A social dynamic in which one person’s happiness is made contingent on another’s. This often functions unequally, requiring those whose happiness is treated as secondary (such as children or wives) to align their own desires with the desires of those whose happiness is given priority.

Moments, objects, or bodies to which changes in feeling are attributed, for instance from good to bad. A person may become a conversion point when they are perceived as the cause of a change in a collective mood.

Originally a Marxist concept referring to a failure to recognize the social conditions and interests that shape one’s understanding of the world. Ahmed describes false consciousness as something that can be collectively inherited: People learn to see and not see the world in particular ways, while happiness can cover over injustice and sustain an existing social order.

A political figure who is accused of ruining the happiness of others by pointing out problems like sexism and injustice. The killjoy is perceived as a spoilsport for refusing to participate in social conventions that are presented as joyful, thereby exposing the bad feelings that are hidden or displaced by public signs of happiness.

A concept from positive psychology describing an optimal state of engagement in which a person becomes deeply involved in an activity and does not experience the world as an obstacle or source of resistance. Ahmed questions whether this apparently frictionless relationship between body and world is equally available to everyone, suggesting that some bodies are better accommodated by the worlds they inhabit than others.

The etymological root of happiness, meaning chance, contingency, or “what happens.” Ahmed returns to this older meaning to emphasize possibility, happenstance, and the contingency of happiness. A politics of the “hap” would be open to chance encounters and deviations from prescribed paths.

Objects that become associated with good feelings and circulate as social goods. They carry the promise that happiness will follow proximity to them, orienting people toward objects and ways of life already understood as good.

Objects, practices, or choices that are designated as the source of happiness, often before an individual directly encounters them. Society directs individuals toward these causes with the expectation that proximity to them produces happiness. They therefore carry the promise that happiness will follow from having, doing, or approaching particular things.

The social pressure or moral obligation to be happy, both for oneself and for others. This duty suggests that being happy can become an obligation through which individuals are expected to contribute to the happiness of others.

Prescribed social narratives that instruct individuals on how to live and what to desire in order to achieve happiness. These scripts direct people toward socially approved life choices such as marriage and reproduction.

Ahmed’s term for the contemporary cultural, academic, and political preoccupation with happiness. This phenomenon is characterized by the rise of positive psychology, a proliferating self-help industry, and the adoption of happiness as a measurable goal for governance.

A figure who is perceived as a threat to national happiness by being “stuck” on past injuries such as colonialism and racism. This figure is seen as melancholic for refusing to “get over” historical unhappiness and embrace the promise of integration into the happy, forward-looking nation.

A field of psychology that focuses on understanding the causes of happiness and well-being and using that knowledge to help people become happier. Ahmed critiques its emphasis on happiness as something individuals can cultivate and its association of positive feelings with living well.

The expectation that happiness will follow from particular choices, objects, or ways of living. For Ahmed, this promise directs people toward certain socially valued paths by presenting them as likely to lead to happiness.