In the West, emotions are often understood through the philosophy of cognition and experimental psychology – separated from the world of art and aesthetic. However, in pre-modern India, aesthetic and emotion were deeply intertwined. In this 10-Minute Talk, Professor Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad FBA discusses how the aesthetics of drama and literature were key to understanding emotions in the Sanskrit tradition, exploring ideas from Bharata’s treatise on drama to Abhinava Gupta’s theory of viewership. Hear his consideration of this ecology of affect, and the question of its role in our understanding of ourselves and others today. 

Speaker: Professor Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad FBA, Distinguished Professor of Comparative Religion and Philosophy, Lancaster University  

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.  

10-Minute Talks are a series of pre-recorded talks from Fellows of the British Academy screened each Friday on YouTube and also available on Apple Podcasts. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/10-minute-talks/id1530020476    

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