Maffesoli presents a powerful argument for understanding everyday life by examining the passional logic that animates the social body. He asserts that the "circulation of sexuality," as much as the circulation of goods and services or language, is a structural component of sociality. By examining the dionysian adventure (passion, bonds of shared emotion, communal feeling), he redefines the problems of sociality and the strong hedonistic ethics present in contemporary daily life.

Michel Maffesoli is Professor of Sociology at Rene Descartes University, the Sorbonne. He is Secretary General of the Center for Research on the Imaginary, and Adjunct-Director of the Study Center on the Current and the Everyday (Paris V), and has published works on violence, bureaucracy, and daily life.