Zidane in Tartarus : a neoAristotelian inquiry into the emotional dimension of kathartic recognition

Katharsis occupies an important place in the social imagination as a mode of emotional clarification. It was the term used by Aristotle in the Poetics, where he argued that through observing tragedy audiences could experience kathartic recognition by affectively rationalising the events constituting mythos (the tragic plot) in a process synonymous with feeling-realisation. Research on katharsis has generally fallen into disrepute following various interdisciplinary interpretations, cultural changes and the term’s common conflation with Freud’s hydraulic theory of emotional repression. While Attic tragedy has lost the prominence it formerly held in ancient Greece, it has been replaced to a large extent by manifestations of ‘the tragic’ in contemporary scandals which are played out in popular culture and mediated for public consumption. It is in this context that Zinédine Zidane’s World Cup sporting scandal will be explored, not merely as a personal tragedy for the French footballer or confined to the domain of sport, but rather from a sociological perspective with regard to the civic implications that his ‘tragic’ coup de tête afforded - a social tragedy with consequences for those members of society with symbolic investments in his-story. This thesis will draw upon Zidane’s transgression as a case study through which sociological accounts of emotions, namely pragmatic and Durkheimian contributions, are employed as means of amplifying Aristotle’s account of katharsis and the broader social significance of tragic mythos in contemporary life. An analysis of katharsis requires a reconsideration of tragedy’s primary component - mythos. Corresponding to Enlightenment principles, the emotional foundation of mythos has engendered much scrutiny in the climate of rationalism permeating the modern Western world. This thesis proposes a novel way of understanding mythos. Applying Aristotle’s kathartic paradigm to Zidane’s scandal, it is suggested that this contemporary manifestation of ‘the tragic’ presents a lens through which to examine mythos as a form of rational inquiry. Despite the fact that tragic instruction was inexorably politicised in antiquity and, therefore, susceptible to operating as a mechanism of social control, it would be an oversimplification to reduce mythos to rhetorical modes of persuasion. The tendency to conflate mythos with political ideology points to an important distinction between what is referred to in this thesis as a social myth and mythos – the former operating as a common referent and ideological framework through which the conscience collective is solidified around Durkheimian feelings of collective effervescence, while the latter is conceptualised as a heterogeneous, metaphorical construction through which the very foundation of social myths may be examined, challenged and revised. Such an understanding moves beyond the popular conflation of mythos with fabrication; emphasising the significance of the ways in which this social phenomenon is communicated, symbolically contested and affectively rationalised in the public domain. A re-evaluation of katharsis has implications for the way in which emotions are more generally conceptualised. The problem with conventional theories of emotion are that they maintain a misleading dichotomy between thought and emotion, derived from a limited understanding of rationality that couples cognition with reason over emotion as appetite, polarising mythos and logos. Contrary to such Neoplatonic views, which consider emotions to be impediments to ‘critical’ faculties and the objectivity demanded of scientific thought, the emotional foundation of mythos is understood as not only susceptible to reason but intrinsically rational. Moreover, the orthodox notion that emotions are essential to well-being emerges from an established tradition of Aristotelian ethics. Despite significant differences between Aristotelian and contemporary notions of ‘emotional intelligence,’ corresponding to a series of broader historical developments from the Greek’s moral concern with ‘being good’ to modern psychology’s quest to ‘feel good,’ both emphasise the instrumental role that emotions play in sustaining well-being. It is suggested that, by excavating the mythic heritage of katharsis, mythos may be restored as a valuable apparatus of critical inquiry which recognises the broader social implications of the ways in which ‘the tragic’ is represented in the public domain