This major collection of essays stands at the border of aesthetics and ethics and deals with charged issues of practical import: art and morality, the... ethics of taste, and censorship. As such its potential interest is by no means confined to professional philosophers; it should also appeal to art historians and critics, literary theorists, and students of film. Prominent philosophers in both aesthetics and ethics tackle a wide array of issues. Some of the questions explored in the volume include: Can art be morally enlightening and, if so, how? If a work of art is morally better does that make it better as art? Is morally deficient art to be shunned, or even censored? Do subjects of artworks have rights as to how they are represented? Do artists have duties as artists and duties as human beings, and if so, to whom? How much tension is there between the demands of art and the demands of life?

<div><span><em>Aesthetics and Film</em> is a philosophical study of the art of film. Its... motivation is the recent surge of interest among analytic philosophers in the philosophical implications of central issues in film theory and the application of general issues in aesthetics to the specific case of film. <br/>Of particular interest are questions concerning the distinctive representational capacities of film art, particularly in relation to realism and narration, the influence of the literary paradigm in understanding film authorship and interpretation, and our imaginative and affective engagement with film. <br/>For all of these questions, Katherine Thomson-Jones critically compares the most compelling answers, driving home key points with a wide range of film examples including Wiene's <em>The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari</em>, Eisenstein's <em>October</em>, Hitchcock's <em>Rear Window</em>, Kubrick's <em>The Shining</em> and Sluizer's <em>The Vanishing</em>. Students and scholars of aesthetics and cinema will find this an illuminating, accessible and highly enjoyable investigation into the nature and power of a technologically evolving art form.</span></div>>

This study demonstrates how popular women writers used the female visual artist as their alter ego to renegotiate the boundaries between high and low... culture. The figure of the professional woman painter allowed women writers to critique the dominant aesthetic and scientific theories that categorized women and an ethnically configured lower class as artistically and intellectually inferior to an elite, male-defined figure of the Romantic artist-as-genius. Illustrated.

Aesthetics and Nature offers a clear and accessible introduction to the field of nature aesthetics. Glenn Parsons explores the current debates in the... field, providing the reader with a thorough overview of the subject. The book situates nature aesthetics in relation to two principal influences: aesthetics' traditional project of understanding the value of art and current thought on the ethics of our relationship with nature.  The book outlines five major approaches to understanding the aesthetic value of nature and explores the aesthetic appreciation of nature as it occurs in wilderness, in gardens, and in the context of appreciating environmental art. The book also includes a study of the idea that conserving nature's beauty provides a compelling reason to preserve wilderness. This highly topical idea has deep implications for the importance of aesthetic value in our relationship to nature, and for the fate of nature itself. Combining a clear and engaging style with a sophisticated treatment of a fascinating subject, Aesthetics and Nature is a valuable contribution to contemporary aesthetics.

Aesthetics and Painting introduces and opens up current debates and ideas in the aesthetics of painting. At the book's center is an investigation of the... complex relationship between what a painting depicts and the means by which it is depicted. The book looks at: how and why painting may be distinguished from other art forms; the relationship between the painted surface and the depicted subject; the "rules of representation" specific to painting; abstract art and nonrepresentational painting; the most recent technological and aesthetic developments and their implications; the role of the artist—and that of the spectator. A sophisticated treatment of major ideas in art and philosophy, Aesthetics and Painting remains highly readable throughout, offering a clear and coherent account of the nature of painting as an art form.

An intense and lively debate on literature and art between thinkers who became some of the great figures of twentieth-century philosophy and... literature.No other country and no other period has produced a tradition of major aesthetic debate to compare with that which unfolded in German culture from the 1930s to the 1950s. In Aesthetics and Politics the key texts of the great Marxist controversies over literature and art during these years are assembled in a single volume. They do not form a disparate collection but a continuous, interlinked debate between thinkers who have become giants of twentieth-century intellectual history.

This anthology provides comprehensive coverage of the major contributions of analytic philosophy to aesthetics and the philosophy of art, from the... earliest beginnings in the 1950’s to the present time. Traces the contributions of the analytic tradition to aesthetics and the philosophy of art, from the 1950’s to the present time. Designed as a comprehensive guide to the field, it presents the most often-cited papers that students and researchers encounter. Addresses a wide range of topics, including identifying art, ontology, intention and interpretation, values of art, aesthetic properties, fictionality, and the aesthetics of nature. Explores particular art forms, including pictorial art, literature, music, and the popular arts.

Why do people read novels, go to the theater, or listen to beautiful music? Do we seek out aesthetic experiences simply because we enjoy them--or is... there another, deeper, reason we spend our leisure time viewing or experiencing works of art? Aesthetics, the first short introduction to the contemporary philosophy of aesthetics, examines not just the nature of the aesthetic experience, but the definition of art, and its moral and intrinsic value in our lives. Anne Sheppard divides her work into two parts: In the first, she summarizes the major theories defining art and beauty; in the second, she explores the nature of aesthetic evaluation and appreciation. As Sheppard explains, there are three main approaches to defining art, all focused on what art objects share. One proposes that all art imitates something in life, another that it expresses something (such as anger or ecstasy), still another suggests that all art has formal qualities. There is also a fourth which offers that all art shares the quality of beauty. In the second part, which concentrates on literary art, Sheppard explores such philosophic topics as critical judgment, meaning and truth in literature, and the relationship between art and morals. She raises such questions as whether there is one correct interpretation of a work of art and whether art has a moral effect on its audience and, citing specific examples, explores the views that have been put forth. A wide-ranging, intriguing book, which assumes no formal knowledge on the part of its readers, Aesthetics opens the door to a greater understanding and appreciation of art.

This anthology reverses gives special attention to popular arts as to the so-called fine arts. This book has a huge number of selections. The book... divides articles into sections according to specific arts, while also providing sections on classical and contemporary sources regarding the arts in general. As with the first edition, this book also brings together readings in continental and analytic philosophy. It also contains helpful introductions by the editors for each section, as well as a useful general introduction. Readings are separated into the following sections: painting, photography and film, architecture, music, dance, literature, performance, mass and popular art, classic sources, and contemporary sources. An interesting collection of readings for anyone interested in the philosophy behind the works of art that can be viewed in museums, on film, through music, dance, and architecture.

This anthology is a collection of basic readings for beginning students, chosen to illustrate the major movements in the history, development and nature... of aesthetics. Selections of major importance are drawn from the period of the Greeks to the mid-twentieth century. Every section introduction includes an historical overview of each period, biographical information, and a brief analysis of key concepts. The editor designed this anthology to be of sufficient length for use as the sole text in a one quarter course, yet brief enough to invite the use of additional materials in longer courses.

Reissued for 2003! This comprehensive anthology offers a vast collection of classic and contemporary readings in aesthetics from both western and... non-western sources. It is organized topically into four parts: Art and the Nature of Beauty, Interpreting and Evaluating Art, Challenges to the Tradition and Beyond the West.

With the increasing demand for midwives among U.S. women, reproductive rights activists are lobbying to loosen restrictions that deny legal access to... homebirth options. In Pushing for Midwives, Christa Craven presents a nuanced history of women's reproductive rights activism in the U.S. She also provides an examination of contemporary organizing strategies for reproductive rights in an era increasingly driven by "consumer rights." By framing the midwifery struggle through a political economic perspective on reproductive rights, Pushing for Midwives offers an in-depth look at the strategies, successes, and challenges facing midwifery activists in Virginia. Craven examines how decades-old race and class prejudices against midwives continue to impact opposition tooas well as divisions withinowomen's contemporary legislative efforts for midwives. She argues that this recognition is vital for both scholars and activists if they hope to maintain their commitment to expanding reproductive rights for all women.

This is the first of two volumes of the only English edition of Hegel's Aesthetics, the work in which he gives full expression to his seminal theory of... art. The substantial Introduction is his best exposition of his general philosophy of art. In Part I he considers the general nature of art as a spiritual experience, distinguishes the beauty of art and the beauty of nature, and examines artistic genius and originality. Part II surveys the history of art from the ancient world through to the end of the eighteenth century, probing the meaning and significance of major works. Part III (in the second volume) deals individually with architecture, sculpture, painting, music, and literature; a rich array of examples makes vivid his exposition of his theory.

This is the second of two volumes of the only English edition of Hegel's Aesthetics, the work in which he gives full expression to his seminal theory of... art. The substantial Introduction is his best exposition of his general philosophy of art. In Part I he considers the general nature of art as a spiritual experience, distinguishes the beauty of art and the beauty of nature, and examines artistic genius and originality. Part II surveys the history of art from the ancient world through to the end of the eighteenth century, probing the meaning and significance of major works. Part III (in the second volume) deals individually with architecture, sculpture, painting, music, and literature; a rich array of examples makes vivid his exposition of his theory.

The fundamental concern of psychotherapy is change. While practitioners are constantly greeted with new strategies, techniques, programs, and... interventions, this book argues that the full benefits of the therapeutic process cannot be realized without fundamental revision of the concept of change itself. Applying cybernetic thought to family therapy, Bradford P. Keeney demonstrates that conventional epistemology, in which cause and effect have a linear relationship, does not sufficiently accommodate the reciprocal nature of causation in experience. Written in an unconventional style that includes stories, case examples, and imagined dialogues between an epistemologist and a skeptical therapist, the volume presents a philosophically grounded, ecological framework for contemporary clinical practice.