Aesthetics Commons^™

Recovering Authenticity: Care, Conversation And Value, Shannon M. Brick

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Suppose you learn that your steak-loving friend has just adopted a vegan diet. You ask her what prompted the change, and she tells you that someone she trusts recently tweeted “Eating meat is immoral.” Your friend’s response is a little disappointing and shallow, but why? Most of our knowledge comes from trusting what other people tell us, so why, when it comes to moral matters, does deference seem inappropriate? Some philosophers think it’s because moral testimony cannot transmit important epistemic goods, like knowledge or understanding. Others think that when people defer to moral testimony, their actions or characters will be …

Tell Me A Story: The Normative Power Of Storytelling, Zoe Cunliffe

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Few would dispute that stories are powerful: they have the capacity to inform, to persuade, and to engage our imaginations and sympathies. However, the contemporary philosophical literature on stories focuses exclusively on the functions of narrative stories, and in particular on the role that novels can serve in cultivating our moral and political competencies. I argue that this narrow focus is theoretically pernicious in two ways. First, it leads to an unfortunate myopia regarding the value of non-narrative storytelling practices. Second, it results in analysis that is disproportionately likely to exclude forms of storytelling that originate in marginalized groups. My …

Reflections On Beauty, Miklos Nikolaus Legrady

Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)

No abstract provided.

Aphorism And Anti-Aphorism: Language And Aesthetics, Nicholas Romanos

Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)

Karl Kraus, the great Viennese satirist, poet, and aphorist, is still little read in the Anglophone world. This article argues that Kraus’ innovative ideas about aesthetics and language, generated in response to the problems of modernity, are of great interest to the contemporary philosopher of aesthetics. Kraus’ writing is discussed here as a basis for a theory of the aphorism, which is shown to be a literary form uniquely concerned with its own form (and thus with literary and linguistic aesthetics). Kraus uses the aphorism to ‘serve language’ and, along with quotation, it constitutes the foundation of his style. This …

Inner Song Phenomenological Description Of A Musical Object Of Phantasy, Ellen Moysan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is the phenomenological description of a musical object of phantasy I call “inner song,” i.e., the music that the musician “sings in his or her head” while practicing his or her instrument. It describes the specific inner song of a single musician playing a melodic instrument, and rehearsing in a solipsistic situation. The description is based on three resources: my personal experience as a cellist; the third person experiences of other musicians I have interviewed on that topic since 2010; and the Husserlian corpus. Each chapter starts with excerpts of interviews focusing on specific aspects the inner song. …

The Fallacy And Verification Of Criticism On Contemporary Chinese Confessional Poetry, Lei Wei

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Contemporary Chinese confessional poetry has engaged much academic attention despite its short existence between the 1980s and the 1990s. The confessional poetry has been related with female poetry by scholars since the beginning, and they have been criticized for lacking Chinese cultural characteristics, skills or aesthetic values etc.. However, contemporary Chinese confessional poetry is not exclusively the product of female poets, as there are quite a few male poets who created some fine confessional poems. Chinese confessional poetry of new period turned out to be embodied with a literary form of strong nationalistic features and contain rich elements of traditional …

“It's So Normal, And … Meaningful.” Playing With Narrative, Artifacts, And Cultural Difference In Florence, Dheepa Sundaram, Owen Gottlieb

Articles

This article considers how player interactions with religious and ethnic markers, create

a globalized game space in the mobile game Florence (2018). Florence is a multiaward-

winning interactive novella game with story-integrated minigames that weave

play experiences into the narrative. The game, in part, explores love, loss, and

rejuvenation as relatable experiences. Simultaneously, the game produces a unique

experience for each player, as they can refract the game narrative through their own

cultural, identitarian lens. The game assumes the shared cultural space of the player,

the player-character (PC), and the non-player-character (NPC) while blurring the

boundaries between each of these …

Cultivating The Human Narrative: On Nietzsche, Science Fiction, And The Aesthetics Of Life., Derek Carpenter

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, I will argue that there is a specific model of morality which can account for the intuition about moral features that we take to be intrinsic to the human type. This model of morality is that of Virtue Ethics, but not a conventional kind of Virtue Ethics. Instead, I will argue that the moral philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche presents a model of cultivating narrative types that we take to be grounded in the kinds of beings we are, without resorting to any problematic metaphysical systems. This will require that I defend a novel interpretation of Nietzsche’s ethics …

Book Review On A Grand Materialism In The New Art From China (By Mary Wiseman), Kathleen Higgins

Comparative Philosophy

No abstract provided.

Post-Postmodernism And The Emergence Of Heterolinational Literatures, Mehdi Ghasemi

Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)

Following the challenge by Linda Hutcheon inviting readers to name the era after postmodernism, several scholars have attempted to conceptualize the aftermath of postmodernism through introducing some successors. To join the challenge, I also introduce “heterolinationalism” as another successor to postmodernism and draw upon some paradigms of heterolinational literatures, including postacademia, postnationalism and polyliterature, polyvocalism and plurilingualism, self-publishing, social media and multimediality as well as transtextuality and fanfiction.

Appreciating Covers, Cristyn Magnus, P.D. Magnus, Christy Mag Uidhir, Ron Mcclamrock

Philosophy Faculty Scholarship

A recording or performance of a song is a cover if there is an earlier, canonical recording of the song. It can seem intuitive to think that properly appreciating the cover requires considering it in relation to the original, or at least that doing so will yield a deeper appreciation. This intuition is supported by some philosophical accounts of covers. And it is complicated by the possibility of hearing in, whereby one hears elements of the original version in the cover. We argue that it can nevertheless be just as legitimate to consider a cover version on its own …

Hope And Wonder In The Wasteland: Post-Apocalyptic Fiction As Tolkienian Fairy Story, Alfredo J. Mac Laughlin

Journal of Tolkien Research

J. R. R. Tolkien’s four functions of fantasy stories, as developed in his Andrew Lang lecture “On Fairy Stories” (1939), have become a key conceptual tool for discussing human beings’ attraction to fantasy stories, particularly when attempting to push the analysis beyond the literary into the aesthetic, and beyond the aesthetic into the existential. Applying this interpretive key to an analysis of the expanding genre of post-apocalyptic fiction reveals that post-apocalyptic stories, despite superficial differences, are surprisingly close to fairy stories in their aesthetic core and orientation, and that post-apocalyptic stories are well-suited to fulfill—albeit with their own distinctive aesthetic …

Negative Dialectics In Elliott Carter: Toward An Adornian Aesthetics Of Carter's Music, Gregory J. Menillo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation is an attempt to lay the groundwork for an Adornian aesthetics of Elliott Carter’s music. The first chapter suggests that Theodor W. Adorno’s negative dialectics is the most appropriate paradigm for understanding the material antagonisms that characterize Carter’s music over a quasi-Hegelian “unity of opposites” as suggested in the Carter scholarship. Chapter Two demonstrates this through an Adornian reading of key aspects of the first movement of Carter’s 1948 Sonata for Cello and Piano, the watershed work for Carter’s mature style. The third chapter addresses the issue of musical time in Carter from a philosophical perspective; it discusses …

"You Can't Be Shakespeare And You Can't Be Joyce": Lou Reed, Modernism, And Mass Production, Daniel C. Jacobson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation proposes a reevaluation of the overlooked connections between American popular music and modernist literature’s scope and formal experimentation which arose in the mid-20th century. Because Lou Reed’s ever-changing persona situates his work uncomfortably between high art and pop-culture, modernism and “post-modernity,” literature and music, and ethics and aesthetics, I intend to consider Reed as this dissertation’s empty, refracted center. One that will allow for a critique of several major intellectual movements, both inside and outside the academy, that continue to influence thinking about art, ethics, and material culture. Additionally, I hope to show that the work of a …

Ambiguity Of Vision: Reimagining The Hypervisible Void, Kiwha Lee Blocman

Theses and Dissertations

Asking questions about what Painting is in the 21st century and the dominant narratives it can challenge, my paintings complicate the viewer’s reading of pictorial hierarchy and the projection of human relations in the world. I de-hierarchize and decentralize the compositional components that make up a painting by using patterns to create spatial depth, not European perspectival conventions. In dialogue with modernists such as Matisse who drew from the visual vocabulary of “The Orient”, my central forms derived from architecture and ornamental fragments possess a body-like presence. Further, I reinvent ancient Asian printmaking processes with oil paint. Observing the tenets …

Save And Continue?, Douglas Boyd Johnson

Theses - ALL

The purpose of this thesis is to describe the research I completed and the body of work produced during the course of my Master's studies. The paper begins by briefly recounting early influences and the nature of my practice at the time I began the program. Then elaboration follows on the development of my work across various media, both traditional and digital. The work centers on formal questioning of pictorial media and draws conclusions on the nature of picture making, and the motivations I have for pursuing pictorial art.

Dust, Mist, Haze, Michael C. Tracy

Theses and Dissertations

This paper explores painting through the ideas of dust, mist, and haze as specific atmospheric metaphors that could be used to describe ontologies of space, time, memory, and history.

“Paint What You Hate”: Philip Guston’S Hooded Figures And The Postponement Of The Exhibition Philip Guston Now, Thomas Baldwin

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis interrogates the postponement of the Philip Guston Now exhibition, examining the justification for the postponement, the actions taken by the National Gallery of Art, and the effects of the postponement. My research examines the museum’s choice to cite social justice as the main context for understanding Philip Guston.

Genres, Communities, And Practices, Evan Malone

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

In this dissertation, I defend a communitarian, practice-based, theory of genre and aesthetic value. I argue that theories of aesthetic value and art ontology within analytic philosophy have been too focused on the intentions of individual artists, the features of individual works, and the aesthetic experience of individual audience members. Accordingly, philosophical accounts of genre also follow this model. However, taking genre seriously means recognizing that they are social categories. If this is right, then philosophy of art ought to pay closer attention to the ways in which genres (as social categories) mediate aesthetic practices, values, and concepts. By thinking …

Attention, Reflection, And Contemplation: Approaching The Divine Through Romantic Poiesis, Katelynn Tyner

English Undergraduate Honors Theses

Often the techniques of the said and the unsaid work together. This paper will explore ways in which poets embrace iconophilic or iconoclastic postures toward divine poiesis. One objective will be to focus on the arrangement of an abundance of images into itineraries and poetic landscapes. Another objective will be to demonstrate how these patterns of cultivation can be related to a divine poiesis. Through poetry, there are ways of attending to, reflecting on, and contemplating divine images that can return us to forms of participation with the sacred. First examining poetic attention, I identify poets who demonstrate …