Aesthetic Hysteria

<p><em>Aesthetic Hysteria</em> is a deconstructive psychoanalytic study of hysteria using literary texts to foreground a telling encounter between two growing discourses within English studies: that of emotion/affect and trauma studies. It brings together several academic foci - the history of medicine aesthetic theory speech act theory feminism and gender and performance studies. The study uses its theoretical and philosophical questioning of a cultural phenomenon to interrogate the politics and ends of theory and is timely in addressing similar anxieties dominating contemporary critical and cultural theory.</p>