abril de 2004 - CCHLA - Universidade Federal da Paraíba

Generated by Foxit PDF Creator © Foxit Softwarehttp://www.foxitsoftware.com For evaluation only.It implies both unity of the lovers, on the one hand,and separateness ("an extraordinary sense of individualidentity") on the other. This duality suggests that genuinelove involves a balance, over time, between unity andseparation.Although Solomon’s approach to defining love veryhelpful, it is incomplete in that it lacks any reference tothe physical basis of non-erotic love, attachment, and forromantic love, both attachment and sexual attraction. Likethe other authors that emphasize the cognitive/emotionalside of love, Solomon simply ignores other sides.If we are going to advance in our understanding oflove, we will probably need to integrate the physical andthe cognitive/emotional into a single definition. In anotherplace (Scheff, Chapter 6, forthcoming), I have definednon-erotic love as a conjunction of attachment andattunement (shared identity/awareness). For romanticlove, a third "A" is needed, (sexual) attraction.Like Jasper (2003), I consider love to be an affect.But I attempt to go further conceptually, by defining thecomponents and their interplay. In this approach, most ofthe various combinations of these components, because ofthe attunement requirement, are not classified as genuinelove. Instead, they are viewed as look-alikes, such asmere desire, infatuation, obsession, affection, unresolvedgrief, etc. This definition of genuine love is more precise,complex, and narrower than both the vernacular meaningand the expert ones.At this point it might be well to respond to an innervoice that I frequently hear coming from my"commonsense," my response as an ordinary man, son,parent, lover, etc. "Wait a minute, I say, aren’t yourobbing love of its mystery, its sacredness, by defining itin such an explicit way?"At first sight, my deconstruction of the concept oflove may appear to be Grinch-like. Why remove the auraof ineffability, of sacred mystery by defining it as aconcept? Perhaps this attempt is only one more exampleof what Max Weber called the progressive disenchantmentof the world.118