CFP: Living Well: Histories of Emotions, Wellness & Human Flourishing

A special issue of the Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences

Submission deadline: November 1, 2018

Organized by the Forum for the History of the Human Sciences in honor
of historian John C. Burnham (1929-2017), this special issue will
bring together historical studies that analyze how the social and
behavioral sciences have attended to the meanings and conditions of
living well and human flourishing. We are interested in accounts that
consider what these sciences, as well as popular works that draw on
them, have said about living well, in its spiritual, psychological,
cultural, social, economic, and/or political dimensions.

We welcome article-length submissions that explore the development,
implementation, and critique of social and behavioral science research
and theoretical frameworks in this area. In addition, we are
interested in studies that consider the uptake of such work in the
broader society, at the level of ideas, social practices, popular
culture, and/or public policy.  We welcome manuscripts that engage
with the topics, geographical areas, and theoretical approaches that
Burnham used himself.  But we are equally interested in manuscripts
that advance other lines of analysis.

Possible topics of historical investigation include:

- self-help and other advice literature

- humanistic psychology, positive psychology, and happiness studies

- work on mindfulness and resilience

- studies of the emotions

- research from behavioral economics

- social justice movements’ use of the behavioral sciences to
challenge the conditions and inequalities impeding human flourishing
at the levels of the individual, group, and/or society

- social and behavioral scientific studies of “bad habits” and
strategies for overcoming them

- critiques of scholarly work and popular accounts of living well,
happiness, and/or positive thinking

- the biopolitics of living well

-the relationship between popular and expert views of how to live well
and flourish

- the sponsorship of studies on well-being and the use of such work by
communities, groups, private organizations, philanthropy, business,
and government.

Send manuscript submissions of approximately 10,000, including notes
and references, by November 1, 2018 to guest editors Mark Solovey
([log in to unmask]) and Debbie Weinstein
([log in to unmask]). The guest editors also welcome
preliminary inquiries about the appropriateness of particular subject
matters and lines of analysis. All submissions should follow the
format outlined in the journal’s Author Guidelines.  Submissions
selected by the guest editors will be peer-reviewed per the standard
procedures of the journal.