- Table View
- List View
Aesthetic Perceptions of Urban Environments (Interventions)
by Arundhati VirmaniTo what extent do urban dwellers relate to their lived and imagined environment through aesthetic perceptions, and aspirations? This book approaches experiences of urban aesthetics not as an established framework, defined by imposed norms or legislations, but as the result of a continuous reflexive and proactive gaze, a complex and deep engagement of the mind, body and sensibilities. It uses empirical studies ranging from China, India to Western Europe. Three axes are privileged. The first considers urban everyday aesthetic experiences in the long-term as a historical production, from medieval Italy to a future imagined by science fiction. The second examines the impact of aestheticizing everyday material realities in neighbourhoods, and the tensions and conflicts these engender around urban commons. Finally, the third axis considers these relationships as aesthetic inequalities, exacerbated in a new age of urban development. The book combines local and transnational scales with an interdisciplinary approach, bringing together historians, sociologists, cultural geographers, anthropologists, architects, and contemporary art curators. They illustrate the importance of combining different social science methods and functional perspectives to study such complex social and cultural realities as cities. This book will be of interest to students, scholars and practitioners of humanities and social sciences, cultural and urban studies, architecture and political geography.
Aesthetics and Marxism: Chinese Aesthetic Marxists and Their Western Contemporaries
by Liu KangAlthough Chinese Marxism--primarily represented by Maoism--is generally seen by Western intellectuals as monolithic, Liu Kang argues that its practices and projects are as diverse as those in Western Marxism, particularly in the area of aesthetics. In this comparative study of European and Chinese Marxist traditions, Liu reveals the extent to which Chinese Marxists incorporate ideas about aesthetics and culture in their theories and practices. In doing so, he constructs a wholly new understanding of Chinese Marxism. Far from being secondary considerations in Chinese Marxism, aesthetics and culture are in fact principal concerns. In this respect, such Marxists are similar to their Western counterparts, although Europeans have had little understanding of the Chinese experience. Liu traces the genealogy of aesthetic discourse in both modern China and the West since the era of classical German thought, showing where conceptual modifications and divergences have occurred in the two traditions. He examines the work of Mao Zedong, Lu Xun, Li Zehou, Qu Qiubai, and others in China, and from the West he discusses Kant, Schiller, Schopenhauer, and Marxist theorists including Horkheimer, Adorno, Benjamin, and Marcuse. While stressing the diversity of Marxist positions within China as well as in the West, Liu explains how ideas of culture and aesthetics have offered a constructive vision for a postrevolutionary society and have affected a wide field of issues involving the problems of modernity. Forcefully argued and theoretically sophisticated, this book will appeal to students and scholars of contemporary Marxism, cultural studies, aesthetics, and modern Chinese culture, politics, and ideology.
Aesthetics and Political Culture in Modern Society (Routledge Innovations in Political Theory)
by Henrik Kaare NielsenDo aesthetic appeals to senses and emotions in political debate necessarily marginalise political reason and reduce citizens to consumers – thus dangerously undermining democracy? Or is sensuous-emotional engagement, on the contrary, a basic fact of the political process and a crucial precondition for revitalising democracy? Aesthetics and Political Culture in Modern Society investigates the current interrelationship between aesthetic practice and political practice in Western democracies, focusing on its impact on democratic political culture. Henrik Kaare Nielsen argues that aesthetic interventions in the political process do not by definition undermine politics’ content of reason. Instead, a differentiation must be made between a multiplicity of aesthetic forms of intervention – some of which tend to weaken the political judgement of citizens while other forms tend to stimulate competent judgement. This book will be of interest to scholars in the fields of political science, sociology, media studies, and cultural studies.
Aesthetics and Politics (Radical Thinkers)
by Walter Benjamin Theodor Adorno Georg Lukacs Bertolt Brecht Ernst BlochNo 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.
Aesthetics and Politics: A Nordic Perspective on How Cultural Policy Negotiates the Agency of Music and Arts (New Directions in Cultural Policy Research)
by Ole Marius Hylland Erling BjurströmThrough comparative and integrated case studies, this book demonstrates how aesthetics becomes politics in cultural policy. Contributors from Norway, Sweden and the UK analyse exactly what happens when art is considered relevant for societal development, at both a practical and theoretical level. Cultural policy is seen here as a mechanism for translating values, that through organized and practical aesthetical judgement lend different forms of agency to the arts. What happens when aesthetical value is reinterpreted as political value? What kinds of negotiations take place at a cultural policy ground level when values are translated and reinterpreted? By addressing these questions, the editors present an original collection that effectively centralises and investigates the role of aesthetics in cultural policy research.
Aesthetics and the Philosophy of Art: Comparative Perspectives
by Prabha Shankar DwivediThis volume brings together the finest research on aesthetics and the philosophy of art by stalwart critics and leading scholars in the field. It discusses various themes, such as the idea of aesthetic perception, the nature of aesthetic experience, attitude theory, the relation of art to morality, representation in art, and the association of aesthetics with language studies in the Indian tradition. It deliberates over the theories and views of Aristotle, Freud, Plato, Immanuel Kant, T. S. Eliot, George Dickie, Leo Tolstoy, R. G. Collingwood, Michael H. Mitias, Monroe C. Beardsley, and Abhinavagupta, among others. The book offers a comparative perspective on Indian and Western approaches to the study of art and aesthetics and enables readers to appreciate the similarities and differences between the conceptions of aesthetics and philosophy of art on a comparative scale detailing various aspects of both. The first of its kind, this key text will be useful for scholars and researchers of arts and aesthetics, philosophy of art, cultural studies, comparative literature, and philosophy in general. It will also appeal to general readers interested in the philosophy of art.
Aesthetics and the Revolutionary City: Real and Imagined Havana (Studies of the Americas)
by James Clifford KentAesthetics and the Revolutionary City engages in alternative ways of reading foreign visual representations of Havana through analysis of advertising images, documentary films, and photographic texts. It explores key narratives relating to the projection of different Havana imaginaries and focuses on a range of themes including: pre-revolutionary Cuba; the dream of revolution; and the metaphor of the city “frozen-in-time.” The book also synthesizes contemporary debates regarding the notion of Havana as a real and imagined city space and fleshes out its theoretical insights with a series of stand-alone, important case studies linked to the representation of the Cuban capital in the Western imaginary. The interpretations in the book bring into focus a range of critical historical moments in Cuban history (including the Cuban Revolution and the “Special Period”) and consider the ways in which they have been projected in advertising, documentary film and photography outside the island.
Aesthetics at Large: Volume 1: Art, Ethics, Politics (Art, Ethics, Politics)
by Thierry de DuveImmanuel Kant’s Critique of Judgment, Thierry de Duve argues in the first volume of Aesthetics at Large, is as relevant to the appreciation of art today as it was to the enjoyment of beautiful nature in 1790. Going against the grain of all aesthetic theories situated in the Hegelian tradition, this provocative thesis, which already guided de Duve’s groundbreaking book Kant After Duchamp (1996), is here pursued in order to demonstrate that far from confining aesthetics to a stifling formalism isolated from all worldly concerns, Kant’s guidance urgently opens the understanding of art onto ethics and politics. Central to de Duve’s re-reading of the Critique of Judgment is Kant’s idea of sensus communis, ultimately interpreted as the mere yet necessary idea that human beings are capable of living in peace with one another. De Duve pushes Kant’s skepticism to its limits by submitting the idea of sensus communis to various tests leading to questions such as: Do artists speak on behalf of all of us? Is art the transcendental ground of democracy? Or, Was Adorno right when he claimed that no poetry could be written after Auschwitz? Loaded with de Duve’s trademark blend of wit and erudition and written without jargon, these essays radically renew current approaches to some of the most burning issues raised by modern and contemporary art. They are indispensable reading for anyone with a deep interest in art, art history, or philosophical aesthetics.
The Aesthetics of Democracy
by Craig CarsonThis book offers an original and interdisciplinary interpretation of the relation between aesthetics and modern liberal democracy, uniting the fields of art theory with the democratic political philosophy and modern liberal economic theory. The central argument of the books offers an explanation of the theoretical limitations of the contemporary discourse concerning "political art," while at the same time illustrating historically how the European and American discourse of modern democracy and political economy developed an explicit stance against the conflation of art and politics. Exposing the unstated presuppositions about our modern liberal democracy, Craig Carson opens a new field of inquiry concerning the role of art, media, and televisual "theater" central to modern politics.
The Aesthetics of Hate: Far-Right Intellectuals, Antisemitism, and Gender in 1930s France
by Sandrine SanosThe Aesthetics of Hate examines the writings of a motley collection of interwar far-right French intellectuals, showing that they defined Frenchness in racial, gendered, and sexual terms.
The Aesthetics of Rule and Resistance: Analyzing Political Street Art in Latin America (Protest, Culture & Society #29)
by Lisa BogertsEffective visual communication has become an essential strategy for grassroots political activists, who use images to publicly express resistance and make their claims visible in the struggle for political power. However, this “aesthetics of resistance” is also employed by political and economic elites for their own purposes, making it increasingly difficult to distinguish from the “aesthetics of rule.” Through illuminating case studies of street art in Buenos Aires, Bogotá, Caracas, and Mexico City, The Aesthetics of Rule and Resistance explores the visual strategies of persuasion and meaning-making employed by both rulers and resisters to foster self-legitimization, identification, and mobilization.
The Aesthetics of Rule and Resistance: Analyzing Political Street Art in Latin America (Protest, Culture & Society #29)
by Lisa BogertsEffective visual communication has become an essential strategy for grassroots political activists, who use images to publicly express resistance and make their claims visible in the struggle for political power. However, this “aesthetics of resistance” is also employed by political and economic elites for their own purposes, making it increasingly difficult to distinguish from the “aesthetics of rule.” Through illuminating case studies of street art in Buenos Aires, Bogotá, Caracas, and Mexico City, The Aesthetics of Rule and Resistance explores the visual strategies of persuasion and meaning-making employed by both rulers and resisters to foster self-legitimization, identification, and mobilization.
Æthelflæd: Lady of the Mercians
by Tim ClarksonThis Dark Ages biography chronicles the life of one of the period&’s most famous women: the ruler of Mercia who took England back from the Vikings. At the end of the 9th century, a large part of what is now England was controlled by the Vikings—warlike Scandinavians who had been attacking the British Isles for more than a hundred years. Alfred the Great, king of Wessex, was determined to regain the conquered lands. But when he died in 899 A.D., the task passed to his son Edward. In the early 900s, Edward led a great fight against the Viking armies, assisted by the English rulers of Mercia: Lord Æthelred and his wife Æthelflæd, who was also Edward&’s sister. After her husband&’s death, Æthelflæd ruled Mercia on her own, leading the army to war and working with her brother to achieve their father&’s aims. Known to history as the Lady of the Mercians, she earned a reputation as a capable general who was feared by her enemies. In this authoritative biography, Tim Clarkson tells her remarkable life story from childhood to her vital role in saving England from the Vikings.
Æthelred: The Unready
by Dr Levi RoachAn imaginative reassessment of Æthelred "the Unready," one of medieval England’s most maligned kings and a major Anglo-Saxon figure
Aethelred the Unready: The Failed King (Penguin Monarchs)
by Richard Abels'Æthelred's reign of nearly thirty-eight years was the longest of any Anglo-Saxon ruler. If he had died in AD 1000, history would have remembered him more kindly'Few monarchs of the Middle Ages have had a worse popular reputation than Æthelred II, 'the Unready', remembered as the king who lost England to Viking invaders. But, as Richard Abels shows, the failure to defend his realm was not entirely his alone. Æthelred was in many ways an innovative ruler but one whose challenges - a divided court, a fragile nascent kingdom, a voracious, hydra-headed enemy - were ultimately too great to overcome.
The Affair (The Strangers and Brothers Novels)
by C.P. SnowAn academic is accused of fraud in this novel set in 1950s England by &“an extremely shrewd observer of men and society&” (Commentary). At Lewis Eliot&’s Cambridge college, Dr. Donald Howard is not well liked. Some believe his research to be subpar, and his far-left politics off-putting. So no one much mourns when Howard is fired for committing academic fraud. Eliot, though, is disturbed when new information seems to throw doubt on the don&’s guilt, dividing the fellows against each other and compelling Eliot to prevent a possible miscarriage of justice. This suspenseful story is by the Booker Prize finalist and winner of the James Tait Black Memorial Award for Fiction. &“Lionel Trilling has spoken of the job the contemporary novelist does of &‘telling us the way things are&’: The Affair is only the latest evidence to confirm that this is a job at which C. P. Snow excels.&” —Commentary &“A master craftsman.&” —The New York Times
Affairs of China: A Survey of the Recent History and Present Circumstances of the Republic of China
by Eric TeichmanFirst published in 1938, this book aims to be a ‘true and objective’ account of China’s recent history and its present circumstances at the time, drawing on the author’s thirty years of experience as a member of the British consular service in China. The recurrent themes of the period are examined: the efforts of the Chinese leadership to build a new China out of the ruins of the old, their efforts to claim a place of equality among the nations of the world, and the development of the conflict between a resurgent China and the ambitions of Japan. Some of the issues studied were in the process of change and others definitely closed by war — nearly all were affected to some degree.
Affairs Of Honor: National Politics In The New Republic
by Joanne B. FreemanIn this extraordinary book, Joanne Freeman offers a major reassessment of political culture in the early years of the American republic. By exploring both the public actions and private papers of key figures such as Thomas Jefferson, Aaron Burr, and Alexander Hamilton, Freeman reveals an alien and profoundly unstable political world grounded on the code of honor. In the absence of a party system and with few examples to guide America's experiment in republican governance, the rituals and rhetoric of honor provided ground rules for political combat. Gossip, print warfare, and dueling were tools used to jostle for status and form alliances in an otherwise unstructured political realm. These political weapons were all deployed in the tumultuous presidential election of 1800--an event that nearly toppled the new republic. By illuminating this culture of honor, Freeman offers new understandings of some of the most perplexing events of early American history, including the notorious duel between Burr and Hamilton. A major reconsideration of early American politics, Affairs of Honor offers a profoundly human look at the anxieties and political realities of leaders struggling to define themselves and their role in the new nation.
Affairs of State
by Jennifer LewisAmerican RoyaltyFirst she discovers she's the secret daughter of the American president, then she falls for a British prince. Ariella Winthrop's life can't get much more complicated. Or can it?Having fun with Simon Worth-passionate meetings, hiding their attraction from the public-is one thing. But getting serious? The British monarchy certainly doesn't want their beloved prince dating an American, much less one with her fair share of scandals. But when Ariella discovers she's pregnant with a royal baby, all bets are off. This woman is fighting for what is hers.
Affect and American Literature in the Age of Neoliberalism
by Rachel Greenwald SmithRachel Greenwald Smith's Affect and American Literature in the Age of Neoliberalism examines the relationship between American literature and politics in the twentieth- and twenty-first centuries. Smith contends that the representation of emotions in contemporary fiction emphasizes the personal lives of characters at a time when there is an unprecedented, and often damaging, focus on the individual in American life. Through readings of works by Paul Auster, Karen Tei Yamashita, Ben Marcus, Lydia Millet, and others who stage experiments in the relationship between feeling and form, Smith argues for the centrality of a counter-tradition in contemporary literature concerned with impersonal feelings: feelings that challenge the neoliberal notion that emotions are the property of the self.
Affect and Belonging in Political Uses of the Past
by David Farrell-BanksAffect and Belonging in Political Uses of the Past examines key political events of the past decade, to analyse the relationship between the representation of certain pasts in ‘official’ heritage settings and the use of the same pasts in political discourse. Drawing on data gathered from museums, heritage sites, news articles, political speeches, manifestos, and through digital media such as Twitter, Farrell-Banks demonstrates how a connection with a shared past can move people emotionally and give them the confidence to engage in political action. The book considers how heritage and the past moves in time and space, examining how it shapes political beliefs and action in the present. The work is a timely intervention, calling attention to the political responsibilities that come with heritage work, when these same languages of heritage are adopted to promote a politics of division. Introducing the concept of the ‘moving moment’, a framework by which to research and understand uses of the past, the book demonstrates how the past becomes a potent political tool. Combining critical heritage studies, critical discourse, memory studies and political theory, the book demonstrates new approaches to interdisciplinary studies within heritage. Affect and Belonging in Political Uses of the Past will thus be essential reading for academics and students engaged in the study of heritage, memory, politics, history and media.
Affect, Gender and Sexuality in Latin America (Gender, Development and Social Change)
by Cecilia Macón Mariela Solana Nayla Luz VacarezzaThis book emphasizes the significance of affects, feelings and emotions in how we think about politics, gender and sexuality in Latin America. Considering the complex and even contradictory social processes that the region is experiencing today, many Latin American authors are turning to affect to find a key to understand our present situation, to revisit our history, and to imagine new possibilities for the future. This tendency has shown such a specificity and sometimes departure from northern productions that it compels us to focus more deeply on its own arguments, methods, and critical contributions. This volume features essays that explore the particularities of Latin American ways of thinking about affect and how they can shed new light into our understanding of, gender, sexuality and politics.
The Affected Teacher: Psychosocial Perspectives on Professional Experience and Policy Resistance
by Alex MooreAt a time when teaching and learning policy too often presents itself in a simplistic input-output language of measurable targets and objectives, The Affected Teacher explores the role played by emotionality in how professional life is experienced by school teachers. The book argues that, in the very highly organised and structured social spaces of public institutions, emotionality - or, more precisely, all that is included in the concept of ‘affect’ - needs to be recognised and validated, rather than ignored or pathologised. It explores how neoliberal education policy seeks to mould professional subjectivities, relationships and practices; how teachers experience and ‘manage’ their feelings; and the role that affect plays in guiding either compliance with or resistance to often unpopular policy directives. Drawing on a rich body of original data comprising formal and informal discussions with a range of teachers, the case is argued for psychoanalytically and politically informed individual and group reflexivity, both as a form of professional and personal development and as a way of keeping alive alternative beliefs and understandings regarding the purposes of education. The Affected Teacher is relevant to practising schoolteachers and to undergraduate and graduate students and academics involved in education related courses such as policy studies, education management and the sociology of education, as well as disciplines related to psychosocial studies and psychoanalysis.
Affecting Change: Social Workers in the Political Arena
by Karen S. Haynes James S. MickelsonUpdated to reflect advances in a changing political arena of Obama's administration, this revision shows students how to develop political action skills and to take advantage of the opportunity of change. This practical, step-by-step guide focuses on advocacy as the central mission of social work practice. New material and 17 new personal scenarios involving social workers who have made a difference-senators, representatives, and officials in the political arena-serve to inspire students. Revised chapters show how social work skills can be most effective, whether by impacting the political arena as a social worker or running for office.
Affections: A Novel
by Rodrigo Hasbún Sophie HughesA haunting novel about an unusual family’s breakdown—set in South America during the time of Che Guevara and inspired by the life of Third Reich cinematographer Hans Ertl—from the literary star Jonathan Safran Foer calls, “a great writer.”Inspired by real events, Affections is the story of the eccentric, fascinating Ertl clan, headed by the egocentric and extraordinary Hans, once the cameraman for the Nazi propagandist Leni Riefenstahl. Shortly after the end of World War II, Hans and his family flee to Bolivia to start over. There, the ever-restless Hans decides to embark on an expedition in search of the fabled lost Inca city of Paitití, enlisting two of his daughters to join him on his outlandish quest into the depths of the Amazon, with disastrous consequences. Set against the backdrop of the both optimistic and violent 1950s and 1960s, Affections traces the Ertls’s slow and inevitable breakdown through the various erratic trajectories of each family member: Hans’s undertakings of colossal, foolhardy projects and his subsequent spectacular failures; his daughter Monika, heir to his adventurous spirit, who joins the Bolivian Marxist guerrillas and becomes known as “Che Guevara’s avenger”; and his wife and two younger sisters left to pick up the pieces in their wake. In this short but powerful work, Hasbún weaves a masterfully layered tale of how a family’s voyage of discovery ends up eroding the affections that once held it together.