Shame & Guilt

Pavlo Smytsnyuk

Shame is considered one of the most complex human emotions. The aim of the workshop is to investigate the phenomenon of shame, to see its relation with the concept of guilt and to reflect whether it is a positive moral compass or a block that limits the development of our freedom. We propose to approach the topic of shame from different sides: biblical, psychological and artistic, and to make conclusions on the basis of our own experience.

The workshop can take between 1-2 hours depending on the length of conversation, and of how much time you give the groups to create the advertisements. It can be used for both small and large groups. It is composed of 3 discussions, advertisement preparation and presentation and a conclusion.

Materials

• PowerPoint presentation or printed reproductions of the paintings and posters mentioned below or similar; printed Bible passage and a synthetic story of Hester Prynne.
• clean sheets of paper;

1.      Discussion about the connotations of the meaning of the concept of shame in different languages.

This discussion – if done in groups, composed of people of different mother tongues – can bring a lot of confusion and some very interesting insights into understanding of the idea of shame. For example, in some languages the concept of shame and that of embarrassment are expressed with the same term.

Example questions:

• What is the difference between shame, embarrassment and shyness?
• Are those concepts expressed by different words in your language?

2.      Discussion about shame in the Bible

Read with the participants the biblical account of the fall (Genesis 2: 25; Genesis 3: 7-10, 21), show them the painting of Tommaso Masaccio, The Expulsion of Adam and Eve from Eden, ca. 1425 (maybe one of the best examples of how the shame is represented in art). Let discussion follow.

The embarrassment of being seen naked is excellently depicted in the paintings based on the Biblical account about the chaste Susanna (Book of Daniel 13). You can also show the reproductions of Rembrandt, Susanna and the Elders, 1636; Pierre Van Hanselaere, Susanna and the Elders, 1820.

Example questions:

• What do Adam and Eve feel: guilt or shame? Where is shame and where is guilt? What comes first?
• Why did they feel no shame being naked before the fall? Why do Adam and Eve feel naked after the sin?
• Why people are normally ashamed/embarrassed to be nude in presence of the others? What does it reveal about humans?

3.      Discussion about the shame as social control/conditioning.

1. Tell or read the story of Hester Prynne (the protagonist of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel, The Scarlet Letter) – convicted of the crime of adultery, and sentenced to be forced to wear a prominent scarlet letter ‘A’ for the rest of her life.
2. Show the British poster of Savile Lumley, Daddy, What did YOU do in the Great War? 1915, and the Soviet poster of Velezheva/Kuzovkin, «He drank, swore, broke tree – ashamed to look in the face of people», 1958
3. Show the Andrex ‘Moistened’ advertisement, Could you be cleaner? .
4. To stimulate discussion of the relationship between advertising and shame, the groups can be invited to create two advertisements, either a spectacle or a poster, that will refer to the feeling of shame of the spectators (one – which refers to the moral feelings; another – in which the manipulation with ones feeling of shame or embarrassment is present). Let the groups present and comment on the advertisements. Let the discussion follow.

Example questions:

• Is shame a mean of social control over people?
• What are the positive and negative effects of the social dimension of shame?
• How does advertising use our feelings of shame and embarrassment?
• So, what is shame???

Subscribe to Mozaik for printed copies delivered to your door!