Brian Massumi (born 1956) is a Canadian social theorist, writer and philosopher, He is widely known for his English-language translations of A Thousand Plateaus, a 1980 philosophy book by French authors Gilles Deleuze and who, respectively a philosopher and a psychoanalyst?
Félix Guattari
Title: Affect (philosophy)
Passage: Affect (from Latin "affectus" or "adfectus") is a concept, used in the philosophy of Baruch Spinoza and elaborated by Henri Bergson, Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, that places emphasis on bodily experience.  For Spinoza, as discussed in Parts Two and Three of his "Ethics", affects are states of mind and body that are related to (but not exactly synonymous with) feelings and emotions, of which he says there are three primary kinds: pleasure or joy ("laetitia"), pain or sorrow ("tristitia") and desire ("cupiditas") or appetite.  Subsequent philosophical usage by Gilles Deleuze, Félix Guattari and their translator Brian Massumi, while derived explicitly from Spinoza, tends to distinguish more sharply than Spinoza does between affect and what are conventionally called emotions.  Affects are difficult to grasp and conceptualize because, as Spinoza says, "an affect or passion of the mind ["animi pathema"] is a confused idea" which is only perceived by the increase or decrease it causes in the body's vital force.  The term "affect" is central to what has become known as the "affective turn" in the humanities and social sciences.
Title: A Thousand Plateaus
Passage: A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia (French: "Mille plateaux" ) is a 1980 philosophy book by French authors Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, respectively a philosopher and a psychoanalyst.  The authors draw upon and discuss the work of a number of authors, including Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, and Wilhelm Reich.  "A Thousand Plateaus" is written in a non-linear fashion, and the reader is invited to move among plateaux in any order.  It is the second volume of "Capitalism and Schizophrenia", and the successor to "Anti-Oedipus" (1972).  Before the full English translation by social theorist Brian Massumi appeared in 1987, the twelfth "plateau" was published separately as "Nomadology: The War Machine" (New York: Semiotext(e), 1986).  Though influential, and considered a major statement of post-structuralism and postmodernism, the book has been criticized on many grounds.
Title: Brian Massumi
Passage: Brian Massumi (born 1956) is a Canadian social theorist, writer and philosopher.  Massumi's research spans the fields of art, architecture, political theory, cultural studies and philosophy.  He is widely known for his English-language translations of recent French philosophy, including Jean-François Lyotard's "The Postmodern Condition" (with Geoffrey Bennington), Jacques Attali's "" and Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari's "A Thousand Plateaus".
Brian Massumi A Thousand Plateaus