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Interpassivity

Swales, Stephanie orcid logoORCID: 0000-0001-6299-4619 (2026) Interpassivity. In: The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology. Palgrave Macmillan, New York.

Abstract
Interpassivity names a widespread yet underacknowledged form of cultural behavior in which subjects delegate not their labor or responsibilities to others but precisely their enjoyment and belief. First proposed by the Austrian philosopher Robert Pfaller in 1996 and developed systematically in his 2017 monograph Interpassivity: The Aesthetics of Delegated Enjoyment, the concept describes the structural tendency of subjects to interpose a representative agent—a person, machine, or ritual medium—between themselves and the experience of pleasure, conviction, or identification. Rather than enjoying directly, the interpassive subject arranges for an Other to enjoy in their place. Pfaller situates interpassivity within a materialist, post-Althusserian theoretical framework, reading it as both a pervasive feature of everyday cultural life and a potential site of escape from ideological interpellation and subjectivization. The concept has been taken up across psychoanalytic theory, media studies, art theory, political philosophy, cultural anthropology, and theological studies and carries significant implications for psychological accounts of enjoyment, belief, subjectivity, and ideology.
Metadata
Item Type:Book Section
Refereed:Yes
Uncontrolled Keywords:Interpassivity; Ideology; interpellation; Subjectivization; Jouissance; Belief; Ritual; Cultural behavior; Lacanian theory; Capitalism
Subjects:UNSPECIFIED
DCU Faculties and Centres:DCU Faculties and Schools > Faculty of Science and Health
DCU Faculties and Schools > Faculty of Science and Health > School of Nursing, Psychotherapy & Community Health
Publisher:Palgrave Macmillan
Official URL:https://link.springer.com/referencework/10.1007/97...
Copyright Information:Author
ID Code:32865
Deposited On:02 Jul 2026 12:03 by Vidatum Academic . Last Modified 02 Jul 2026 12:03
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