The Literary Geography of İstanbul and the Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar in the Framework of the Narration and Tourism Relationship

This chapter aims to evaluate the works made under the title “the literary geography of İstanbul” concerning literary tourism in the activities carried out by the Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar Research and Application Centre regarding Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar and the novel Huzur. In this framework, the author examines the tourist experiences of literary tourists in actual and fictitious localities, their psycho-aesthetic experiences, the relationships they build with the city, the method used by the research center in these touristic activities, as well as the consequences of these experiences for literary tourism. The potential of Turkish literature in determining the future of cultural tourism and literary tourism will also be evaluated.

Tesori di arte sacra a Venezia e Padova nelle descrizioni dei viaggiatori polacchi del XVIII secolo

In the 18th century, Italian sanctuaries played an important religious and cultural role, especially in Venice and Padua. They were visited by Polish wanderers during their trips around Europe, for example: diplomatic missions, pilgrimages, educational or tourist trips. They recorded their impressions from visiting these places in the form of descriptions in diaries, journals and itineraries. Reading the reports from the expeditions provides valuable insights on the mentality, customs of upbringing, as well as the religious and aesthetic experiences of eighteenth-century adventurers. The article aims to present the ways in which the collections of sacred art were perceived by Polish travelers from the 18th century. The analysis of their accounts, especially the fragments concerning the sanctuaries in Venice and Padua, will serve to present the literary covenants used by Polish wanderers. It should also answer the questions which tendencies dominated in the travel literature of that time, what phrases and formulations were used, and what items were paid special attention to.

On the Neuronal Dynamics of Aesthetic Experience: Evidence from Electroencephalographic Oscillatory Dynamics

Aesthetic experiences have an influence on many aspects of life. Interest in the neural basis of aesthetic experiences has grown rapidly in the past decade, and fMRI studies have identified several brain systems supporting aesthetic experiences. Work on the rapid neuronal dynamics of aesthetic experience, however, is relatively scarce. This study adds to this field by investigating the experience of being aesthetically moved by means of ERP and time–frequency analysis. Participants' electroencephalography (EEG) was recorded while they viewed a diverse set of artworks and evaluated the extent to which these artworks moved them. Results show that being aesthetically moved is associated with a sustained increase in gamma activity over centroparietal regions. In addition, alpha power over right frontocentral regions was reduced in high- and low-moving images, compared to artworks given intermediate ratings. We interpret the gamma effect as an indication for sustained savoring processes for aesthetically moving artworks compared to aesthetically less-moving artworks. The alpha effect is interpreted as an indication of increased attention for aesthetically salient images. In contrast to previous works, we observed no significant effects in any of the established ERP components, but we did observe effects at latencies longer than 1 sec. We conclude that EEG time–frequency analysis provides useful information on the neuronal dynamics of aesthetic experience.

Introduction

The introduction orients readers to the aesthetic dimensions of biblical poems and argues that poems as verbal arts are not reducible to rhetoric or a single “message” but rather operate with an excess of meaning that both involves and transcends semantic content. It suggests that biblical poems can be fruitfully examined by considering what kinds of aesthetic experiences they offer. It draws on the work of Alva Noë and Susan Sontag to offer an embodied description of the intellectual work that poems can accomplish as art. The introduction also provides a succinct overview of its chapters.

An Invitation to Biblical Poetry

An Invitation to Biblical Poetry is an accessibly written introduction to biblical poetry that emphasizes the aesthetic dimensions of poems and their openness to varieties of context. It demonstrates the irreducible complexity of poetry as a verbal art and considers the intellectual work poems accomplish as they offer aesthetic experiences to people who read or hear them. Chapters walk the reader through some of the diverse ways biblical poems are organized through techniques of voicing, lineation, and form, and describe how the poems’ figures are both culturally and historically bound and dependent on later reception. The discussions consider examples from different texts of the Bible, including poems inset in prose narratives, prophecies, psalms, and wisdom literature. Each chapter ends with a reading of a psalm that offers an acute example of the dimension under discussion. Students and general readers are invited to richer and deeper readings of ancient poems and the subjects, problems, and convictions that occupy their imagination.

READING SĪTĀ’S LETTER ON OLD JAVANESE RĀMĀYAṆA KAKAWIN ON THE BASIS OF CANDRAKIRAṆA AS PROSODIC TREATISE

The study presented in this article focuses on the signification of the poetic metres and the theory of rasa expounded in Candrakiraṇa, a guide to the composition of kakawin that is preserved in the scriptoriums of mountains. The use of the poetic metres and theory of rasa was examined in the text of Sītā’s letter to Rāma that was taken from the Rāmāyaṇa Kakawin. It was carried out on the three manuscripts of Candrakiraṇa preserved by the National Library of Indonesia (PNRI). The findings show that the use of śārdūlawikriḍita metre in Sītā’s letters results in a form of signification for particular aesthetic experiences (rasa), namely karuṇa (sympathy), bhayānaka (concern), śānta (peace) and śṛṅgara (love). Tulisan ini berfokus pada metrum dan teori rasa sebagai sarana pemaknaan yang dimuat dalam Candrakiraṇa, sebuah pedoman penulisan kakawin yang diwariskan di skriptorium-skriptorium pegunungan. Metrum dan teori rasa tersebut dikaji penggunaannya dalam surat Sītā kepada Rāma yang terkandung dalam Kakawin Rāmāyaṇa. Kajian ini melibatkan tiga manuskrip yang merupakan koleksi Perpustakaan Nasional Republik Indonesia. Hasil analisis menunjukkan bahwa metrum śārdūlawikriḍita yang digunakan pada surat Sīta menunjukkan bentuk pemaknaan untuk pengalaman-pengalaman estetika (rasa) tertentu, yaitu karuṇa (belas kasihan), bhayānaka (kekhawatiran), śānta (damai) dan śṛṅgara (cinta).

Aesthetic appraisals of literary style and emotional intensity in narrative engagement are neurally dissociable

Humans are deeply affected by stories, yet it is unclear how. In this study, we explored two aspects of aesthetic experiences during narrative engagement - literariness and narrative fluctuations in appraised emotional intensity. Independent ratings of literariness and emotional intensity of two literary stories were used to predict blood-oxygen-level-dependent signal changes in 52 listeners from an existing fMRI dataset. Literariness was associated with increased activation in brain areas linked to semantic integration (left angular gyrus, supramarginal gyrus, and precuneus), and decreased activation in bilateral middle temporal cortices, associated with semantic representations and word memory. Emotional intensity correlated with decreased activation in a bilateral frontoparietal network that is often associated with controlled attention. Our results confirm a neural dissociation in processing literary form and emotional content in stories and generate new questions about the function of and interaction between attention, social cognition, and semantic systems during literary engagement and aesthetic experiences.

THE ART INCULTURATION OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH OF THE SACRED HEART OF JESUS GANJURAN AND ITS IMPLICATIONS ON THE SPIRITUALITY OF THE PEOPLE

The connection between art and religion is found in several places. The Catholic Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus Ganjuran, Yogyakarta is proof of the cohesion between art and religion in Indonesia. Inculturation is the process of adapting Catholic teachings with local culture, one of which is with art. This study aims to describe the cultural unquenching that occurred in the Catholic Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus Ganjuran Yogyakarta and its implications on the spirituality of the people. This study uses descriptive qualitative methods with phenomenological approaches. The results showed that the inculturation that occurred resulted in a variety of art activities and art artifacts including Javanese liturgy, liturgical gamelan, Javanese architecture such as pendopo (Javanese pavilion), Javanese versions of Jesus and Mary statues and temples. The spirituality of the people is awakened with the concept of Java which is thick in its worship. Liturgical gamelan is one of the integral components in worship that makes a bond as man's sacred activity with God. The contemporary aspect can be seen from the gamelan classical rules that combine with the choir that forms a new aesthetic. It can touch the people in feeling the presence of God through local culture. The cohesiveness of the value of art and religion can stimulate people to experience the same religious and aesthetic experiences in worship.

An Early Framework for a Cognitive Neuroscience of Visual Aesthetics

In the early 2000s, no framework within which to investigate the biology of aesthetics had been articulated. The author believes that a componential framework, as was common in cognitive psychology, applied to neuroaesthetics made sense. Such frameworks were commonly applied to complex cognitive domains, such as in language, emotion processing, or visual processing research. As such, the author proposes a “box and arrow” model which incorporated levels of visual processing, emotions, attention, and decision-making. The advantage of such a framework is that specific experiments could be placed in the context of testing hypotheses of parts of a larger system deployed for aesthetic processing. The framework has held up well over the years, although the author believes he did not sufficiently emphasize the role of the motor system and the rich contribution of semantics in aesthetic experiences.