oneself in Video Games: The “Atmosfearic” Aesthetics of Amnesia: Rebirth 41 Paulo Gajanigo – The Mood for Democracy in Brazil: Controlling the Public Atmosphere During the Transitional Period 1974 – 1985 59 Zhuofei Wang – At Atmosphere and Moodmospheric Experience: Fusion of Corporeality, Spirituality and Culturality 77 Juan Albert and Lin Chen – Working with Atmospheres to Improve our Planet’s Mood 95 Andreas Rauh – Aesthetic Interest and Affectability 107 Katharina Brichetti and Franz Mechsner – Healing Atmospheres: A Design Based Study 127 Giada Lombardi, Martina Sauer, and Giuseppe Di Cesare – An Affective Perception: How “Vitality Forms” Influence our Mood
“Contemporary Aesthetics”, vol 12, , 2024
English Abstract: According to German philosopher Gernot Böhme, the “aesthetics of atmospheres” is highly important in architectural design. This holds particularly true in the design of hospitals and sanatoriums, where users require special care and attention. Moreover, in these marginal places of everyday life, not only the production of appropriate atmospheres but also the “aesthetics of care” can transform into a tool capable of influencing patients' health. This essay aims to establish a connection between the aesthetics of atmosphere and the aesthetics of care, which stem from different philosophical backgrounds, namely Phenomenology and Everyday Aesthetics. By examining their interrelations through the lens of “artification”, this paper will shed light on their potential practical applications. Italian Abstract: Secondo il filosofo tedesco Gernot Böhme, l'“estetica delle atmosfere” riveste un'importanza fondamentale nella progettazione architettonica. Questo è particolarmente vero nel caso di ospedali e sanatori, dove gli utenti necessitano di cure e attenzioni speciali. Inoltre, in questi luoghi marginali della vita quotidiana, non solo la creazione di atmosfere adeguate, ma anche l'“estetica della cura” può trasformarsi in uno strumento capace di influire sulla salute dei pazienti. Questo saggio si propone di stabilire un collegamento tra l'estetica dell'atmosfera e l'estetica della cura, che derivano da differenti ambiti filosofici, rispettivamente la Fenomenologia e l'Everyday Aesthetics. Esaminando le loro interrelazioni attraverso il concetto di “artificazione”, questo contributo mira a far luce sulle loro potenziali applicazioni pratiche.
In a neo-phenomenological mood: Stimmungen or atmospheres?
Studi di estetica” (Sensibilia 12-2018-Moods), XLVII, IV serie, 2/2019, 121-151, 2019
What is a mood (Stimmung) and why has this concept been experiencing a true renaissance in the human sciences? As a consequence of the so-called "affective turn" replacing the linguistic turn, notions like atmosphere (since the 1960s) and Stimmung/mood (in the last decade) actually seem to better explain the qualitative emotional "more" of our sensible experience. The paper explores the essential terms of today's debate, starting from its fluctuation between subjectifying approaches and objectifying ones. After debunking two relevant false myths about Stimmung (the untranslatability of the word and the supposed harmonious nature of what it expresses) and suggesting a de-axiologization both of Stim-mung/mood and atmosphere, it examines and problematizes the traditional tax-onomy of mood characteristics (duration, intensity, ubiquity, unintentionality, pragmatic uncertainty and dispositionality, non-producibility), reviews the similarities and differences between moods and atmospheres (also in the light of Hermann Schmitz's neo-phenomenology) and suggests in conclusion to conceive any distinction among moods, emotions and atmospheres as the result of a focusing-blurring alternation within the fluid continuum.