ABSTRACT
Passions and moods are diffuse concepts that have been defined and interpreted in many different ways over the centuries. One place to find discussions of passions and moods is within the growing literature on emotions in history. Later generations of historians began to break down assumptions about rationality and the exclusive focus on Western men and to examine the value judgments inherent in projecting unrestrained emotion onto groups such as women and non-Western people of color. Medical historians such as Roy Porter explained transitions of views of madness away from religious interpretations of possession or witchcraft to philosophical ideas based in reason. While broad narratives about melancholia and mania focused on continuities over time or highlighted themes that could be traced over many time periods and locations, scholars with more of a focus on specific contingencies and settings have emphasized that mood disorders look very different if they are closely examined.
