Affect

Definition

According to Massumi, affect is fluid and dynamic. A preconscious emotion sensed in the body and has political implications but cannot be reduced to well-known emotions like jealousy or joy is referred to as an “affect.”

Explanation

In contrast to the cognitive component of mental experience, affect refers to the emotional or element of feeling. When we discover that our parent has passed away, we act cognitively; when we are upset by that information, we act in an affective way.

Limitations for social research may result from the notion of affect as an autonomous force that is precognitive, beyond the semiotic systems, inaccessible to explanation and quantification, and resistant to framework and analysis.

Scholars’ views on the concept of affect have been divided by Emile Durkheim’s attempts to comprehend the compelling force of social currents, which offer a means to reassess the distinctions between affect and structure and the idea of a “presocial.” Although the sociology of emotions has a long tradition, theories of affect assert that they raise new issues about infective emotional currents.