Jane Forsey
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- May 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199964369
- eISBN:
- 9780199333233
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199964369.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Aesthetics, General
This book offers the first full treatment of design in the field of philosophical aesthetics. Aesthetic theory has traditionally occupied itself with fine art in all its forms, sometimes with craft, ...
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This book offers the first full treatment of design in the field of philosophical aesthetics. Aesthetic theory has traditionally occupied itself with fine art in all its forms, sometimes with craft, and often with notions of beauty and sublimity in art and nature. In so doing, it has largely ignored the quotidian and familiar objects and experiences that make up our daily lives. Yet how we interact with design involves aesthetic choices and judgements as well as practical, cognitive and moral considerations. This work challenges the discipline to broaden its scope to include design, and illustrates how aesthetics helps define our human concerns. Subjecting design to as rigorous a treatment as any other aesthetic object exposes it to three main challenges that form the core of this book. First, design must be distinguished from art and craft as a unique kind of object meriting separate philosophical attention, and is here defined in part by its functional qualities. Second, the experience of design must be defended as having a particularly aesthetic nature. Here Forsey adapts the Kantian notion of dependent beauty to provide a model for our appreciation of design as different from our judgments of art, craft and natural beauty. Finally, design is important for aesthetics and philosophy as a whole in that it is implicated in broader human concerns. Forsey situates her theory of design as a constructive contribution to the recent movement of Everyday Aesthetics, which seeks to re-enfranchise philosophical aesthetics as an important part of philosophy at large.Less
This book offers the first full treatment of design in the field of philosophical aesthetics. Aesthetic theory has traditionally occupied itself with fine art in all its forms, sometimes with craft, and often with notions of beauty and sublimity in art and nature. In so doing, it has largely ignored the quotidian and familiar objects and experiences that make up our daily lives. Yet how we interact with design involves aesthetic choices and judgements as well as practical, cognitive and moral considerations. This work challenges the discipline to broaden its scope to include design, and illustrates how aesthetics helps define our human concerns. Subjecting design to as rigorous a treatment as any other aesthetic object exposes it to three main challenges that form the core of this book. First, design must be distinguished from art and craft as a unique kind of object meriting separate philosophical attention, and is here defined in part by its functional qualities. Second, the experience of design must be defended as having a particularly aesthetic nature. Here Forsey adapts the Kantian notion of dependent beauty to provide a model for our appreciation of design as different from our judgments of art, craft and natural beauty. Finally, design is important for aesthetics and philosophy as a whole in that it is implicated in broader human concerns. Forsey situates her theory of design as a constructive contribution to the recent movement of Everyday Aesthetics, which seeks to re-enfranchise philosophical aesthetics as an important part of philosophy at large.
Yuriko Saito
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- September 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780823254491
- eISBN:
- 9780823261185
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fordham/9780823254491.003.0003
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Science
Yuriko Saito argues for the broadening of environmental aesthetics’ scope from natural environments to mixed environments such as gardens, agricultural landscapes, urban environments, and its further ...
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Yuriko Saito argues for the broadening of environmental aesthetics’ scope from natural environments to mixed environments such as gardens, agricultural landscapes, urban environments, and its further expansion to include what Saito has called ‘everyday aesthetics’, i.e., all those ingredients that constitute our spatial environments, namely artefacts, human activities, and social relationships. The environment understood in this widest sense shapes the state of the world and the quality of life. Aesthetics plays a crucial, although often unrecognized, role in this ongoing world-making project, for better or worse. Environmental aesthetics can help cultivate aesthetic literacy so that we become aware of the power wielded by aesthetics, but it can also help to find ways of guiding aesthetically motivated decisions and actions toward better world-making.Less
Yuriko Saito argues for the broadening of environmental aesthetics’ scope from natural environments to mixed environments such as gardens, agricultural landscapes, urban environments, and its further expansion to include what Saito has called ‘everyday aesthetics’, i.e., all those ingredients that constitute our spatial environments, namely artefacts, human activities, and social relationships. The environment understood in this widest sense shapes the state of the world and the quality of life. Aesthetics plays a crucial, although often unrecognized, role in this ongoing world-making project, for better or worse. Environmental aesthetics can help cultivate aesthetic literacy so that we become aware of the power wielded by aesthetics, but it can also help to find ways of guiding aesthetically motivated decisions and actions toward better world-making.
