scholarly journals A Reading of Community

2021 ◽  
Vol 70 (3) ◽  
pp. 57-72
Author(s):  
Nina Seiler
Keyword(s):  
Philosophical Writing ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
Affective Interaction ◽  
Ground Line

The thinking about the idea, forms and practices of communitas has developed a specific discourse in political philosophical writing since the 1980s. This paper retraces the ways in which Jean-Luc Nancy established a “community of writing [and] the writing of community,” how in his view community compears with philosophical writing. Taking Nancy’s discussion as a ground line, the author modulates the perspective on writing—as both text and practice—and focuses on the confrontation with community in reading. By poetologically tackling Nancy’s essay “The Confronted Community” (2001), she investigates into the text’s performing of community and the affective interaction between text and corporeality. Her reading of Nancy’s writing thus activates not only its ecstatic valences leading towards the proposed community of those who have no community; it also uncovers the aesthetic, social and political implications that emanate from Nancy’s writing in this situated reading. Therefore, this paper analytically retraces the textual micro-performances of community in writing as a performative confrontation entailed in reading.

Untimely Love: The Aesthetics and Politics of Anachronism in The Age of Innocence

2020 ◽  
Vol 53 (2) ◽  
pp. 254-273
Author(s):  
John Sampson
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Aesthetics And Politics ◽  
Free Love ◽  
Central Park ◽  
Metropolitan Museum Of Art ◽  
Modern Novel ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
The Age Of Innocence ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
Emma Goldman

Abstract “Untimely Love” reassesses the aesthetic choices and political implications of Edith Wharton's The Age of Innocence (1920), first by highlighting a surprising overlap between Wharton and the anarcho-feminist Emma Goldman. Wharton's novelistic critique of New York society's marriage rituals, spurred by an unconsummated affair between Newland Archer and his wife's cousin Ellen Olenska, follows Goldman in positing an antagonism between the hierarchies of marriage and the equalizing nature of love. For Wharton, however, this antagonism will not be resolved with free love one day triumphing. To explain her position, the article turns to Jacques Rancière's unresolvable antagonism between “politics” and “the police,” which has an aesthetic analogue in the clash between the formally anarchic modern novel and premodern hierarchies of genre. Wharton unearths 1870s New York like an archeologist to expose how its patriarchal logic polices women's sexuality within and outside marriage, making expressions of love quite rare. Wharton unleashes the disruptive power of love through formal experimentation, temporarily subverting her own historical realism, when she has Ellen and Archer visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Central Park, which did not yet exist in the novel's timeframe. The Met's impossible location and its uncataloged holdings open to public viewing upset New York's social and aesthetic hierarchies. It is in this anachronistic and democratic context that Archer first sees “love visible” in the world, rearranging his entire worldview. Wharton, in a related political gesture of aesthetic dissensus, aligns her untimely lovers with the museum's suddenly visible ghosts of history.

scholarly journals The co-optation of sensibility and the subversion of beauty

2015 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 9-26
Author(s):  
Arnold Berleant
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
Aesthetic Judgment ◽  
Social Analysis ◽  
Sense Experience ◽  
Political Criticism ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
Aesthetic Sensibility ◽  
Mass Marketing ◽  
Ethical Significance

The aesthetic analysis of everyday life has developed an important body of work whose significance extends beyond the academy. Because of its ubiquity in experience, aesthetic sensibility has many manifestations, both overt and concealed. This paper examines some largely hidden ways in which taste and aesthetic judgment, which are manifested in sense experience, have been subtly appropriated and exploited. I identify and describe such procedures as the cooptation (or appropriation) of aesthetic sensibility, a phenomenon that has consequences damaging to health, to society, and to environment. These practices are a form of negative aesthetics that distorts and manipulates sensible experience in the interest of mass marketing and political control. Such practices have great ethical significance and carry social and political implications that suggest another role for aesthetics, a critical one: aesthetics as an instrument of emancipation in social analysis and political criticism.

Kinesthetic Empathy in Sergei Eisenstein’s Film Theory

2020 ◽  
pp. 175-235
Author(s):  
Ana Hedberg Olenina
Keyword(s):  
William James ◽  
Film Theory ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Psychological Theories ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Soviet Psychology ◽  
Kinesthetic Empathy ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
The 19Th Century ◽  
The Brain

Chapter 4 explores Sergei Eisenstein’s theory of the audience’s corporeal empathy, evoked by actors’ movements and graphical, nonhuman “gestures”—that is, “movements” implied by the structure of the shot composition, editing, and other formal devices. In scrutinizing Eisenstein’s theory that spectatorship is, fundamentally, an enactive experience, this chapter traces the roots of his ideas and evaluates the aesthetic and political implications of his position. First, I analyze the filmmaker’s engagement with psychological theories of William James, William Carpenter, Vladimir Bekhterev, Alexander Luria, and Lev Vygotsky, as well as the 19th-century German theorists of empathy (Einfühlung). Special attention is devoted to one of Eisenstein’s major sources: Vladimir Bekhterev’s Collective Reflexology (1921), a seminal work of early Soviet psychology, which discussed nonverbal communication in crowds and argued that the processing of visual sensations by the brain instantaneously impacts motor networks. I argue that although Eisenstein’s model of spectatorship appears manipulative, it is also potentially emancipatory. Embracing the utopian spirit of the avant-garde, he was willing to subject himself and his audience to radical experimentation aimed at testing the sensory properties of cinema and demystifying the mass production of emotions.

scholarly journals Nothingness in motion: Theorizing Bruce Lee’s action aesthetics

2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 362-380
Author(s):  
Wayne Wong
Keyword(s):  
Chinese Culture ◽  
Cultural Significance ◽  
Kung Fu ◽  
Bruce Lee ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Chinese Aesthetics ◽  
Global Action ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
Action Cinema ◽  
Shed Light

This article argues that Bruce Lee revolutionized kung fu cinema not only by increasing its authenticity and combativity but also by revealing its inherent connection to wuyi (武意), or martial ideation. Martial ideation refers to a specific negotiation of action and stasis in martial arts performance which contains a powerful overflow of emotion in tranquility. Since the early 1970s, Bruce Lee’s kung fu films have been labeled “chop-socky,” offering only fleeting visual and visceral pleasures. Subsequently, several studies explored the cultural significance and political implications of Lee’s films. However, not much attention has been paid to their aesthetic composition—in particular, how cinematic kung fu manifests Chinese aesthetics and philosophy on choreographic, cinematographic, and narrative levels. In Lee’s films, the concept of martial ideation is embodied in the Daoist notion of wu (nothingness), a metaphysical void that is invisible, nameless, and formless. Through a close reading of Laozi’s Daodejing (道德經), it is possible to discover two traits of nothingness—namely, reversal and return—which are characteristics of Lee’s representation of martial ideation. The former refers to a paradigmatic shift from concreteness to emptiness, while the latter makes such a shift reversible and perennial via the motif of circularity. The discussion focuses on films in which Lee’s creative influence is clearly discernible, such as Fist of Fury (1972), The Way of the Dragon (1972), and the surviving footage intended for The Game of Death featured in Bruce Lee: A Warrior’s Journey (2000). These films shed light on the complicated relationship between the cinematic (action and stasis), the martial (Jeet Kune Do), the aesthetic (ideation), and the philosophical (Daoism). The goal is to stimulate a more balanced discussion of Lee’s films both from the perspective of global action cinema and Chinese culture.

scholarly journals OF APPEARANCE AND DISAPPEARANCE: THEATRE AND BARCELONA (CATALUNYA INVISIBLE, PART II)

2004 ◽  
Vol 18 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 161-177
Author(s):  
Sharon G. Feldman
Keyword(s):  
Sense Of Self ◽  
Self Identity ◽  
Paradoxical Phenomenon ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Rhetorical Figure ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The City ◽  
New Millennium

The relationship between place and stage, and between landscape and theatre, can be enormously revealing in terms of a playwright’s sense of self, identity, and culture. During the decades of the 1980s and 1990s, a paradoxical phenomenon occurred whereby the city of Barcelona —or Catalunya, for that matter— as an image, notion, rhetorical figure, or poetic trope seemed to have all but vanished from the contemporary Catalan stage (specifically, from the realm of text-based drama). In the new millennium, however, Barcelona is gradually becoming visible on the stage once again. The three contemporary playwrights examined here —Josep Maria Benet i Jornet, Llüisa Cunillé, and Sergi Belbel— have all displayed an awareness of the aesthetic and political implications of a dialectic of visibility and invisibility, appearance and disappearance.

Un-fixing Baker: Against a Criticism of Stasis

2014 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 62-79 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie Townsend
Keyword(s):  
Critical Approach ◽  
Counter Narrative ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Methodological Problems ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
Josephine Baker

Much of the biographical and critical work on Josephine Baker seeks to recuperate Baker from discursive and visual layers of racialized colonial vestments and proposes to repair her story by putting Baker in the role of agent. This locks Baker into a counter-narrative that minimizes the complexity and context of her performances; arguably, these methods lose sight of the aesthetic and political implications of a dancing body that incorporated and put into motion wildly disparate elements and influences. The methodological problems posed by the nature of Baker's work present an opportunity to develop a critical approach that resists fixity in favor of mobility. Methodologies that sustain discursive mobility will equip our critical work to engage with the aesthetic production of the dancing body. In the case of Baker and perhaps more widely, we might draw upon emerging methods that shift critical foci from solid arguments to mobile analyses.

scholarly journals Reflections on Immediatism and Aesthetics

eTopia ◽  
2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victor Cirone
Keyword(s):  
Technological Development ◽  
Felix Guattari ◽  
Final Part ◽  
Artistic Practice ◽  
Ancient India ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Musical Traditions ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
Musical Forms

This paper considers the aesthetic and political implications of Hakim Bey’s (also known as Peter Lamborn Wilson) Immediatist project. The paper begins with a discussion of the cosmogonic notions of Chaos and nothing that Bey adopts in his work and explores the ways in which these notions are foundational to his concept of Ontological Anarchy. It is then explained how, through indiscriminately drawing on a variety of mystical and magical traditions (from those of Pagan Greece and Ancient India to the contemporary Western Occult world) Immediatism aims to establish an experiential foundation for the reality of interdependent non-dual wholeness. In order to advance Bey’s critique of ‘the sleep of Order’, pathological (calculative) reason, and Western technological development, his work is brought into dialogue with that of schizoanalyst and philosopher Felix Guattari. The final part of this paper discusses the implications of Bey’s Immediatist project for contemporary artistic practice, with special emphasis placed on musical forms and the possibility of reviving Occidental sacred musical traditions. KEYWORDS: Hakim Bey, Peter Lamborn Wilson, Felix Guattari, Chaos, Nothing, Ontological Anarchy 

scholarly journals The Ocular Turn, Misty Poetry, and a Postrevolutionary Imagination

Prism ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 62-84
Author(s):  
Xiaobing Tang
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Revolution ◽  
The Political ◽  
Young Generation ◽  
Chinese Poetry ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
New Generation ◽  
Post Cultural Revolution ◽  
Bei Dao ◽  
Contemporary Chinese

Abstract “The Answer,” a poem by Bei Dao first published in 1978, marks the emergence of a defiant voice in contemporary Chinese poetry and asserts skepticism as the political stance of a young generation in post–Cultural Revolution China. It also heralds a historic transition from an era of sonic agitation to an aesthetics based on visual perception and contemplation. This rereading of Bei Dao's canonical poem and other related texts goes back to the late 1970s, when the political implications of the human senses were firmly grasped and heatedly debated. The author shows that an ocular turn occurs in “The Answer” and drives the aesthetic as well as political pursuits of a new generation of poets. He further argues that, in a moment still enthralled with a revolutionary sonic culture, Misty poetry disavowed aural excitement and was part of the reconditioning of the human senses in preparation for a postrevolutionary order and sensibility.

Candid Conversations: Black Women Political Elites and Appearances

Sister Style ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 75-94
Author(s):  
Nadia E. Brown ◽  
Danielle Casarez Lemi
Keyword(s):  
Black Women ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
Women Candidates ◽  
Aesthetic Experiences ◽  
Age Cohorts ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Action Committee ◽  
Political Office ◽  
The Aesthetic

This chapter showcases how conversations are a generative tool to assess the differences and similarities in the aesthetic experiences of Black women political elites. The authors partnered with the Black Women’s Political Action Committee of Texas to provide the first ever scholarly focus group with Black women political elites. Through an organic conversation, they found that Black women candidates and elected officials face challenges from others, including fellow Black women, about how they choose to present themselves for political office. The authors documented generational splits in how age cohorts of Black women decide to style themselves and the political implications of these choices. Most notably, Millennial Black women political elites detailed discrimination and hostilities based on their styling preferences, often at the hands of older Black women.

A Thousand Suns: Traversing the Archive and Transforming Documentary in Mati Diop's Mille Soleils

2016 ◽  
Vol 70 (1) ◽  
pp. 85-95
Author(s):  
James S. Williams
Keyword(s):  
Original Form ◽  
Specific Context ◽  
African Cinema ◽  
Found Footage ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Documentary Fiction ◽  
The Rich ◽  
New Vision ◽  
The Aesthetic

This article explores the aesthetic and political implications of the 2013 experimental short Mille Soleils (A Thousand Suns) by the Franco-Senegalese director Mati Diop. Placing it within the specific context of Djibril Diop Mambety's legendary 1973 feature, Touki Bouki, which it references directly, the article reveals how Diop (Mambety's niece) crafts an urgent, sensuous, and highly original form of documentary fiction that draws on, and extends, the historical impurity of African documentary. By plugging into the rich intertextual imaginary of cinema and engaging poetically with notions of found footage and the everyday (including that of Touki-Bouki's main actor, Magaye Niang, still living in Dakar forty years later), Mille Soleils, as Williams argues, produces an inclusive wide frame open simultaneously to the personal and historical, social and political. In the process, it both projects a new vision of documentary form and reconceives the very nature of the archive in African cinema.

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