Appel à contributions : Objects and Discourses of Resentment

21-22 octobre 2026, Brest (France)

Date : 21-22 octobre 2026
Lieu : Brest, France
Organisateur : Mohamed Saki (mohamed.saki@univ-brest.fr)
Mail de contact : d&o_ressentiment@univ-brest.fr
Calendrier :

• Soumission des résumés : 14 juin 2026
• Notification aux auteurs : 10 juillet 2026

Format de soumission : We invite proposals for individual papers (25-minute presentation + 5-minute discussion). Abstracts should be:

• No more than 300 words
• Submitted in English or in French
• Accompanied by a short biographical note (max. 100 words) and 3–5 keyword
• Sent to: d&o_ressentiment@univ-brest.fr

Argumentaire :

Far from being a private matter, recent studies on emotion, particularly since the affective turn, have shown its complexity as a subject of study; it is at the intersection of psychology, history, sociology, anthropology, neuroscience, etc. Admittedly, emotion is subjective, but it also has a collective, social, and cultural dimension. Emotions are felt by the subject in their psyche and body, but their representation and semiotization use linguistic and semiotic codes specific to a culture, an era, as well as social and cultural norms that allow and value the expression of certain affects and prohibit and delegitimize others.

This conference focuses on one emotion in particular: resentment. Often viewed as a negative emotion, a melancholic and “unworthy” passion associated with self-victimization, resentment is said to affect powerless individuals, vulnerable people, and losers in rapidly changing and highly competitive societies. The problem with this definition is that it reduces resentment to a sad and negative feeling in response to the denunciation of social injustice. Social criticism is then limited to its emotional dimension, which prevents its political and moral dimensions from being taken into account. Typically, discourses that mobilize this emotion aim to reverse the hierarchy of values, portraying the values of the dominant group as unjust, inequitable, immoral, etc., while presenting those of the dominated group as the purest and most morally acceptable.

Rather than being an expression of spite, jealousy, bitterness, etc., resentment is a moral emotion that challenges the prevailing societal hierarchy of values at a given moment. It calls for the existing value system and its hierarchy to be discussed anew in the public sphere.

Since all emotions are triggered in response to a stimulus, the following questions arise: What stimuli trigger resentment, and how can this be understood? What is the rationale behind its manifestations and upsurge in the public space? What argumentative rationalities explain, justify, or dismiss it?
The conference aims at gaining insights into resentment as a complex emotion and welcomes contributions approaching it from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, such as philosophy, political science, linguistics, rhetoric, discourse analysis, psychology, etc.

Topics include, but are not limited to:

– The transformations of the concept of resentment
– Linguistic, rhetorical, and discursive expressions of resentment
– Resentment and speech acts
– Modalities of auto- and alter-attribution of resentment
– Social and political groups that mobilise resentment in their discourse
– Resentment and politics
– Moral, political, and social values and resentment
– Cultural and/or historical expressions of resentment
– The objects and catalysts of resentment
– etc.