In Theory: Memory as an Affective Archive

Abstract

This chapter focuses on methodology in the field of affect studies. The discussion focuses on three contemporary studies of affective epistemology and traces this epistemology back to its intellectual foremothers in addition to linking it to Eve Sedgwick’s notion of “reparative reading.” The three case studies that exemplify what I call “reparative writing” include Jean Halley’s The Parallel Lives of Women and Cows: Meat Markets, Anne Cvetkovich’s Depression: A Public Feeling, and Elspeth Probyn’s Blush: Faces of Shame. Each author draws on personal memories as crucial sources of material in much the same way that they draw on more standard archival materials, thereby demonstrating their use of an “affective archive.”