Intimacy and the Transformation of the Public Sphere

Abstract

Intimacy and the public sphere have typically been conceptualized dichotomously both in scholarly and popular accounts. Problematizing this approach, I argue that considering ‘intimacy’ and ‘public’ solely as dichotomous entities unduly limits the scope of research on intimacy. In making this case, I interpret classic social theory from the works of Simmel and Habermas. Both accounts of transformations in modernity describe the emergence of a sphere of intimacy as a corollary of these transformations, i.e. not as clearly opposed to but intricately related to the emergence of the public sphere. I reflect on the implications of these insights for contemporary studies of intimacy by applying them to the example of wedding ceremonies with the aim to explain a transition from a conspicuously ‘public’ performance to a hybrid public/private event which has now come to include experiences of intimacy supported by mediated publics.