The secret life of the senses
Routledge publishes a thought-provoking exploration of the world of the senses, revealing how what we see, hear, smell, taste and touch shapes our ways of thinking, interacting, and healing.
The senses are in the news. They are being stimulated by teachers to improve literacy skills, employed in alternative medicines and treatments for autism, engaged by multimedia works of art, and seduced by immersive marketing strategies. Something is clearly stirring in the world of the senses and an engaging new book by David Howes and Constance Classen, Ways of Sensing (Routledge 2013) delves into the matter by exploring the social uses of the senses and providing a cultural counterpart to psychological studies of perception.
The authors uncover how the senses were banished from modern hospitals and compare this with their extensive use in the form of aromas, massage and music in alternative medicines. What is modern medicine missing by ignoring the possibilities of sensual healing? While the non-visual senses were likewise banished from the modern museum, the authors describe how current artistic and educational trends are beginning to turn sterile galleries into sensory gymnasia.
Ways of Sensing further explores how marketers are competing to brand our senses with trademark sounds, scents and colors, such as "Cadbury purple," and how psychologists investigating synaesthesia have ignored its fascinating and diverse forms of expression across cultures. Even at the level of politics and law, the senses play a key role in shaping society, from the common stereotyping of immigrant groups as "smelly" to conflicts over whether the ringing of church bells should be outlawed as "noise pollution". Who owns the sensory space of a community?
The product of twenty-five years of research into the social life of the senses, this important new work demonstrates that perception is a cultural process and not simply a physiological function. It is a wake-up call, rousing readers from the sleep of the senses and urging them to realize the importance of sensory "literacy" in all aspects of life.
Visit the book page at: http://www.routledge.com/u/WOS13/
978-0-415-69715-6 | $39.95 in paperback | October 2013
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NOTES TO EDITORS
For more information, a review copy, or to arrange an interview, please contact:
Ilaria Parodi, Partnership Marketing Manager, Routledge Humanities
Tel: +44 (0)207 017 7960 | Email: ilaria.parodi@tandf.co.uk
Harriet Connor, Partnership Marketing Assistant, Routledge Humanities
Tel: +44 (0)207 011 9921 | Email: harriet.connor@tandf.co.uk
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