Melancholia, Temporal Disruption, and the Torment of Being both Unable to Live and Unable to Die

Hughes, Emily

doi:10.1353/ppp.2020.0024

Cited by 5 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 27 publications

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“…This experience of being beyond or outside time has also been attributed to other affective states like melancholia and also trauma. See for example [38,39]. depth of desynchronization and the pathological trajectory and severity of any particular grief experience.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As I have argued elsewhere, at a mild level of disturbance, in slowing time down, depression can involve the experience that death will not come soon enough, whilst at a moderate level of disturbance it can seem, as time stagnates to a halt, that death has become impossible. At the profound level of temporal disturbance in melancholic depression atemporality can, like grief, involve the experience that one has partially died (see [39] p. 208). Yet, as a footnote in the DSM-5 (2013) entry for Major Depressive Disorder suggests, because this experience is oriented towards the death of the self rather than the death of the other, its meaning differs significantly:…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This experience of being beyond or outside time has also been attributed to other affective states like melancholia and also trauma. See for example [38, 39].…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Depths of Temporal Desynchronization in Grief

Hughes¹

2022

Psychopathology

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Introduction: The experience of disconnection is common in first-person accounts of grief. One way in which this feeling of estrangement can manifest is through the splintering apart of the time of the mourner and the time of the world. Supplementing and extending Thomas Fuchs’ influential idea of temporal desynchronization, my aim in this article is to give an account of the heterogeneous ways in which grief can disturb time. Method: I organize these manifold experiences of temporal disruption according to a method of “depth analysis”: a phenomenological interpretation of temporal desynchronization that tracks the increasing disconnect between the mourner and the world as it manifests in time. In so doing, I draw on a wide range of descriptive first-person responses to the question “Has your experience of time changed in any way?” – included as part of an online questionnaire on the emotional experience of grief conducted recently with colleagues at the University of York. I then stratify these according to a mild, moderate, and profound level of disruption. Results: Before setting out the results of this analysis, I give a background account of Fuchs’ interpretation of temporal desynchronization in phenomenological psychopathology more generally and in grief specifically. In my results, I then supplement and extend his interpretation by setting out my phenomenological depth analysis of the increasing disconnect between the time of the mourner and the time of the world, as demonstrated by the questionnaire data. As I argue, such a fine-grained account is an important step in understanding the way time can shape the meaning and significance of different grief experiences. Following this, in my discussion, I demonstrate how a depth approach might be helpful in differentiating between temporal disturbances in a range of affective disorders and give an illustrative comparison of grief and depression. Conclusion: In conclusion, I reflect briefly on what grief might reveal about the depth and complexity of temporal experience itself. In so doing, I consider how the radical disruptions to time in grief might transform the mourner’s experience of time irreversibly but in a way that enables a renewed connection to both their deceased loved one and the world from which they have become estranged.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Depths of Temporal Desynchronization in Grief

Hughes¹

2022

Psychopathology

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“…Depending on the particular attunement with which one is affected, therefore, temporal experience is subject to a “peculiar transformation” (Heidegger, 1995 , p. 125/ GA 129/130, 189); past, present and future are denied and withheld in different configurations such that, whilst some dimensions become blocked, others are intensified. These modifications to the contours of temporal experience then have significant implications for the way in which one finds oneself in the world in any given attunement (see Hughes 2020a , b , 2022 ). It is in the sense of this inter-reliant ontological relation between attunements and temporality that the experiences of meaninglessness and monotony in boredom are necessarily intertwined for Heidegger.…”

Section: The Philosophy Of Boredommentioning

confidence: 99%

Meaninglessness and monotony in pandemic boredom

Hughes

2023

Phenom Cogn Sci

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Boredom is an affective experience that can involve pervasive feelings of meaninglessness, emptiness, restlessness, frustration, weariness and indifference, as well as the slowing down of time. An increasing focus of research in many disciplines, interest in boredom has been intensified by the recent Covid-19 pandemic, where social distancing measures have induced both a widespread loss of meaning and a significant disturbance of temporal experience. This article explores the philosophical significance of this aversive experience of ‘pandemic boredom.’ Using Heidegger’s work as a unique vantage point, this article draws on survey data collected by researchers in an ongoing project titled ‘Experiences of Social Distancing During the Covid-19 Pandemic’ to give an original phenomenological interpretation of the meaninglessness and monotony of pandemic boredom. On a Heideggerian interpretation, pandemic boredom involves either a situative confrontation with relative meaninglessness that upholds our absorption in the everyday world, or an existential confrontation with absolute meaninglessness that forces us to take up the question of our existence. Arguing that boredom during the pandemic makes this distinction difficult to sustain, I consider some of the ways in which pandemic boredom might be seen to expose and then exceed the distinctive methodological limitations of Heidegger’s philosophical interpretation of boredom.

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“…n "Melancholia, temporal disruption, and the torment of being both unable to live and unable to die" (Hughes, 2020), I discuss the way in which the temporal desynchronization of melancholia can disrupt the melancholic's relation to their own death and, on a Heideggerian interpretation, the meaning and significance of their life. In their thoughtful commentaries, Kevin Aho and Gareth Owen draw out some important points for further elaboration and clarification, the most pressing of which invoke Heidegger's interpretation of time and the radical temporalities of fundamental attunements.…”

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confidence: 99%

Heidegger and the Radical Temporalities of Fundamental Attunements

Hughes¹

2020

Philosophy, Psychiatry, & Psychology

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Melancholia, Temporal Disruption, and the Torment of Being both Unable to Live and Unable to Die

Cited by 5 publications

References 27 publications

The Depths of Temporal Desynchronization in Grief

The Depths of Temporal Desynchronization in Grief

Meaninglessness and monotony in pandemic boredom

Heidegger and the Radical Temporalities of Fundamental Attunements

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