The expanding field of affective neuroscience is redefining the role of emotions in cognition, reasoning, and judgment. This contradicts long-standing assumptions about cognition that consider emotions antithetical to learning. Emotions arose early in human brain development as essential to survival by directing the embodied brain toward…

In this paper we move from considering the chair as an (inanimate) object, to exploring its vitality through a more vibrant and active reading of this inescapable everyday item. We are inspired by feminist new materialism and how affect shapes our understanding of matter. Reading matter in this way surfaces our orientations toward everyday items…