Inaugural Lecture: Professor Mary Holmes

How we feel now

Professor Mary Holmes, School of Social and Political Science, delivers her inaugural lecture How we feel now.

Ideas circulate about young people as sensitive, anxious ‘snowflakes’ compared to supposedly emotionally robust older generations, especially those who lived through the Second World War. I am not so convinced about this comparison, so this lecture will take us through some of the social changes of the last century or two. What have these changes meant for how we experience, understand and express our emotions? I will examine how globalisation and greater social diversity have challenged and changed how we feel. This diversity has resulted from histories of colonisation, migration and political resistance. Drawing on some of my research on white settlement in Aotearoa New Zealand, feminism, distance relationships, and on British feelings since the 1930s, I reflect on whether we are increasingly expected to know and share what we feel. I will tell some stories about how changes in emotional life operate at both larger and more intimate levels, hindering some connections and enabling others. Through these examples and stories I will convey how emotions are fundamental to navigating and changing a complex social world.

Recorded on 6 March 2023.

Image credits

All photographs are the author’s apart from:

Empty streets, 2020, Mass observer 04128, permission courtesy of the Mass Observation Archive Trustees.

King, Marcus, 1891-1983. King, Marcus, 1891-1983 :[The signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, February 6th, 1840]. 1938.. Ref: G-821-2. Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, New Zealand. /records/22308135. Personal, non-commercial use licence.

Tupaia’s map. This work is in the public domain.

Nineteenth century migration routes. This work is in the public domain.

Google maps data 2022, fair use and attribution licence.

Northcote Primary School as a hospital 1918, non-commercial use licence. Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections, BO155.

Northcote emergency hospital 1918, non-commercial use licence, Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections. 1571-2.

Margaret McCahon. Enlargement from photograph above.

Photographs of Jane Rendall and Treva Broughton from University of York website. Public domain.

Raetihi Non-Smoking Club, 1902. Auckland Weekly News, Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, AWNS-19020403-12-3. Non-commercial use licence.

The Piano. Fair use licence.

Broadsheet 107, March 1983: back cover. Licenced for not-for-profit educational use. University of Auckland.

Photograph of Audre Lorde, Creative commons licence.

Promotional image of cover of author’s book: Distance Relationships. Palgrave MacMillan, 2014.

Promotional image of cover of author’s book: Heterosexuality in question. Routledge, 2016.

Photograph of Chris Beasley from University of Adelaide. Public domain.

Photograph of Heather Brook. Public domain.

Screenshot of Guardian article, The Guardian, 2011.

Family sheltering from bush fire, Tim Holmes. Public domain.

Greatest generation/Entitled generation. Meme from LouderCrowder.com. Public domain.

Screenshot of Mass Observation Online, What is Happiness?. Permission courtesy of the Mass Observation Archive Trustees.

Feeling fluctuations, Mass Observation Archive, 1940. Permission courtesy of the Mass Observation Archive Trustees.

Feeling fluctuations diary, Mass Observation Archive, 1940. Permission courtesy of the Mass Observation Archive Trustees.

Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh 1937, https://library.rcsed.ac.uk/about-us/blog/archive/i-am-a-refugee-of-nazi-oppression-the-scottish-royal-medical-colleges-and-medical-refugees. Royal College of Surgeons Archive. Non-commercial use permitted.