Anatomy of the Passions [Hardcover]

The study of facial expression and its musculature undertaken by Guillaume-Benjamin Duchenne de Boulogne in 1862, an attempt to secure biological meaning in the natural language of the emotions, resulted in the pioneeringM?chanisme du physiognomie humaine. Duchenne, who used photography to document his experiments, inspired Charles Darwin'sExpression of the Emotions in Man and Animals(1872) and had a significant influence on artists (his teachings were incorporated into the curriculum of the ?cole Normale Sup?rieur des Beaux Arts). Through Duchenne, Fran?ois Delaporte provides a remarkable philosophical and historical examination of expressive physiology during the mid-nineteenth century and considers the science of emotion as a means of revealing inner life upon the surface of the face. The central concern ofAnatomy of the Passionsis how techniques of studying facial musculature became a point of contact between existing and novel understandings of the body's expressive anatomy. Delaporte shows that Duchenne entirely reordered the knowledge and limits of expressive physiology in science and art. The face became a site where the signs of inner life are silently revealed, not yet betrayed by speech, but brought forth by reflexive physiology or by technical manipulation.Through the pioneering work of Duchenne de Boulogne, Franois Delaporte provides a remarkable philosophical and historical examination of expressive physiology during the mid-19th century, and considers the science of emotion as a means of revealing inner lifethoughts, feelingsupon the surface of the face. This remarkable book is exemplary of what the history of science can do for cultural and social history. Fran?ois Delaporte is Professor of Philosophy at Universit? de Picardie Jules-Verne in Amiens, France. His publications includeNature's Second Kingdom(1982),The History of Yellow Fever(1991), andDisease and Civilization(1986).