Introduction to Aesthetics and Aesthetic
Theory
• What does aesthetic mean, and what are we
talking about when we talk about
aesthetics?
• Do you think that there are universal
standards/values of beauty? How can these
be proven, justified, or explained?
Introduction to Aesthetics and Aesthetic Theory
Edmund Burke (1729-1797)
Burke’s distinction of the beautiful and the sublime
(1757):
“By beauty I mean that quality or those qualities in
bodies, by which they cause love, or some passion
similar to it.”
“Whatever is fitted in any sort to excite the ideas of
pain and danger, that is to say, whatever is in any
sort terrible, or is conversant about terrible objects,
or operates in a manner analogous to terror, is a
source of the sublime; that is, it is productive of the
strongest emotion which the mind is capable of
feeling.”
The sublime and the beautiful “are indeed ideas of a
very different nature, one [the sublime] being
founded on pain, the other [the beautiful] on
pleasure”
Beautiful?
Sublime?
The sublime and the beautiful are both aspects of
aesthetic experience – two faces of the same
aesthetic coin.
Introduction to Aesthetics and Aesthetic Theory
Kant (1724-1804)
• Kant’s was arguably the first major contribution to aesthetic
theory and philosophy.
• He was influenced in part by Burke’s distinction of the beautiful
and the sublime.
• Beauty is a problem for Kant: it is an immediate experience “in”
us, and yet we perceive beauty “in” things; therefore, we act as
if “x is beautiful” is universally true.
• Beauty appears to be in other things, and yet it is justified by
our own immediate experiences – so what guarantees that
something really is beautiful?
• Pure aesthetic pleasure should be free from concepts; e.g., the
experience of a “something” greater than oneself when looking
out over, say, the Grand Canyon is not a representation of any
thing or concept, whereas as photograph of me is.
Introduction to Aesthetics and Aesthetic Theory
Kant (cont.)
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Pure aesthetic experience should allow the “free play” of the imagination – it
should allow us to make links and leaps, without the need of concepts, and
without being “for” anything else.
Aesthetic contemplation should lead us to a point of disinterested reflection
– not uninterested; “disinterested” means free from concerns to do with my,
or anyone’s, advantage; disinterested here means contemplating the
aesthetic object for its own sake.
Pure aesthetic experience indicates a harmony between us (our rational
faculties) and the world/aesthetic objects.
Aesthetic experience should give us a sense of a “beyond” that we can
neither know nor explain, but of which we have glimpses and are given
clues.
In this sense, aesthetic experience is moral, for it makes us realize we are
part of a grander design than ourselves, one we can never truly understand.
It is also linked to morality because in aesthetic experience, as in our
dealings with others, we learn to view things as ends in themselves, not
means to other ends.
Introduction to Aesthetics and Aesthetic Theory
John Dewey (1859-1952)
• When we experience anything, we do so through our bodies (our 5
senses)
• So, if aesthetics is a science/study/theory of the senses, then it must in
some ways be a science/study/theory of experience
• For the artists, aesthetic experience proper involves a deliberate
organization (narrating/painting/sculpting) of something that in its original
form DID NOT have such organization or “authorship”:
– E.g., the original experience of falling off my bike becomes an artistic
and aesthetic experience in the picture I paint of it, or the poem I write
of it.
• For the audience/consumer of art, there is still a similar imposition of
order onto the artwork itself – what is this a picture of; what does this
image/word/sound make me think/feel; what does it “mean”?
• Artworks, then, are experience externalized (as a piece/work of art) and
“distilled”/“concentrated”/deliberately organized
Introduction to Aesthetics and Aesthetic Theory
Dewey vs. Kant
• Note that for Kant it was important that the aesthetic
object did NOT refer to anything other than itself (e.g., a
tidal does not “mean” anything other than itself; it just
is). Therefore, for Kant, art would always be inferior to
nature.
• For Dewey, however, genuinely aesthetic objects had to
be made, because they had to involve the deliberate
organization of (aesthetic) experience. Therefore, works
of art were in many ways the best examples of truly
aesthetic objects and of deeply aesthetic experience. For
Dewey true art could not be separated from experience.
Introduction to Aesthetics and Aesthetic Theory
Marxist/Historicist view: Art is part of the superstructure, and therefore offers
clues/information about the society in which it was produced (e.g. classical vs
hard-boiled detective stories). Therefore, we might be able to talk about the
ways in which writers create, say, a “working class” aesthetic.
Brecht and alienation/distancing
Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956) formulated the “distancing
effect,” “which prevents the audience from losing itself
passively and completely in the character created by the
actor, and which consequently leads the audience to be a
consciously critical observer.”
George Orwell
“I do not think one can assess a writer's motives without knowing something
of his early development. His subject matter will be determined by the age he
lives in — at least this is true in tumultuous, revolutionary ages like our own
— but before he ever begins to write he will have acquired an emotional
attitude from which he will never completely escape. … In a peaceful age I
might have written ornate or merely descriptive books, and might have
remained almost unaware of my political loyalties. … What I have most
wanted to do throughout the past ten years is to make political writing into an
art. … The job is to reconcile my ingrained likes and dislikes with the
essentially public, non-individual activities that this age forces on all of us.”
Introduction to Aesthetics and Aesthetic Theory
Can literature make us “better”
people?
Richard Rorty liked the idea that reading lots of
books and being more aesthetically sensitive people
would make us morally better people, but he could
not, ultimately, believe it.
For him, one of the most important novels of the
C20, one which demonstrated this point, was
Orwell’s 1984 and the character O’Brien. Rorty
believed that 1984 would remain publically
important until society solved and progressed
beyond the social problems the novel dramatizes.
Why might discussions of
aesthetics be problematic?
Discussions
1. What aesthetic experiences have you
had (that you are willing to share)?
a) Would you count them as “beautiful” or
“sublime”?
2. Discuss the extracts that have been
handed out: Can you discuss them in
aesthetic terms?
How do make aesthetic judgements?
Is English Literature worth studying? Or, can reading books make
us better people?
Richard Rorty, and the test-case of Orwell’s 1984
Richard Rorty (1931-2007) said that people, philosophers in particular, often
wanted to “hold self-creation and justice ... in a single vision.”
However, he concluded that “there is no way in which philosophy ... will ever let
us do that. The closest we will come to joining these two quests is to see the
aim of a just and free society as letting its citizens be as privatistic,
‘irrationalist,’ and aestheticist as they please so long as they do it on their own
time – causing no harm to others and using no resources needed by those less
advantaged.”
Rorty, Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity (1989)
Rorty liked the idea that reading lots of books and being more aesthetically
For him, one of the most important novels of the C20, one which
sensitive people would make us morally better people, but he could not,
demonstrated this point, was Orwell’s 1984 and the character
ultimately, believe it.
O’Brien. Rorty believed that 1984 would remain publically
important until society solved and progressed beyond the social
problems the novel dramatizes.