Meanings and implications of love: review of the scholarship of love with a sub-Saharan focus
Abstract Love, as an emotion, binds people together in social practices that are contingent on culture, historical processes, and social trends. As such, love is a perfect site to study how people interact and to understand how power, equality, and sustainability play out in human relations. Despite...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Springer Nature
2024-01-01
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| Series: | Humanities & Social Sciences Communications |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-023-02504-1 |
| _version_ | 1797350096125296640 |
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| author | Karin Steen Alice Antoniou Lehnke Lindemann Anne Jerneck |
| author_facet | Karin Steen Alice Antoniou Lehnke Lindemann Anne Jerneck |
| author_sort | Karin Steen |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Abstract Love, as an emotion, binds people together in social practices that are contingent on culture, historical processes, and social trends. As such, love is a perfect site to study how people interact and to understand how power, equality, and sustainability play out in human relations. Despite its importance and much attention, love as a concept and form of interaction is not fully understood, especially not across cultures. In our research, mainly in sub-Saharan Africa, we show that alongside other emotions, love matters not only for passion in life or for wellbeing but also for improved resource use, increased gender equality, and, subsequently, higher food security and sovereignty – all signs of sustainability. While love is understood as a universal human phenomenon, definitions and expressions of love vary across time and cultures. Since love drives human interaction in many intertwined ways there is no single best way to define it. Yet, scholars have advanced the theory of love by identifying at least 40 major distinct but interdependent ‘love constructs’ fitting into the four main dimensions of affection, closeness, compassion, and commitment (Karandashev et al. 2022). In parallel to this and based on our review of the scholarship of love in a subset of 45 relevant academic articles from an 80-article systematic literature search of ‘love’ we find four core (and partly overlapping) types of how to speak about love as an expression and experience. These include: 1/ contextual love influenced by culture, space, and time; 2/ romantic and compassionate love; 3/ transactional love; 4/ post-humanist perspectives and ‘harmony love’. Finally, we examine love in relation to power; love-related emotions; and how understandings of love and culture impact gender relations. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-08T12:39:53Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-e3a32694736649bb8f22d82685bea3c2 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2662-9992 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-08T12:39:53Z |
| publishDate | 2024-01-01 |
| publisher | Springer Nature |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Humanities & Social Sciences Communications |
| spelling | doaj.art-e3a32694736649bb8f22d82685bea3c22024-01-21T12:14:28ZengSpringer NatureHumanities & Social Sciences Communications2662-99922024-01-011111910.1057/s41599-023-02504-1Meanings and implications of love: review of the scholarship of love with a sub-Saharan focusKarin Steen0Alice Antoniou1Lehnke Lindemann2Anne Jerneck3Lund University Centre for Sustainability Studies (LUCSUS), Lund UniversityLund UniversityLund UniversityLund University Centre for Sustainability Studies (LUCSUS), Lund UniversityAbstract Love, as an emotion, binds people together in social practices that are contingent on culture, historical processes, and social trends. As such, love is a perfect site to study how people interact and to understand how power, equality, and sustainability play out in human relations. Despite its importance and much attention, love as a concept and form of interaction is not fully understood, especially not across cultures. In our research, mainly in sub-Saharan Africa, we show that alongside other emotions, love matters not only for passion in life or for wellbeing but also for improved resource use, increased gender equality, and, subsequently, higher food security and sovereignty – all signs of sustainability. While love is understood as a universal human phenomenon, definitions and expressions of love vary across time and cultures. Since love drives human interaction in many intertwined ways there is no single best way to define it. Yet, scholars have advanced the theory of love by identifying at least 40 major distinct but interdependent ‘love constructs’ fitting into the four main dimensions of affection, closeness, compassion, and commitment (Karandashev et al. 2022). In parallel to this and based on our review of the scholarship of love in a subset of 45 relevant academic articles from an 80-article systematic literature search of ‘love’ we find four core (and partly overlapping) types of how to speak about love as an expression and experience. These include: 1/ contextual love influenced by culture, space, and time; 2/ romantic and compassionate love; 3/ transactional love; 4/ post-humanist perspectives and ‘harmony love’. Finally, we examine love in relation to power; love-related emotions; and how understandings of love and culture impact gender relations.https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-023-02504-1 |
| spellingShingle | Karin Steen Alice Antoniou Lehnke Lindemann Anne Jerneck Meanings and implications of love: review of the scholarship of love with a sub-Saharan focus Humanities & Social Sciences Communications |
| title | Meanings and implications of love: review of the scholarship of love with a sub-Saharan focus |
| title_full | Meanings and implications of love: review of the scholarship of love with a sub-Saharan focus |
| title_fullStr | Meanings and implications of love: review of the scholarship of love with a sub-Saharan focus |
| title_full_unstemmed | Meanings and implications of love: review of the scholarship of love with a sub-Saharan focus |
| title_short | Meanings and implications of love: review of the scholarship of love with a sub-Saharan focus |
| title_sort | meanings and implications of love review of the scholarship of love with a sub saharan focus |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-023-02504-1 |
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