Compassion: The Culture and Politics of an Emotion

In Compassion, ten scholars draw on literature, psychoanalysis, and social history to provide an archive of cases and genealogies of compassion. Together these essays demonstrate how "being compassionate" is shaped by historical specificity and social training, and how the idea of compassion takes place in scenes that are anxious, volatile, surprising, and even contradictory.

Lauren Berlant is Professor of English at the University of Chicago. Among her books are The Queen of America Goesto Washington City and The Anatomy of Fantasy.