WP304 Emotions and globalization

The purpose of this paper is to discuss how emotions are significant in the context of an increasingly globalized world, especially in relation to the phenomenon of migration. Research in many academic disciplines during the last two decades highlights the importance of emotions to international relations, human mobility and the new emotional networks or borders that emerge from globalization and transnationalization processes. As this research shows, the role of language is significant, yet it is inseparable from the importance of spaces, bodies, and practices. Theorizing emotions as discursive-social-embodied processes enables an analysis of the different modalities — including language — through which emotions are constituted and circulated in globalizing and transnational contexts, and highlights their subversive and transformative possibilities. It is suggested that future research needs to delve deeper into exploring the complexities and interplay of these modalities and the impact they have on the affective economies of societies at the macro- and micro-levels. It is important to acknowledge how different people and groups bring different emotional histories and embodied experiences with them, and that these histories and embodiments are embedded in a wider context of sociopolitical forces, needs and interests that involve complex, multiple actors across national borders.