Art and negative affect
Philosophy Compass 4 (1):39-55 (2009)
| Abstract | Why do people seemingly want to be scared by movies and feel pity for fictional characters when they avoid situations in real life that arouse these same negative emotions? Although the domain of relevant artworks encompasses far more than just tragedy, the general problem is typically called the paradox of tragedy. The paradox boils down to a simple question: If people avoid pain then why do people want to experience art that is painful? I discuss six popular solutions to the paradox: conversion, control, compensatory, meta-response, catharsis, and rich experience theories. | |||||||||
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Aaron Smuts (2011). The Feels Good Theory of Pleasure. Philosophical Studies 155 (2):241-265.
Rocco J. Gennaro (2000). Fiction, Pleasurable Tragedy, and the HOT Theory of Consciousness. Philosophical Papers 29 (2):107-20.
Aaron Smuts (2008). The Desire-Frustration Theory of Suspense. Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 66 (3):281-291.
Bernard E. Whitley (2001). Gender Differences in Affective Responses to Having Cheated: The Mediating Role of Attitudes. Ethics and Behavior 11 (3):249 – 259.
Aaron Smuts (2009). The Paradox of Suspense. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy 2009 (6.1):1-15.
Aaron Smuts (2007). The Paradox of Painful Art. Journal of Aesthetic Education 41 (3):59-77.
Anton Kühberger, Christa Großbichler & Angelika Wimmer (2011). Counterfactual Closeness and Predicted Affect. Thinking and Reasoning 17 (2):137 - 155.
Aaron Smuts (2011). Rubber Ring: Why Do We Listen to Sad Songs? In John Gibson & Noel Carroll (eds.), Narrative, Emotion, and Insight. Penn State UP.
Richard Shusterman (2000). Performing Live: Aesthetic Alternatives for the Ends of Art. Cornell University Press.
Aaron Smuts (2012). Popular Art. In The Continuum Companion to Aesthetics. Continuum.
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