Dr Kyriakoula Tzortzopoulou’s Article on Collective Emotions and Social Cohesion Accepted in the Journal of Early Christian Studies

We are pleased to announce that a second article by Dr Kyriakoula Tzortzopoulou, Postdoctoral Researcher of our project, has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Early Christian Studies. The forthcoming article, titled “Binding and Dividing: John Chrysostom on Collective Emotions in the Riot of the Statues”, examines the role of collective emotions in shaping social cohesion and division in late antique Antioch following the Riot of the Statues in 387 AD.

Kyriakoula explores how collective emotions operated as forces of social division or communal cohesion in late antique Antioch after the Riot of the Statues (387 AD). The principal sources for this study are the homilies of John Chrysostom, preached to the Antiochene congregation in the aftermath of the riot, as pastoral responses intended to console, spiritually guide, and cultivate communal solidarity. This article shows that Chrysostom’s descriptions of the emotional landscape in Antioch suggest a sophisticated awareness of the subtle mechanisms involved in the generation and intensification of collective emotions—particularly their synchronic shaping through social and environmental affordances. Chrysostom creatively harnesses these dynamics in his preaching, notably by supporting communal prayer and inviting his congregation to participate in one another’s pain as members of a single, unified body. As Kyriakoula demonstrates, by reframing their emotions theologically, Chrysostom aimed to forge an emotional community that would play a critical role in consolidating bonds of solidarity and averting further division.

This study engages with foundational questions in contemporary social science and cognitive psychology concerning the nature of collective emotions as emergent properties of group dynamics—phenomena of extended cognition that arise from the intersubjective and relational fabric of collective experience.

This publication represents an important contribution both to early Christian studies and to the interdisciplinary theoretical framework of the GROUPMINDS project. We warmly congratulate Dr Tzortzopoulou on this outstanding accomplishment and on the continued dissemination of the project’s research in leading international journals.