Overview

Romantic love presents some of life's most challenging questions. Can we choose who to love? Is romantic love rational? Can we love more than one person at a time? And can we make ourselves fall out of love? Berit Brogaard here attempts to get to the bottom of love's many contradictions. This short book, informed by both historical and cutting edge philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience, combines a new theory of romantic love with entertaining anecdotes from real life and accessible explanations of the neuroscience underlying our wildest passions. Against the grain, Brogaard argues that love is an emotion; that it can be, at turns, both rational and irrational; and that it can be manifested in degrees. We can love one person more than another and we can love a person a little or a lot or not at all. And love isn't even always something we consciously feel. However, love -- like other emotions, both conscious and not -- is subject to rational control, and falling in or out of it can be a deliberate choice. This engaging and innovative look at a universal topic, featuring original line drawings by illustrator Gareth Southwell, illuminates the processes behind heartbreak, obsession, jealousy, attachment, and more.

Full Product Details

Author:   Berit Brogaard (Professor of Philosophy, Department of Philosophy and Center for Neurodynamics, University of Missouri, St. Louis)
Publisher:   Oxford University Press Inc
Imprint:   Oxford University Press Inc
Dimensions:   Width: 13.50cm , Height: 2.50cm , Length: 18.60cm
Weight:   0.328kg
ISBN:  

9780199370733

ISBN 10:   0199370737
Pages:   288
Publication Date:   12 February 2015
Audience:   General/trade ,  General
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   To order  
Stock availability from the supplier is unknown. We will order it for you and ship this item to you once it is received by us.

Table of Contents

Preface Chapter 1: Letter from a Friend Chapter 2: The Chemistry of Love Your Brain on Crack Beliefs and Brain Chemistry Taking the Drug Away Addicted to Grief Emotional Pain Stress, Pimples and Gray Hair Love and Hate Chapter 3: The Philosophy of Love Love as an Emotion Basic and Complex Emotions The James-Lange Theory The Conjunctive Theory of Emotions The Connection Problem The Problem of Emotional Responses to Fiction The Perceived-Response Theory Chapter 4: Irrational Love Does the Idea of Irrational Love Make Sense? You Call It Madness, I Call It Love Irrational Compassionate Love Love as a Moral Emotion Love as a History Love and Personal Identity Is Love Unconditional? Love and Personal Identity Love and Sex Chapter 5: Relationships and Insecure Attachment Avoidant Attachment Style Secure Versus Insecure Attachment Avoidant Attachment Anxious Attachment Childish Relationships Jealousy and Anxious Attachment Attachment and the Relationship Theory Can Attachment Styles Change? Familiar Love Attachment Love Can Animals Love? The Other Dimension of Sex Chapter 6: Our Unconscious Affections Opponents of Unconscious Affection Unconscious Affect Unconscious Love In Your Dreams Is Love a Disposition Chapter 7: He Is Just Not That into You (And Other In-Between Cases) Prototype Theory Non-Monogamous Love as In-Between Cases Love is a Gradable Verb He's Just Not That Into You Ambivalence Chapter 8: How To Fall Out of Love Sigmund Freud and Friedrich Nietzsche Psychoanalysis and Talk Therapy Emotional Regulation and Avoidance Behavior The Repetition Technique Prolonged Exposure Therapy Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing Deep Relaxation and Meditation Heartbreak and Placement Conditioning The Sinclair Method Out, Damned Spot: Using Soap to Wash Away Your Negative Feelings Emotional Regulation as a Route to Happiness The End: The Heart Wants What It Wants References

Reviews

Brogaard's book is written to be accessible to general readers without sacrificing philosophical content. It offers more than enough interesting current theoretical work to merit serious attention by professional readers. Whimsical line drawings by illustrator Gareth Southwell add to the book's appeal. Essential. Choice ... it is a helpful manual to be used in case of being harmed in love... Metapsychology Online Reviews It is fascinating in that it discusses so much literature - both in philosophy and in science - that the reader is bound to learn something new. In addition, Brogaard does not shy away from critically evaluating the ideas she presents ... I recommend the book to anyone who wants to know more about the topic. Hichem Naar, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews

.. .Berit Brogaard's On Romantic Love is an achievement... Brogaard illustrates her arguments with acute philosophical intelligence, stylistic verve, and concrete human examples... She allows readers to engage in a very personal way with profound, contentious philosophical positions. She also navigates easily through the tempestuous technical waters of contemporary neurological research on love, which is where we might expect a flood of future insights. --The Chronicle of Higher Education

Author Information

Berit Brogaard is Professor of Philosophy, University of Miami. Her book Transient Truths was published by Oxford University Press in 2012. In her academic research she specializes in philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, and the cognitive sciences.

Tab Content 6

Author Website:  

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

No review item found!

Add your own review!

Countries Available

All regions