Ways of being and feeling in the acceleration and the contemporary limitlessness

Abstract

This study aims at discussing the question of looking in contemporary societies, highlighting the increasingly marked presence of forms of individualism and narcissism. It is based on a genealogical perspective to clarify the contemporary, trying to tell apart developments, transformations and commotions. It remarks that the social, political and anthropological upheavals, in particular due to the presence of images and monitors, the existence of continuous strea ms and incessant visual requests affect the look of the individual, showing paradoxical processes of individualization and massification. Revisiting and unfolding aspects of the debate already proposed by authors such as Benjamin, Adorno, Horkheimer, Elias, Mauss, Simmel and Le Goff, the article addresses, from a historical perspective, the issue of look deprivation throughout the evolvement of democracy, of the inequality of attention and later the narcissistic individualism of contemporary technologies. Finally, a deep reflection on the condition of modern man is provided together with a discussion on the importance of rethinking some of the categories of analysis in the interpretation of contemporary societies