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Empathy

Epistemic Problems and Cultural-Historical Perspectives of a Cross-Disciplinary Concept

Palgrave Macmillan
  • Addresses the epistemic problems in empathy research resulting from its divers and cross-disciplinary cultural and conceptual history
  • Discusses how the Mirror Neuron System is connected with emotions
  • Examines empathy in relation to interpersonal and social behaviour such as altruism or care giving

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About this book

This book digs into the complex archaeology of empathy illuminating controversies, epistemic problems and unanswered questions encapsulated within its cross-disciplinary history.


The authors ask how a neutral innate capacity to directly understand the actions and feelings of others becomes charged with emotion and moral values associated with altruism or caregiving. They explore how the discovery of the mirror neuron system and its interpretation as the neurobiological basis of empathy has stimulated such an enormous body of research and how in a number of these studies, the moral values and social attitudes underlying empathy in human perception and action are conceptualized as universal traits. It is argued that in the humanities the historical, cultural and scientific genealogies of empathy and its forerunners, such as Einfühlung, have been shown to depend on historical preconditions, cultural procedures, and symbolic systems of production.


The multiple semantics of empathy and related concepts are discussed in the context of their cultural and historical foundations, raising questions about these cross-disciplinary constellations. This volume will be of interest to scholars of psychology, art history, cultural research, history of science, literary studies, neuroscience, philosophy and psychoanalysis.



Editors and Affiliations

  • Faculty of Psychology, Ruhr University Bochum, Bochum, Germany

    Vanessa Lux

  • ZfL Berlin, Berlin, Germany

    Sigrid Weigel

About the editors

Vanessa Lux is a research fellow at the Faculty of Psychology at Ruhr University Bochum, Germany. From 2011 to 2015, she was a postdoctoral researcher at the Center for Literary and Cultural Research Berlin in research projects on epigenetics and neuropsychoanalysis. She is a member of the International Society for Theoretical Psychology.


Sigrid Weigel is a research scholar and former Director of the interdisciplinary Center for Literary and Culture Research in Berlin, an expert of Benjamin, Warburg, Heine, Freud, Arendt, Scholem et al. and has published on the cultural history of knowledge, images and European cultural history.


Bibliographic Information

Buy it now

Buying options

eBook USD 59.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book USD 79.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access