Affectus: A Journey on the Outside of Life

We are constantly being influenced and acted upon by various people, creatures and things, in other words, by beings outside our bodies. Taking Spinoza’s concept of ’Affectus’ as a base, this book is an attempt by fourteen specialists from various fields, including anthropology, Japanese painting, primatology, cognitive psychology and philosophy, to present their work from the perspective of Affectus.

Ryoko Nishii is a professor at the Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. She holds a PhD in literature. Her specialties and interests are anthropological fieldwork, ethnography of affect and the anthropology of death. Tadashi Yanai has been a professor at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the University of Tokyo, since 2013. He received his PhD from the University of Tokyo in 1993. He was a visiting professor at the University of Barcelona, and an associate professor at Tenri University and the Graduate School of the University of Tokyo. He specializes in the anthropology of images and of nature, as well as philosophy.