Unnatural Emotions: Everyday Sentiments on a Micronesian Atoll and Their Challenge to Western Theory

By Catherine A. Lutz

Book Overview

"An outstanding contribution to psychological anthropology. Its excellent ethnography and its provocative theory make it essential reading for all those concerned with the understanding of human emotions."--Karl G. Heider, American Anthropologist

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0226497224
• ISBN13: 9780226497228
• Release Date: October 1988
• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Length: 281 Pages
• Weight: 0.89 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.9" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

Emotions as a cultural product

An interesting book asserting emotions are culturally constructed. Lutz did fieldwork on Ifaluk, a Micronesian atoll, & studied the Ifaluk coneption of emotions & of the self. Ifaluk ethnopsychology includes such emotions as fago 'love/sadness/compassion', song 'justified anger', ker 'excitement/happiness/anger' & rus 'anxiety/panic/surprise.' What exactly does classing emotions differently mean? Do the Ifaluk people just call them different things? Do they *feel* different things than we do? What does it all mean? I am fascinated although not entirely convinced by this book. My grad school advisor suggests there are certain basic sort of proto-emotions that are generated by hormones & things basic to all human beings, but that how these are shaped & perceived depends on culture. Anyway, this is a really interesting book, & a good read (well-written). I highly recommend it.