‘Given it is all so remote from us’: family secrets, ancestral shames and the proximities of emotion

Abstract

This article examines how families relate emotionally to their ancestors as they deal with the discovery of past family secrets. In response to Eduardo Bericat’s (2012) call for sociologists of emotion to pay closer attention to the ways that ‘emotional experiences happen over time’, I explore how families imagine and register the emotions of the past. To do this, I draw on concepts from the sociology of the family and personal life and cultural studies of affect and emotion. I use these concepts to examine what I term ‘emotional proximities’ within responses from a qualitative survey about intergenerational family secrets. The analysis explores how respondents locate emotions as both the cause and effect of family secrets, but crucially also the force that cuts or ties descendants to their ancestors. This study opens up our capacity to consider what work emotions do within families. I argue that attention to how families navigate the emotions that surround inherited secrets foregrounds the emotional labour that goes into sustaining family identities over time.

Stigma, shame and family secrets as consequences of mental illness in previous generations: A micro-history approach

“…The Fletcher and Kett families managed the secret of mental illness in different ways. Barnwell (2019b) found that people spoke about emotional closeness and time or recency when decided how to manage secrets within families. She also noted that we needed to learn more about how and why families deal with stigma and secrets (Barnwell, 2019a) and the micro-histories provide clues to why the families acted differently.…”

“…There are also differences in the strength of emotions within families, between and within generations and over time and distance, and these would influence the extent of shame and stigma. People have referred to proximity of time and relationship when discussing family emotions in relation to secrets (Barnwell, 2019b) and we would argue that geographic distance is also important, both for keeping secrets and for feeling released from obligation to maintain secrecy. Norms of behaviour change over time, too, and behaviours or events once considered shameful may now be more acceptable or less deserving of shame.…”

“…Conversely, revelations of secrets such as homosexuality can lead to sorrow and concern for the relatives involved. Mental illness and institutionalisation were often identified among events that families sought to conceal (Barnwell, 2019b).…”

Emotional reflexivity in the time of COVID-19: working-class emotional practices

“…These ideas draw on thinking about the internal conversation, which describes the often emotional ways in which people imagine interactions with significant (usually intimate) or generalised others (Mead, 1925: 274;1934/1962. Those intimate and nearby are important but emotional connections are also maintained through inner dialogues, and felt connections, with those physically distant, no longer living, or even imagined (Hepworth and Featherstone, 1974;Roseneil, 2009;Barnwell, 2019). However, to speak of using internal and external 'conversations' to make one's way through the world (Archer, 2003), may over-emphasise the importance of talk as an emotional practice.…”

The Ghost of the ‘Y’: Paternal DNA, Haunting and Genealogy

“…Porter (2011, p. 16) discusses the arguments for and against with reference to the accounts he discusses in his book and concludes that if the motivation of the individual revealing such secrets is to arrive at understanding and to share such understanding with others who have had similar experiences, then revelation is justified. Barnwell (2019), in a survey of Australian family historians who had discovered family secrets, found that emotional proximity, sometimes across time, to those with the secrets and perceived emotional risks to the living were influential in people's ethical decision-making as to who and what to tell about their findings. In my story, some of the details constitute secrets kept by my father, but more significant are the secrets that it seems were kept from him by his family, whose reasons for doing so I do not know and probably never will know.…”