The conditions that form us: media, affect, social change

Abstract

Under what conditions is social change possible today? The essays comprising this special issue grapple, each in their own way, with this question. Together, the authors contend that any attempt to understand social change must attend to the conditions of possibility for transformations of any kind, as well as the forces that condition us to feel, think, and act (differently). In these opening pages, we trace this underlying thread through to its more explicit appearances in this special issue, that is, to the attention paid by all of the authors to affect and media.