Elements of Criticism (1762) is a philosophical work by Henry Home, Lord Kames. Published at the height of his career as a leading legal and cultural figure of the Scottish Enlightenment, Elements of Criticism has been credited as a crucial academic work in the development of modern English literary studies. "The science of criticism tends to improve the heart not less than the understanding...A just taste in the fine arts, by sweetening and harmonizing the temper, is a strong antidote to the turbulence of passion and violence of pursuit. Elegance of taste procures to a man so much enjoyment at home, or easily within reach, that in order to be occupied, he is, in youth, under no temptation to precipitate into hunting, gaming, drinking; nor, in middle age, to deliver himself over to ambition; nor, in old age, to avarice." Although he is largely unheard of today, Henry Home was an integral figure in the elevation of the art of literary criticism as a subject in universities around Britain and the world. His central thesis is that criticism itself stems from the senses and directly relates to humanity's capacity for reason. Through art, Home believed, humanity could live both morally and in harmony with the natural world, thereby creating a civilization rooted in virtue and creativity. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Henry Home, Lord Kames' Elements of Criticism is a classic of English literature reimagined for modern readers.

Love and depression are key elements in the cultural script of emotions or affectual life within contemporary Western society, and the two have become intertwined to such an extent that it is informative to talk about depressive love. Indeed, the most common source of depression is intimate relationships, in which one partner is not recognised by the other as being in need or worthy of loving care. This book addresses the question of how it is possible for opposite emotional experiences such as love and depression to appear simultaneously, empirically documenting the phenomenon of depressive love and its implications through studies of art, including music, literature and photography, and the experiences of everyday life, by way of interviews and the analysis of e-mail-, sms-, messenger-correspondence, and other new media spaces. Engaging with a range of sociological, psychoanalytic and philosophical theories of love, depression and emotion, including the work of Simmel, Alberoni, Barthes, Hochschild, Giddens, Luhmann, Beck and Beck-Gernsheim, Illouz, Bauman, Hegel, Honneth, Ehrenberg, Han, Levinas, Sartre, Freud, Lacan, and Kristeva, to name but a few, the author examines the ways in which depressive love is expressed in modern society, asking whether it is a new phenomenon and confined to the West and if not, what is distinctive about depressive love and its associated (dys)functions in contemporary Western society. An empirically rich and theoretically broad study of depressive love as a sign of our times, this book will appeal to scholars and students of social theory and the sociology and philosophy of emotion and interpersonal relationships.

Semiotics of Musical Time investigates the link between musical time and the world of signs and symbols. It examines the extent to which musical time is a product of signs, sign systems, and sign-oriented behavior. Sound is discussed as a potential sign of time and of musical time. Inherent and recognizable temporal features are identified in a number of musical works. Time as a compositional concern is examined in the case of Igor Stravinsky and Karlheinz Stockhausen. A principal distinction between hearing associated with perception and listening associated with cognition provides the basis for the proposition that musical time is both unheard and imperceptible. The role of concepts, and their designations, is investigated to demonstrate that consciousness of musical time involves semiotic processes.

The Space that Separates: A Realist Theory of Art radically challenges our assumptions about what art is, what art does, who is doing it, and why it matters. Rejecting the modernist and market-driven misconception that art is only what artists do, Wilson instead presents a realist case for living artfully. Art is defined as the skilled practice of giving shareable form to our experiences of being-in-relation with the real; that is to say, the causally generative domain of the world that extends beyond our direct observation, comprising relations, structures, mechanisms, possibilities, powers, processes, systems, forces, values, ways of being. In communicating such aesthetic experience we behold life's betweenness - "the space that separates", so coming to know ourselves as connected. Providing the first dedicated and comprehensive account of art and aesthetics from a critical realist perspective - Aesthetic Critical Realism (ACR), Wilson argues for a profound paradigm shift in how we understand and care for culture in terms of our system(s) of value recognition. Fortunately, we have just the right tool to help us achieve this transformation - and it's called art. Offering novel explanatory accounts of art, aesthetic experience, value, play, culture, creativity, artistic truth and beauty, this book will appeal to a wide audience of students and scholars of art, aesthetics, human development, philosophy and critical realism, as well as cultural practitioners and policy-makers.

Traditional aesthetics is often associated with the appreciation of art, Allen Carlson shows how much of our aesthetic experience does not encompass art but nature, in our response to sunsets, mountains or horizons or more mundane surroundings, like gardens or the view from our window.
He argues that knowledge of what it is we are appreciating is essential to having an appropriate aesthetic experience and that scientific understanding of nature can enhance our appreciation of it, rather than denigrate it.

This book investigates the significance of Wittgenstein's philosophy for aesthetic understanding. Focusing on the aesthetic elements of Wittgenstein's philosophical work, the authors explore connections to contemporary currents in aesthetic thinking and the illuminating power of Wittgenstein's philosophy when considered in connection with the interpretation of specific works of literature, music, and the arts. Taken together, the chapters presented here show what aesthetic understanding consists of and the ways we achieve it, how it might be articulated, and why it is important. At a time of strong renewal of interest in Wittgenstein's contributions to the philosophy of mind and language, this book offers insight into the connections between philosophical-psychological and linguistic issues and the understanding of the arts.

Why ought we concern ourselves with understanding a concept of evil? It is an elusive and politically charged concept which critics argue has no explanatory power and is a relic of a superstitious and primitive religious past. Yet its widespread use persists today: we find it invoked by politicians, judges, journalists, and many others to express the view that certain actions, persons, institutions, or ideologies are not just morally problematic but require a special signifier to mark them out from the ordinary and commonplace. Therefore, the question of what a concept of evil could mean and how it fits into our moral vocabulary remains an important and pressing concern. The Routledge Handbook of the Philosophy of Evil provides an outstanding overview and exploration of these issues and more, bringing together an international team of scholars working on the concept of evil. Its 27 chapters cover the crucial discussions and arguments, both historical and contemporary, that are needed to properly understand the historical development and complexity of the concept of evil. The Handbook is divided into three parts: Historical explorations of evil Recent secular explorations of evil Evil and other issues. The Routledge Handbook of the Philosophy of Evil is essential reading for students and researchers in the fields of ethics and philosophy of psychology. It also provides important insights and background for anyone exploring the concept of evil in related subjects such as literature, politics, and religion.

Although philosophers have examined and commented on music for centuries, Martin Heidegger, one of the greatest philosophers of the 20th century, had frustratingly little to say about music-directly, at least. This volume, the first to tackle Heidegger and music, features contributions from philosophers, musicians, educators, and musicologists from many countries throughout the world, aims to utilize Heidegger's philosophy to shed light on the place of music in different contexts and fields of practice. Heidegger's thought is applied to a wide range of musical spheres, including improvisation, classical music, electronic music, African music, ancient Chinese music, jazz, rock n' roll, composition, and musical performance. The volume also features a wide range of philosophical insights on the essence of music, music's place in society, and the promise of music's ability to open up new ways of understanding the world with the onset of the technological and digital musical age. Heidegger and Music breaks new philosophical ground by showcasing creative vignettes that not only push Heidegger's concepts in new directions, but also get us to question the meaning of music in various contexts.

This book is for the reader who believes that thinking about and making art is intelligent behavior and that art as a subject in the K-12 school curriculum should not be used as an alibi for other curricular objectives. It examines and makes explicit those cognitive behaviors normally associated with most higher order thinking and problem solving activity and explains how they function in the act of creative forming. Its goal is ultimately to find ways to use these behaviors in the construction of an intelligent art curriculum for K-12 American schools.
This is perhaps the only text in the field designed to assist teachers in meeting the challenges of teaching in the Goals 2000 curriculum and evaluation reform effort, acquainting them with both the National Art Standards and with the assessment processes needed in order for them to become accountable.
"Mind in Art" grapples with current and relevant theory, research, and unsolved problems. It is cohesive as it attempts to bring together information that is only partially known, even among those who are college professors. And it takes a critical look at the ideas and points of view that have created divisiveness and shabby thinking in the field. In this book Charles Dorn significantly advances thinking in the field of art education.

The whole of Marx's project confronts the narrow concerns of political philosophy by embedding it in social philosophy and a certain understanding of the aesthetic. From those of aesthetic production to the "poetry of the future" (as Marx writes in the Eighteenth Brumaire), from the radical modernism of bourgeois development to the very idea of association (which defined one of the main lines of tradition in the history of aesthetics), steady references to Dante, Shakespeare and Goethe, and the idea that bourgeois politics is nothing but a theatrical stage: the aesthetic has a prominent place in the constellation of Marx's thought. This book offers an original and challenging study of both Marx in the aesthetic, and the aesthetic in Marx. It differs from previous discussions of Marxist aesthetic theory as it understands the works of Marx themselves as contributions to thinking the aesthetic. This is an engagement with Marx's aesthetic that takes into account Marx's broader sense of the aesthetic, as identified by Eagleton and Buck-Morss - as a question of sense perception and the body. It explores this through questions of style and substance in Marx and extends it into contemporary questions of how this legacy can be perceived or directed analytically in the present. By situating Marx in contemporary art debates this volume speaks directly to lively interest today in the function of the aesthetic in accounts of emancipatory politics and is essential reading for researchers and academics across the fields of political philosophy, art theory, and Marxist scholarship.

First published in 1999, this study begins with a review of basic biological functions, stressing the importance to the organism of various kinds of information. The 'biology of information' must consider how the brain reacts to new, as contrasted with expected, inputs; these differences are discussed chiefly in relation to language. In language processing predictability is of prime importance, but to clarify what this entails it is necessary to consider just how our concepts are organized. Personal construct theory throws considerable light on this question, but is less informative about fantasy, which requires separate exploration. The main chapter focuses on the origins and interpretation of metaphor, in which quite disparate concepts are united but which we understand nevertheless. Existing theories of metaphor are unsatisfactory, but personal construct theory again helps resolve the psychological-linguistic issues. Finally, the question is raised as to why a good metaphor produces a response which is recognizably aesthetic in character, and its implications for our aesthetic responses to other art forms are explored.

The Colour of Angels uncovers the gender politics behind our attitude to the senses. Using a wide variety of examples, ranging from the sensuous religious visions of the middle ages through to nineteenth-century art movements, this book reveals a previously unexplored area of womens' history.

eBook available with sample pages: HB:0415180732

The Colour of Angels uncovers the gender politics behind our attitude to the senses. Using a wide variety of examples, ranging from the sensuous religious visions of the middle ages through to nineteenth-century art movements, this book reveals a previously unexplored area of womens history.

eBook available with sample pages: 020300759X

This issue of performance Research is a response to the powerful presence in contemporary culture of aesthetic forms and political strategies derived from North America. Counterpointing Letters from Europe, the book addresses the use and abuse of images of and from North America, the deconstruction in performance theory and practice of North American art, film and performance, and the presentation of America as genre and fiction.

In this thought-provoking book Lambert Wiesing asks simply: What is luxury? Drawing on a fascinating range of examples, he argues that luxury is an aesthetic experience. Unlike experience gained via the senses, such as seeing, hearing or tasting, he argues that luxury is achieved by possessing something - an aspect of philosophy that has been largely neglected. As such, luxury becomes a gesture of individual defiance and a refusal to conform to social expectations of restraint. An increasingly rational and goal-oriented ethos in society makes the appeal of luxury grow even stronger. Drawing on the ideas of philosophers such as Immanuel Kant, Friedrich Schiller, Martin Heidegger and the novelist Ernst Junger, as well as sociologists such as Thorstein Veblen and Theodor Adorno, A Philosophy of Luxury will be of great interest to those in philosophy, art, cultural studies and literature as well as sociology.

In contemporary film theory, body and mind have been central to explorations of film form, representation, and spectatorship. While the soul may seem to have no place here, the history of film theory and its legacy to the present suggest otherwise. From the origins of film theory - from Hugo Munsterberg through French Impressionism to writings of the Weimar Republic - to the mid-twentieth century work of Henri Agel and Amedee Ayfre, as well as Edgar Morin, the soul emerges as a multi-faceted, if contested, concept. By revisiting such key moments in the history of film theory, and tracing the survival of this concept through to a range of cutting-edge debates today, from the work of Vivian Sobchack to Jean-Luc Nancy, Gilles Deleuze to Torben Grodal, The Soul of Film Theory tells the heretofore tacit tale of the relation between cinema and the soul, from classical to contemporary times, in dialogue with philosophy, religion, and science.

It is Jean Francois Lyotard's political focus that singles him out from his poststructuralist and postmodernist contemporaries. He is invariably 'thinking politics': finding ways of translating philosophical thought into a basis for political action. Stuart Sim explores how Lyotard's brand of pragmatism can provide a focus for political theory and action in our cultural climate, especially in light of the dramatic resurgence of right-wing extremism.

It is Jean Francois Lyotard's political focus that singles him out from his poststructuralist and postmodernist contemporaries. He is invariably 'thinking politics': finding ways of translating philosophical thought into a basis for political action. Stuart Sim explores how Lyotard's brand of pragmatism can provide a focus for political theory and action in our cultural climate, especially in light of the dramatic resurgence of right-wing extremism.

Object Lessons is a series of short, beautifully designed books about the hidden lives of ordinary things. In the 1970s, the invention of the home pregnancy test changed what it means to be pregnant. For the first time, women could use a technology in the privacy of their own homes that gave them a yes or no answer. That answer had the power to change the course of their reproductive lives, and it chipped away at a paternalistic culture that gave gynecologists-the majority of whom were men-control over information about women's bodies. However, while science so often promises clear-cut answers, the reality of pregnancy is often much messier. Pregnancy Test explores how the pregnancy test has not always lived up to the fantasy that more information equals more knowledge. Karen Weingarten examines the history and cultural representation of the pregnancy test to show how this object radically changed sex and pregnancy in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Object Lessons is published in partnership with an essay series in the The Atlantic.

This book examines four main areas of music in early childhood: the traditions of music for young children, their capacities for music, the way they make music with others, and constructed and mediated musical childhoods. It studies several themes in detail, including music making in the home and family life, various musical experiences in schools, day cares, and the community at large in several locations around the globe. It looks at technology and diverse musical repertoires, as well as innovative pedagogies, children's agency, and brain research. Expanding on the knowledge bases on which early childhood music education typically draws, the book brings together contributions from a range of authors from diverse fields such as education, psychology, sociology, cultural studies, anthropology, philosophy, ethnomusicology, and the neurosciences. The end result is a volume that offers a broad and contemporary picture of music in early childhood.

In this manifesto, the author takes a leap of faith. It is a faith in Lost Causes. He asserts that today, architectonic reason has fallen into ruins. As soon as architecture leaves the limits set to it by architectonic reason, no other path is open to it but the path to aestheticism. This is the wrong path contemporary architecture has taken. In its reduction to a pure aesthetic object, architecture negatively affects the human sensorium. Capitalist consumer society creates desires by generating 'surplus-enjoyment' for capitalist profit and contemporary architecture has become an instrument in generating this 'surplus-enjoyment', with fatal consequences. This manifesto is thus both a critique and a work of theory. It is a siren, alarm, klaxon to the current status quo within architectural discourse and a timely response to the conditions of architecture today.

John Ruskin (1819-1890), Walter Pater (1839-1894) and Adrian Stokes (1902-1972) represent three generations of English aesthetes whose writings have transformed art history and the formations of museums as we know them. This work assembles the autobiographical sketches of these influential aesthetes. David Carrier's "reading" reveals these aesthetes to be less concerned with art appreciation or an aesthetic approach to everyday life than with issues of identity, politics and desire. He unfolds their texts with the aim of exposing the complexity that lies beyond what was once thought merely to represent models of sensitivity and good taste. By comparing the differences and similarities in their social and cultural environment, Carrier points out that the views of Ruskin, Pater and Stokes have surreptitiously worked their way into modern outlooks and thoughts about art, its function and its history.

James Manns presents a readable and entertaining examination of the most serious questions posed by the arts and our relation to them. In a clear and engaging fashion, he explores the central issues in aesthetics: aesthetic judgment, the nature and role of criticism, the elusiveness of the concept of art, and communication through art, and he critically (but sympathetically) considers that principal theories of art that focus on expression, form, and representation. Through the use of extensive, entertaining, and current examples (including film), Manns conveys the solid basics relating to the history and development of aesthetic theories, tries out these various theories against the art of the last half century, then outlines his own view revolving around the artist's intention and the act of communication.

Art in Three Dimensions is a collection of essays by one of the most eminent figures in philosophy of art. The animating idea behind Noel Carroll's work is that philosophers of art should eschew the sort of aestheticism that often implicitly -- but sometimes explicitly, as in the case of aesthetic theories of art and of their commitments to the notion of the autonomy of art -- governs their methodology. Instead, Carroll argues that philosophers of art need to refocus their attention on the ways in which art enters the life of culture and the lives of individual audience members. The reference to "three dimensions" in the title refers to Carroll's view that philosophers of art should look at art from multiple angles and treat it as a substantial participant not only in society, but also as a significant influence upon the moral and emotional experiences of audiences.

James Manns presents a readable and entertaining examination of the most serious questions posed by the arts and our relation to them. In a clear and engaging fashion, he explores the central issues in aesthetics: aesthetic judgment, the nature and role of criticism, the elusiveness of the concept of art, and communication through art, and he critically (but sympathetically) considers that principal theories of art that focus on expression, form, and representation. Through the use of extensive, entertaining, and current examples (including film), Manns conveys the solid basics relating to the history and development of aesthetic theories, tries out these various theories against the art of the last half century, then outlines his own view revolving around the artist's intention and the act of communication.