Cultural Approaches to Disgust and the Visceral

This edited volume traces cultural appearances of disgust and investigates the varied forms and functions disgust takes and is given in both established and vernacular cultural practices.
Contributors focus on the socio-cultural creation, consumption, reception, and experience of disgust, a visceral emotion whose cultural situatedness and circulation has historically been overlooked in academic scholarship. Chapters challenge and supplement the biological understanding of disgust as a danger reaction and as a base emotion evoked by the lower senses, touch, taste and smell, through a wealth of original case studies in which disgust is analyzed in its aesthetic qualities, and in its cultural and artistic appearances and uses, featuring visual and aural media.
Because it is interdisciplinary, the book will be of interest to scholars in a wide range of fields, including visual studies, philosophy, aesthetics, sociology, history, literature, and musicology.

Max Ryynänen is Senior Lecturer of Theory of Visual Culture at Aalto University. Heidi S. Kosonen is Post-Doctoral Scholar at the Department of Music, Art and Culture Studies, University of Jyväskylä Susanne C. Ylönen is Post-Doctoral Scholar at the Department of Music, Art and Culture Studies, University of Jyväskylä.

Introduction 1. From Visceral to the Aesthetic: Tracing Disgust in Contemporary Culture Max Ryynänen, Heidi S. Kosonen, and Susanne C. Ylönen SECTION I: Aesthetic Approaches to Disgust 2. Overcoming Disgust: Why, When, and Whether Carolyn Korsmeyer 3. The Affective Nature of Horror Filippo Contesi 4. Illustrating Disgust as an Aesthetic Sentiment: Bharata's N--yä-stra and Abhinavagupta's Abhinavabh-rat- S. Bhuvaneshwari SECTION II: Disgust and Othering 5. "Childish, Self-Centered, and Cruel": Classed Disgust, Maternal Complaint, and Mediated Morality in an Anonymous Online Discussion Board Armi Mustosmäki and Tiina Sihto 6. Performing Disgust: Affective Intersections of Misogyny, Racism, and Homophobia in Radical-Right Online Discussion Tuija Saresma and Urho Tulonen 7. The Yuck Factor: Reiterating Insect-Eating (and Otherness) Through Disgust Heidi S. Kosonen SECTION III: Foodways and Disgust 8. Disgust by Association: Date Labelling, Standardization, and Freshness Tanja Plasil 9. "We Did Not Shrink From Eating Carrion": Food Disgust And Early Soviet Famines Rebecca Manley and Iryna Skubii 10. Cannibals and Kin: Escaping the Disgusting in Newfoundland Fairy Tales Pauline Greenhill and Diane Tye SECTION IV: Engaging with Disgust in Music and Visual Culture 11. "The Kind of Music that Makes My Skin Crawl": Disgust Associated with Musical Experiences Henna-Riikka Peltola 12. Music to Vomit to: The Dubstep Drop, the Bass Face, and the Sound of the Social Web Edward K. Spencer 13. Generative Disgust, Aesthetic Engagement, and Community Erin Bradfield SECTION V: Disgust, Laughter, and Pleasure 14. Producing Disgust: Profanation, the Carnivalesque, and Queering as Keys for Understanding the Unsettling Pop Cultural Performance of Die Antwoord Susanne C. Ylönen 15. Mortal Bodies, Disgust, and Affective Incongruity in Stand-Up Comedy Outi Hakola 16. A Cultural Approach to Sex-Related Disgust: Rethinking Shunga and Other "Perversions" in the 21st Century Hiroshi Yoshioka