The Fascination with Violence in Contemporary Society

This book directly explores the question of why contemporary society is so fascinated with violence and crime. The Fascination with Violence in Contemporary Society posits that the phenomenon is, in part, because we have all become consumers of the sublime: an intense and strongly ambiguous emotion which is increasingly commodified. Through the experience of violence and the sense of disorientation that accompanies it, we obsessively seek out moments of intensified existence. Equally, crime continues to speak to the depths of the collective unconscious, questioning us about our transience and the model of society we wish to live in. Binik proposes that this is why the reaction to violence has become a tool with which to express and take ownership of a desire for social cohesion. This book uses interviews with viewers, dark tourists, collectors and others to find further interrogate this social trend. Many of these are participants of four key case studies explored within the study: a true-crime TV series, the trend of dark tourism, murderabilia collecting and the fanaticism of (and for) Anders Breivik. This book seeks to answer one of the most pressing cultural trends of the modern age, and fill in a gap in the criminological literature on the subject.

Auteur
Oriana Binik is a research fellow at the University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy.

Contenu
1.Introduction
2.When crime is sublime2.1Sympathy for the (d)evil: the fascination with crime 2.2Targeting the phenomenon: from expulsion narrative to proximity narrative2.3A psycho-social approach: for a cultural criminology of emotions 2.4The emotions involved in fascination with crime: the sublime, the uncanny, the state of awe2.4.1. On The Sublime: violence as unrepresentable wound2.4.2. Edmund Burke' s enquiry into the Sublime and Beautiful 2.4.3. From terror to morals: Kant's sublime2.4.4. Losing oneself is wonderful: uncanny crime2.4.5. Awe-ful moments2.5Potential connections: at the roots of a single emotional experience2.5.1. The sense of vastness and power when a boundary is crossed2.5.1.1. The limit by definition: death2.5.1.2. The limits from sacred to profane and Durkheim's effervescence2.5.1.3. The confines between the Pleasure Principle and the Reality Principle 2.5.2. Undecipherability and the need for accommodation3. Effervescent and ready for use: the sublime and other emotions in the Carnival of crime 3.1. Little Red Riding Hood3.2. The sublime, now3.3. The liminal experience and the Carnival of crime3.4. The carnivalesque and crime, now3.5. A possible bifurcation in thought: consumption and effervescence3.5.1. Crime consumption, chillness and enjoyment 3.5.1.1 Consuming crime3.5.1.2. Consumption: from psychoanalysis to sociology3.5.2. Crime at the center of collective warm and Dyonisiac effervescence3.5.2.1. Violence from sacred to profane3.5.2.2. The sacredness of effervescence: Bataille and Bastide3.5.2.3. The return of Dionysus: Michel Maffesoli
3.5. A few clarifications
4.In the cultural criminology hall of mirrors4.1. The cultural diamond and fascination with crime 4.2.The place of emotions (and the sublime) in culture4.3. Methodological choices4.4. The dual carnival metaphor and the bond between the social world and cultural objects4.5. Research techniques or go out and get your hands dirty in real research
5.From sublime to resentment: emotional pathways watching crime on television5.1. Case study: the Quarto Grado TV series5.2. The trajectory5.3. The morbid blend of attraction and repulsion5.4. The sense of vastness and power when a boundary is crossed 5.4.1. Am I capable of it too?5.4.2. Look how easy is to die!5.5 Undecipherability and the need for accommodation 5.6. Sublime. Use instruction5.7. The commodification of the sublime5.7.1. Selecting and framing crime5.7.2. The aestheticization of violence and visual spectacle5.7.3. Proximity, when the monster is at home5.7.4. The melding of real life and fiction5.7.5. The indeterminate nature of the cold case5.8. An effervescent resentment5.8.1. Collective effervescence and the process as ritual 5.8.2. The Imaginary, fragile rituals and perpetual activation5.8.3. From sublime to resentment
6.In the wild land in search of a story: dark tourism6.1. Dark tourism and its nuances6.2. The research6.3. The sense of vastness and power when a boundary is crossed6.3.1. Death 6.3.2. The eagle and the wild boar: the authentic traces of a history6.4. Undecipherability and the need for accommodation6.5. The feeling rules 6.5.1. Time 6.5.2. Strong stories<div&g...