Pathologies of Overstimulation: An Interpretation Based on Georg Simmel

In this chapter, I explore the psychological pathologies derived from life in the metropolis through Simmel’s understanding of them. I approach his conceptualisation of the modern city and the conditions it imposes. Understanding the role of the city in Simmel is particularly important because of his identification of the city with the dynamics of modern life. I then discuss how he considers that new patterns of conduct in the city influenced the behaviour of the senses in the public sphere. For this chapter, I compare Simmel’s texts on the city, “Rome, Florence, Venice” (1898) and “The Great Cities and Intellectual Life” (1903), with the sociological reading of sensory perception presented in his “Digression on the Sociology of the Senses” (1907). Based on an inter-related analysis of these writings, the purpose of the chapter is not only to understand the role Simmel gives to the senses in this new configuration, but also to investigate the conditions from which his reflections emerged.