PHIL 43312 – Aesthetics and the Philosophy of Art
FALL 2006
Tuesday & Thursday, 11-12:15, Flanner
Course Description
In this course, we will discuss selected topics in contemporary (or fairly recent) aesthetics and the philosophy of art. In the first part of the course we will examine more general questions concerning the status and nature of art, the experience of art, the value of art, and the interpretation of art. These questions will include: What is art? How to define/identify art? How do we evaluate art? Is there a standard of taste? Are there special aesthetic properties? Is there a special aesthetic attitude or a special aesthetic experience? Does it matter for the aesthetic value of a (presumed) work of art if it is a forgery? Can we learn from art? What is beauty? What is the relation between aesthetic and moral values? Can there be great works of art that are morally bad? Is there a correct interpretation of a work of art? In the second part of the course we address more specific questions that arise in different particular fields of aesthetics, namely, the philosophy of literature, of pictorial art, of music, of nature, and of pop art. These questions will include: Why do we feel for fictional characters? Why do we enjoy horror novels? How and what do pictures represent? How does music express emotions? What is it to give an 'authentic' performance of a piece of music? How does our aesthetic appreciation of art differ from our aesthetic appreciation of nature? Is there an aesthetics of Rock music? What is kitsch?
Readings
We will be reading selected articles that are collected in a course reader (bound in two volumes) available at the Decio Copy Center. The page numbers in brackets below refer to the pagination in the course reader. The reading load per session will be between 20 and 40 pages. Most of the readings are comparatively 'light' so that the longer assignments should still be doable in a reasonable amount of time.
Policies, requirements
Requirements
One presentation in class (15%), and either two medium size papers (about 12-15 pages, 30% each), or one long term paper (25-30 pages, 60%), and your class participation will be taken into account as well (25%).
Extensions
If you are unable to hand in your work on time for a legitimate reason, we can arrange for you to submit your work at a later time. If you don't have a good excuse there will be an automatic late-penalty of 0.333 on the usual grading scale for every begun 3 hours of being late. (Example: if you were supposed to hand in your assignment in class, i.e., by 3:15 p.m., and you hand it in at 6:30 p.m., and you would have gotten an A, you will get a B+).
Attendance & Participation
This isn't kindergarten, so I won't take attendance. This doesnÕt mean, however, that you are not expected to attend.
Honor Code and Plagiarism
Honor Code, see your academic handbook. Please respect the honor code. Not doing so will cause a lot of unpleasantness for you and for me. All violations will be prosecuted, despite the fact that it is a great bother.
Preparation
This course is intended to be a discussion class. We will not cover each paper in painstaking detail but rather pick out selected aspects of the readings that are most interesting to the class and that seem worth discussing. This can only work if everyone of us will have read the assigned papers beforehand. So, please, do the readings.
Schedule
Week I
Aug. 22 ~ Logistics, General introduction
What is Art?
Aug. 24 ~ Morris Weitz, "The Role of Theory in
Aesthetics" (2-10); Arthur Danto, "The Artworld" (12-25)
Week II
Aug. 29 ~ Jerrod Levinson, "Defining Art Historically" (26-44); George Dickie, "The New Institutional Theory of Art" (47-49)
Evaluating Art
Sept. 31 ~ Oliver Conolly and Bashshar Haydar, "Aesthetic Principles" (50-61); Anita Silvers, "The Story of Art is the Test of Time" (63-76)
Week III
Ontology, and Aesthetic Properties
Sept. 5 ~ Joeseph Margolis, "The Ontological Peculiarity of Works of Art" (78-83); Frank Sibley, "Aesthetic Concepts" (85-96); Alan Goldman, "Realism about Aesthetic Properties" (98-104)
Sept. 7 ~ Kendal Walton, "Categories of Art" (106-122)
Week IV
The Aesthetic Attitude and Aesthetic Experience
Sept. 12 ~ George Dickie, "The Myth of the Aesthetic Attitude" (123-132); Noel Carroll, "Aesthetic Experience: A Question of Content" (133-147)
Value of art, values in art
Sept. 14 ~ Roman Ingarden, "Artistic and Aesthetic Values" (148-163), Jerome Stolnitz, "The Artistic Values in Aesthetic Experience" (165-175)
Week V
Sept. 19 ~ Jack W. Meiland, "Originals, Copies, and Aesthetic Value" (176-184); Lessing, "What is wrong with a forgery?" (186-196); optional: Dennis Dutton, ÒArtistic CrimesÓ (197-209)
Sept. 21 ~ Jerome Stolnitz, "On the Cognitive Triviality of Art" (210-219); Berys Gaut, "Art and Cognition" (220-226)
Week VI
Sept. 26 ~ Matthew Kieran, "Aesthetic Value: Beauty, Ugliness and Incoherence" (227-235); Christopher Janaway, "Beauty in Nature, Beauty in Art" (236-247)
Sept. 28 ~ Berys Gaut, "The Ethical Criticism of Art" (249-259); Kendall Walton, "Morals in Fiction and Fictional Morality" (260-272)
Week VII
Interpretation
Oct. 3 ~ George Dickie and W. Kent Wilson, "The Intentional Fallacy: Defending Beardsley" (274-291); Peter Lamarque, "The Death of the Author" (292-297); Robert Stecker, "The Constructivist Dilemma" (299-308)
Literature
Oct. 5 ~ Jerrold Levinson, "Intention and Interpretation in Literature" (309-328); Jenefer Robinson, "Style and Personality in the Literary Work" (329-339)
Week VIII
Oct. 10 ~ Alex Neill, "Fiction and the Emotions" (340-346); Colin Radford, "How Can we Be moved by the Fate of Anna Karenina?" (347-354)
Oct. 12 ~ Kendall Walton, "Fearing Fictions" (356-378); Berys Gaut, "The Paradox of Horror" (393-397); optional: Peter Lamarque, "How can we fear and pity fictions?" (379-392)
Week IX
Fall Break
Week X
Pictorial Art
Oct. 24 ~ Malcom Budd, "How Pictures Look" (399-409); Kendall Walton, "Are Representations Symbols?" (411-420)
Oct.26 ~ Richard Wollheim, "On Pictorial Representation" (422-431)
Week XI
Music
Oct. 31 ~ Jerrold Levinson, "What a musical work is" (433-456); Peter Kivy, "Platonism in Music: A kind of Defense" (457-467)
Nov. 2 ~ Roger Scruton, "Understanding Music" (469-482); Jenefer Robinson, "Expression and Arousal of Emotion in Music" (484-493)
Week XII
Nov. 7 ~ Stephen Davies, "Authenticity in Musical Performance" (494-505); James O. Young, "The Concept of Authentic Performance" (506-516); Lydia Goehr, "Being true to the work" (518-529)
Nov. 9 ~ no class
Week XIII
The Aesthetic Appreciation of Nature
Nov. 14 ~ R.W. Hepburn, "Contemporary Aesthetics and the Neglect of Natural Beauty" (531-544); Allen Carlson, "Appreciation and the Natural Environment" (546-554)
Nov. 16 ~ Malcom Budd, "The Aesthetic Appreciation of Nature" (555-570); No‘l Carrol, "On Being Moved by Nature" (572-583)
Week XIV
Pop Culture
Nov. 21 ~ Tim Gould, "Pursuing the Popular" (585-601); Ted Cohen, "High and Low Art, and High and Low Audiences" (603-609); optional: Ted Cohen, "High and Low thinking about High and Low Art" (611-616)
Nov. 23 ~ Thanksgiving
Week XV
Nov. 28 ~ Bruce Baugh, "Prolegomena to Any Aesthetics of Rock Music" (618-624); Stephen Davies, "Rock versus Classical Music" (626-637)
Nov. 30 ~ Alexander Nehamas, "Plato and the Mass Media" (639-649); Robert Solomon, "On Kitsch and Sentimentality" (651-664)
Week XVI
Dec. 5 ~ Wrap-up