The aesthetic understanding : essays in the philosophy of art and culture
by Roger Scruton
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Brings together essays on the philosophy of art in which a philosophical theory ofaesthetic judgment is tested and developed through its application to particular examples. Each essay approaches, from its own field of study, what Roger Scruton argues to be the central problems of aesthetics B what is aesthetic experience, and what is its importance for human conduct? The book is divided into four parts. The first contains a resume of modern analytical aesthetics, which also serves as an show more introduction to subsequent chapters. It also includes an essay that reviews current theories of literary criticism. The second part is devoted to musical aesthetics and contains the theoretical core of the work. Here Scruton describes the contours of aesthetic understanding, and defends the view that the object of aesthetic experience is inherently significant, even when it has no Acontent that can be described in propositional terms. He rebuts the view that music is representational, and in the third part goes on to propose a theory of representation whereby to refute the suggestion that photography is a representational art. This third section also contains a study of film. The final part comprises essays relating aesthetic judgment to the understanding of culture, humor, and design. It covers many subjects, including the prose works of Samuel Beckett and the architecture of Leninism. The essays in this book form parts of a single intellectual enterprise, which is to give analytical foundations to the criticism of literature, visual art, music, and culture. -- show lessTags
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The aesthetic understanding gathers together writings on art philosophy that test and extend a philosophical theory of aesthetic judgment by applying it to specific cases. Each essay examines what the author considers to be the essential concerns of aesthetics from the perspective of his or her own field of study. He talks about what aesthetic experience is and how it affects human behavior.
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Sir Roger Scruton (1944-2020), the distinguished philosopher and public intellectual, taught at many institutions on both sides of the Atlantic including Birkbeck College, Boston University, and the University of Buckingham. He was the author of more than forty books. In his work as a philosopher he specialized in aesthetics, giving particular show more attention to music and architecture. He also wrote several novels, as well as memoirs and essays on topics of general interest. He engaged in contemporary political and cultural debates from the standpoint of a conservative thinker and was well known as a powerful polemicist. He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and the British Academy and was officially honoured by the Czech Republic, by the City of Plzen, and by Virginia's General Assembly. In 2004 he received the Ingersoll Weaver Prize for Scholarly Letters. In 2016 he was recipient of the Polish Lech Kaczynski Foundation's Medal for Courage and Integrity, was awarded the Italian Masi Prize for the Culture of Wine in recognition of his book I Drink Therefore I Am, and was knighted in the Queen's Birthday Honours List. show less
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