Emotional Expressionism

Exploring emotions as social relations through the lens of dramatic television serials, this book investigates the profound role emotions play in popular mediated narratives. E. Deidre Pribram argues that collective emotions, activated through aesthetic attributes, play a crucial role in cultural storytelling.

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In Emotional Expressionism: Television Seriality, the Melodramatic Mode, and Socioemotionality, E. Deidre Pribram examines emotions as social relations through the lens of dramatic television serials to develop the concept of socioemotionality, address sociocultural forms of felt experience, and explore the role of emotions in forging social relations and narrative worlds. Through detailed analyses of serials like Breaking Bad, How to Get Away with Murder, and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Pribram argues that the prominent role emotions play in popular mediated narratives demonstrates the crucial impact of collective emotions—activated through aesthetic attributes—on cultural storytelling. Scholars of television, communication, and cultural studies will find this book of particular interest.