Emotions are usually seen as the terrain of psychology but they are also profoundly affected by social context. This new text investigates the boundaries between social/cultural explanations of emotional experience and bodily (biological/physiological) explanations and, in doing so, forges a clear outline of the novelty, importance, coherence, as well as limits, of a sociological approach to human feeling. The book engages with contending theoretical positions, drawing on cross-cultural empirical material to substantiate its arguments. Pitched carefully to an undergraduate readership, it is an ideal introduction to the field.